Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 105756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
When I glanced back in Jonathan’s direction, he was thankfully no longer looking my way. Instead, he’d refocused his attention on the woman standing next to him.
Why had he been staring? Did he suspect I’d lied about finding a new place to live? More importantly, why did he care? He wanted me gone, and he was getting his wish.
Drowning my sorrows in a bottle of red seemed like a good idea. After tonight, I had two days to find somewhere to live; otherwise, I was going to have to resort to sleeping in my car.
Ah hell, it was my dad’s funeral. I deserved a drink—or five.
Lifting the glass, I downed it in several swallows then called to the bartender for another.
***
Two days later, I stood outside the house I’d called home for the past three years and tried not to be overcome with emotion. This was it. The end of an era. My entire life I’d never felt more at peace than I did there. Every room held a memory. I was even going to miss the smell of the place, strange as that sounded.
Turning, I frowned at my possessions crammed into the back of my car, my gut sinking. I hadn’t managed to find a room to rent, but I’d come up with a plan to survive in the meantime. There were showers and laundry facilities at work I could use. Then, at night, I’d move some stuff around and make enough room to sleep in my car. I’d researched several quiet car parks and neighbourhoods where I could stay overnight without being bothered.
When I fully thought about what my life was going to be like for the next however many weeks it took to find accommodation, I just wanted to break down and cry. My leg was going to suffer sleeping in my car, but what choice did I have?
Stepping outside, I locked the front door for the final time and sucked back the tears that wanted to fall. I hated leaving. If there were any justice in the world, I’d have enough money to buy the place from Jonathan, but unfortunately, I didn’t see my financial situation improving any time soon. Not until I had my loan paid off.
With a heavy sigh, I slid the keys back through the letterbox and turned to go.
This hurt. So bad.
The back windows of my car were tinted, so it wasn’t immediately obvious how much stuff I had crammed in there. You had to really be looking to notice, and I just hoped no one at work was nosy enough to peer inside. If they did, I could lie and say I was in the middle of moving, but hopefully, it wouldn’t come to that.
Driving away, I swallowed down all the pain and loss and fear of the future and plastered on a brave face. By the time I arrived at work, I’d just about managed to pull myself together to send a text to Therese.
Me: Please let Jonathan know that I moved out this morning, and I put my keys back through the letterbox.
A response came not too long after.
Therese: Of course, Miss Rose. I wish you all the best in your new place.
Her text had my gut sinking. My non-existent new place. This really was a low point. Jackie and Philomena were sitting in the garden on a bench when I passed by.
“Morning, Ada,” Philomena greeted. She and several other residents had extended their condolences to me the other day, and their kind words had almost brought me to tears. Maybe older people were better with death because they were closer to facing it. Or maybe because, at their age, they’d already lost enough people.
“Morning to you both,” I replied.
“Himself is in today,” she went on, and I grimaced. “Himself” was how Philomena and Jackie referred to Cathal. They’d say it in a certain tone that told me they were on my side in the breakup. Even after three years, they acted like there was some kind of bad blood between us when there really wasn’t. Even if he’d never started seeing Hannah, Cathal and I wouldn’t have worked out in the long run. We weren’t a good match. I saw that now.
Still, there was no talking to people sometimes. If you had an ex, they simply assumed that person was the enemy.
“Thanks for the heads up,” I said before continuing inside to my office.
As I passed through the lounge, I bumped into Lewis, another of our care workers. He was in his mid-twenties and had been with us a year. He also had a bit of a silver tongue, and the residents loved it when he bantered with them. He was big into all that “If only I’d been born forty years earlier” type of talk, and I often had to resist rolling my eyes at his antics. It worked a treat on the ladies though, always getting giggles and smiles.