**The Old Suitcase**
Emily slammed the garden gate shut with such force that the neighbour’s spaniels started barking in the shed. Another pointless row with Gran—always the same: “Help with the garden,” “Can you stir the jam,” “Stop staring at your phone.” As if an eighteen-year-old girl had nothing better to do with her summer!
“Emily! Come back this instant!” Margaret called after her. But her granddaughter was already striding down the dusty lane without a glance back. There was nowhere to go, but going home was the last thing she wanted.
She reached the pond and sat on the bank, watching the sun dip behind the oaks. Resentment gnawed at her—toward her parents, off working in France and leaving her behind; toward Gran, who’d dragged her to this backwater instead of letting her stay in London. Emily had already got into uni—her new life was starting, and here she was, stuck lugging jars to the cellar.
The next morning, Gran tapped on her door. “Emily, love, could you help me carry the jam jars down? The stairs are too steep for me these days.”
Grudgingly, Emily got up, washed her face, and hauled the heavy jars, making trip after trip. On the last descent, she spotted a battered old suitcase in the corner, covered in dust.
“Gran, what’s this suitcase doing here?”
“Haven’t the foggiest… Probably your grandad’s. I’ve not been down here since he passed.”
Curiosity got the better of Emily. Ignoring Gran’s protests, she dragged the suitcase into the light. The fabric was faded, the clasp rusted.
“Leave that old thing be,” Margaret muttered. “No telling what’s in there.”
But Emily was already digging through yellowed shirts, faded photos, and scribbled notes. At the bottom lay a neat envelope. In familiar handwriting, it read: “To Katherine—forgive and understand.”
“Can I?” Emily glanced at Gran, who nodded.
The letter was heartfelt. Grandad Charles—married to Gran just a year—pleaded for forgiveness from a woman named Katherine. He spoke of loving her deeply, then ruining it all with jealousy. The date read 1967. Gran went pale.
“That’s… the year after we wed,” she whispered.
“Maybe we should leave it,” Emily said softly.
“No. I need to know. Where’s this place he wrote about—‘where I shattered her dreams’?”
Late that evening, Gran asked Emily to book tickets to a village near Bristol.
“Just do it. I need to see that street.”
The next day, they took the train. The journey was long, and Gran talked the whole way—about meeting Charles, falling in love, marrying him. Yet beneath it all, she’d always carried a quiet doubt—that his heart hadn’t been fully hers.
Arriving, they hailed a cab to the address from the letter. The cottage was small, its garden trim. As they lingered at the gate, a voice called out: “You looking for someone? From the pension office?”
They turned. A spry woman in her eighties stood there, sharp-eyed and sturdy.
“Hello. Do you know Katherine Ellis?” Margaret asked.
“My daughter,” the woman smiled. “Moved to Edinburgh years ago.”
“And Charles Whitmore? I’m his widow…”
The woman—Nana Rose—invited them in. She explained Charles had been stationed there. Katherine, her daughter, was a nurse. They’d been in love, but rumours of infidelity broke them. Charles left. Katherine never forgave him but never stopped loving him either. Years later, as she prepared to marry another, Charles’ letter arrived—but Nana Rose intercepted it.
“I wanted her to move on. And I don’t regret it. She’s happy. And you, Margaret, had a good life with him. So maybe it was meant to be.”
They left in silence. Tears brimmed in Gran’s eyes.
“What if she’d forgiven him?” she whispered later at the inn.
“Gran, ‘what ifs’ won’t change anything,” Emily said gently. “You were his wife. He loved you. And you loved him.”
Margaret nodded, pulled Emily close, and smiled—for the first time in years.
Funny, how an old suitcase can teach you—some questions are better left unanswered, and some loves, however tangled, were never meant to be undone.
