“You tore our family apart!” screams my daughter.
Charlotte blames me for her divorce, and her words stab through my heart like shards of glass. She claims I never gave her and her husband the chance for happiness. It all began with their fight over the mortgage, though I begged them not to rush into debt. Now, I’m the villain in their tragedy, and the guilt haunts me day and night.
Charlotte and her husband, James, married three years ago. She dreamed of a lavish wedding—a hundred guests, a vintage Rolls-Royce. I urged her to be sensible, but his mother, Margaret, thumped her chest and declared, “For my only son, I’ll throw a celebration all of Manchester will talk about!” I drained my savings just to keep up appearances. I warned Charlotte—there’d be no wedding gift from me. Every last penny had gone to that one day, now nothing but a bitter memory.
After the wedding, they rented a flat. I bit my tongue, knowing they were throwing money into a landlord’s pocket. They craved independence, but the thrill wore off within a year. Renting bled them dry.
When James’ grandmother passed, she left him a worn-out one-bedroom on the city’s outskirts. Peeling wallpaper, creaking floorboards—but livable. Legally, the flat belonged to Margaret, though she let the young couple stay. They wanted to renovate. I pleaded with Charlotte, “Why pour money into a place you don’t own? If things go wrong, you’ll have nothing!” She wouldn’t listen.
I visited only once—their housewarming. A grim neighborhood, an hour from the city center, weeds choking the cracked pavement. Neighbors who looked like life had chewed them up and spat them out. The kitchen was a cupboard; two people couldn’t stand in it without knocking elbows. Yet Charlotte and James glowed with pride, so I swallowed my words.
A year later, Charlotte announced she was pregnant. A baby in that shoebox? Impossible. James begged Margaret to sell the flat to help with a mortgage, but she refused outright. Still, they took the loan. I begged them to wait: “Charlotte, how will you pay the mortgage on maternity leave? You have a roof—why invite disaster?” My warnings were lost to the wind.
Then Margaret suggested another solution—a swap. I’d move into their crumbling flat, and they’d take my three-bedroom terrace in the city center. I refused. Live in that dismal box, windows overlooking a derelict lot? Never. My home was my sanctuary. Why should I trade it for misery?
Charlotte buried her resentment. She and James went ahead with the mortgage, buying a tired old house that needed no work. But when little Emily was born, James’ salary vanished into repayments. They were drowning. My husband and I helped where we could, but we weren’t made of money. “You made your choice,” I told them. Harsh, perhaps—but what else could I do?
Then Charlotte stood on my doorstep, baby in her arms, her voice raw with fury. “This is your fault! If you’d just swapped houses, James and I would still be together! Emily is growing up without a father because of you!” She screamed, sobbed, while I stood frozen, hollowed out by her pain.
It hurts to see their family shattered. But am I truly to blame? All I did was protect what was mine, offer them sense. Or was I wrong? What would you have done? Tell me—was I right?
