Margaret tightened her grip on the doily beneath the vase, her fingers trembling like the branches of the lilac bush outside. The hourglass on the mantelpiece suggested visitors would arrive in minutes, but the weight of the day pressed on her shoulders like autumn rain. Sixty candles—proper ones, not cheap paraffin—would be lit. The children’s scones, steaming with marmalade, sat cooling on the rack. She needed everything to be perfect.
“Lena, are you done in the kitchen?” she called, the tremor in her voice sharper than the chandelier’s crystals.
“Almost, Nana!” came her daughter’s reply, muffled by the clatter of tin. “Check Daniel—said he’d grab fizzy water from the shops.”
Margaret sighed, her orthopedic shoes thudding against the linoleum as she drifted to Daniel’s room. What was it about him? He’d been living under her roof for a decade, yet his “right after this” philosophy had outlasted his promise to fix the guttering. There he was, slouched before the laptop, a glass of sherry fogging the screen.
“Daniel, the guests will be here soon,” she said, her tone sharp enough to slice bread but softened by years of habit. “The cake—‘The Sweet Corner’ on High Street. The deposit’s paid, but the rest is cash on delivery.”
“I got it, Nana,” he muttered without turning. His fingers danced across the keyboard like clumsy migrants.
The air thickened with the scent of plum jam and lavender, the very image of a proper English afternoon. Margaret’s mind wandered. If not for Lena and Emily, she’d have long told Daniel to take his useless self to the door. He’d promised to save for a house since their wedding, but “when the savings app fills up” remained an eternal mirage. Emily, at least, had been a blessing—a golden helix of joy in the grey.
“Granny, is the cake coming?” The child appeared, her polka-dots neat but her shoes scuffed from climbing the garden wall.
“It is, love. Your dad’s fetching it. Just need to make sure he remembers.”
“Remember’s what he forgot last week when he lost my swimming goggles,” Emily scoffed, crossing her mouth into a frown only a twelve-year-old could perfect.
Margaret ruffled her hair, the bangles on her wrists clinking like ghosts. “He’s got a note. Why don’t you wear the red dress we bought from Marks & Spencer?”
Alone again, Margaret returned to Daniel. “The cake. The Sweet Corner. It’s still open, yes?”
“I’ll get it after the soda,” he said airily. “No rush. Everything’s sorted, Nana.”
Fifteen minutes later, he lumbered out in a coat too thin for the chill, his scarf a crooked loop. “Did you take the credit card? Lena said it’s on the kitchen table,” Margaret added, watching as he fumbled with his keys. The neighbors’ husbandly advice—*“Men forget to bring things back”*—echoed in her mind.
When Daniel finally vanished into the Tuesday drizzle, Margaret resumed her vigil by the sideboard. The guests would arrive—Lena’s colleagues, Jane and Nicholas from next door, the old knitting club members. Thirty years at the school, firming hands on mantelpieces, pinning certificates to walls. Now, retirement bloomed like a bruise on her calendar. She’d taught English literature well enough; she’d host today even better.
“Don’t stress, Nana,” Lena said, joining her with a tray of scones. “The rush hour’s over. We’ll be fine.”
Fine. The word hung in the air, as elusive as the smoke curling from the teapot. The doorbell chimed like a church knell. Jane and Nicholas arrived first, their coats drenched in spring air.
“Maggie, love!” Jane kissed her cheek, the scent of purple soap lingering. “You look radiant. Sixty makes you twenty again, they say.”
“I’ll take it,” Margaret said, ushering them in. The house swelled with laughter and tea, the china clinking in time with the clock’s metronomic ticking. But Daniel was missing.
“Call him.” Margaret passed Lena the phone, her voice brittle.
He claimed a queue at the shop, Lena said. “But it’s mostly him on the phone again,” she added, her smile fraying. Margaret said nothing. She’d heard that excuse for a decade—*“Just a minute, just one text, just a nap”*—until it turned to static in her ears.
At last, the final guest arrived. The table groaned with pies, potted meat quiche, steamed pudding. Margaret carved the gilded Victoria sponge with a trembling knife, its pink roses frosted in affirmation of her resolve.
“I thought we’d start without him,” she declared, though her voice wavered. The guests nodded, forks dipping into the dulcet tones of Cornish pasties.
Emily waited in the corridor. “Is Dad here yet, Granda?”
“Not yet, love,” Margaret whispered. She handed her the cake knife, its hilt wrapped in grosgrain ribbon. “Be brave. We need you.”
The clock struck quarter to. A chime, a creak, then Lena’s pale face. Margaret followed her into the hall where a courier stood, rain dripping from his overcoat.
“Surprise, Margaret,” he said, setting the cake on the rug. “‘The Sweet Corner’ wanted this delivered.”
Margaret’s throat tightened. Where was Daniel? Had he walked into the Thames and drowned? Lena’s tears fell like raindrops on the carpet. No reply on her phone. Just missed calls, a text from a pub in Islington.
The cake was exquisite—raspberry filling, a begoniasque bloom of frosting, letters *Happy 60th* in gold leaf. Yet it felt like a funeral centerpiece. Margaret’s hands shook as she carried it to the table, the guests hush falling like a shawl over them all.
And then—there he was. Daniel, reeking of port, slung forward on his cane. “Here I am! Cheers everyone!”
Silence. The cake’s roses seemed to wilt under the weight of his arrival. Lena’s gaze was a blade. “Where were you?”
“Chatting up the lads—thought it was worth a drink for my Nana’s big day,” he slurred, knocking over a glass of sherry. The liquid pooled on the mahogany like a spilled truth.
Margaret’s voice was steel. “The cake was delivered because you forgot. Again.”
Daniel huffed, toppling into a chair. “I’m here. That’s what matters!”
Guests shifted, his shoe scuffing the curtain. Margaret rose, her cane steady. “I’ve lived with this for ten years,” she said, her words echoing like a gavel. “I put up with the unpaid bills, the broken promises. For Lena, for Emily. But not today. This house is mine. And from dawn tomorrow, you’re out.”
The silence was a vacuum. Daniel stared at the cake, its frosting like a siren call. “Lena! Say something!”
But Lena only hugged her daughter, her wrists white against the fabric of her apron. “Mum, are you sure?”
“Absolutely,” Margaret said, her voice a dam breaking. “You’ve been unhappy for years. Emily sees it. We need to let you live without him.”
Daniel’s face twisted. “You can’t do this!”
“I can, and I will. This house is my sanctuary.”
He left, stomping the stairs like a child, his keys jingling a dirge. Margaret touched the cake, its sweetness now bittersweet. The first slice was like cutting through a vow.
That evening, Lena wept into her mother’s arms. “I wanted to leave long ago. Felt you’d say—*stick it out for Emily’s sake*.”
“I know,” Margaret murmured. “But you deserve better. I’ve saved—enough for a down payment on a flat. Start fresh with Emily.”
Lena laughed through tears. “Since when are you so… *bold*?”
“Since today,” Margaret said, her smile a quiet blaze. “You know what my first schoolteacher once said? *‘Better sixty times empty than once with poison.’* Let’s face it, dear. You’ve been drinking tea with ghosts.”
By spring, Lena and Emily moved into a terraced home with ivy climbing the walls. Margaret visited with tulips and tins of cookies, her cane clicking rhythms against the cobblestones. And one afternoon, a tall man with grey eyes arrived with a bouquet and a CD of jazz music.
“Colleagues said you love *The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle*,” he said, his voice like a well-worn book. “And this flat needs a guitarist for the garden party.”
Margaret smiled, the candlelight flickering on her new ring. The cake, preserved in a display case, glowed like a memory. Some things, she thought, end not with a finale but a beginning.
