The couple had a splendid life together. They married at the age of thirty, and not long after, their son was born. They became a picture-perfect English family: decent house, cheerful neighbours, and enough money tucked away to buy a nice flat in Manchester and turn their country cottage just outside the Cotswolds into a model of cosy British comfortcentral heating, Aga in the kitchen, even underfloor heating. They jetted off on holidays to places with warmer beer and questionable sun cream. Her husband was loyal as a golden retriever, and she never gave a thought to any other men.
Their son grew up and, as young English chaps do, promptly married a sweet girl, both of them just past twenty. Its like me and my husband, only a decade sooner, she beamed, hearing wedding bells in her head. The proud parents bought the newlyweds a petite London flatwell, bijou as the estate agents put it.
Life seemed, on the whole, to be behaving itself. Yet as the years trickled on, perhaps with age or just a British sense that if things are too pleasant, disaster is lurking behind the next Tesco carrier bag, she grew unreasonably nervous. Surely life couldnt just carry on behaving…
Eventually, the inevitable. Her husband passed away.
It took her ages and a few too many cups of tea to recover. Bit by bit, she stitched her life back together. Before, she’d been a housewife, but nowinto the rat race she went.
Everyone was adamant: Sort out the inheritance, love. Off she trotted, son in tow, to the solicitor. Frankly, she never quite understood all the fusssurely half belonged to her, half to her late husband, end of story. There were no mysterious relativesher in-laws had long since shuffled off their mortal coil.
The solicitor welcomed them in. There, at the table, sat a total stranger.
Her husbands share of the estate had been left to this woman.
She gawped at the solicitor, then at the unknown intruder. The woman looked about as inviting as a damp November afternoon. Easily in her fiftiesso, older than her, therefore possibly connected to her husband somehow.
The solicitor explained there was a will. Her husband had written it twenty-seven years earlier, and since no one had voided it, the blasted thing still stood.
This mystery woman, then…
Flash back: The pair had fallen hopelessly in love, fresh out of university, hearts beating double time. Star-crossed lovers, practically out of a Richard Curtis romcom.
He was her first beau, and he treasured it. She joked, Youre like my child! though they were the same age. Theyd laugh, mess about, and once, after watching a film where hopeless romantics wrote wills for each other, they scribbled out their own everything of mine is yours, forever and ever on the back of a curry receipt. She insisted it wasnt official enough, so off they wandered to the solicitor. Afterwards, they drank cheap prosecco and celebrated in, er, enthusiastically romantic fashion.
But soon, reality did what it does best. His dad fell ill, and he and his mother accompanied him to France for treatment.
Meanwhile, she met another chap while he was away. It happened a few times, andsurpriseshe found herself pregnant. The new chap proposed, which her mum thought highly sensible (You cant wait for that missing fellow, now, can you?). The original boyfriend didnt even respond to her letters.
She married, moved to Leeds (the glamour!), where her husband found a proper job. They had a daughter, but the marriage went the way of most bargain bin DVDsquickly forgotten. Divorce followed.
Years later, she remembered the will and hastily wrote a new one, this time leaving everything to her daughter.
So, when the registered letter arrived, she was undeniably gobsmacked. Shed genuinely forgotten her lost love, or at least thats what shed told everyone (including herself). His name on the letter tugged at the last threads of memory. Shed truly loved him once!
He, for his part, had forgotten about the will too. After losing his father, then nursing his poorly mother, hed blocked out old romances. On learning shed married and moved north, he resolved to leave it in the past. He met his future wifea practical, if not exactly heart-thumping, match. They made do, as people do.
Now, what to do? Would she take half the inheritance? The woman wondered aloud.
How odd, that he left that will. Did he really love her so much? she pondered. Well, I suppose Ill take the half as one last memento of him.
Half of your estates now mine, the woman announcedrather more delighted than youd expect.
Not just any half, mind you: the London flat, the Cotswolds cottage, the Ford Fiesta in the drive, the Nottingham Building Society savingseverything.
The widow felt her heart tumble down an elevator shaft. Not enough to have lost her husband; now the whole affair felt like treason.
All those faithful years, not a word about his long-lost flame!
And now she had to hand all that over…
She took the matter to court, which only managed to fray her nerves and empty her wallet.
The court awarded the money to the woman.
The old flame bought herself a new flat and took her daughter off for a week by the seaside. They probably ate ice cream and threw chips to the gulls.
Cheers! she said every daypresumably with a twinkle in her eye.
