The Arrival

The house sat nestled on the green grass like a cat snuggling into a warm blanket, like it always was meant to be exactly where it was. She hadn’t seen it in over forty years and yet just the sight of it filled her with nostalgia and longing – not for what was but what she wished it could be.

“Well, there it is.” She said. Emotionless, matter-of-factly. She sat, making no effort to open the car door, unmoving, staring. In her mind, she was eight years old, running up the porch steps of this exact same house, eager to get through the unwanted hugs, cheek pinches and comments about how much she had grown and get to the place she really wanted to be, the basement.

The adults didn’t go down there much if at all, which is why she loved it so much. She doesn’t remember ever seeing her grandmother or her sister, Great-Aunt Alice, ever IN the basement even though the house was hers. She’d call from the top of the steps when it was time for dinner or church but never actually walked down them. Even now, decades later, surrounded by the cool breeze from the lake, and fresh cut grass, all she could smell was the must of mothballs, dust, and neglect from the house’s basement.

She desperately wanted to jump out of the car, leave her husband and boys behind, ignore the drama she knew was waiting for her inside the doors and race down the basement steps. What would be waiting for her if she did? Would it be the same? Would she find the same sense of wonder, of trepidation, the thrill of being both excited and afraid of what she would find through every door, in every box, behind every corner as she explored her secret space? Would she feel safe there? She used to.

But that was then. She was not a little girl anymore. She didn’t have the luxury of hiding from her problems, disappearing into a world of her imagination whenever she was scared or hurt or alone, which was, always. Ironically, the only time she can remember as a child, not having to be afraid was in this house, during the summers she spent with her Great-Aunt Alice and yet this was the place she had found the most solace from exactly that, fear. And now it was hers. It had been hers for over a year now, she just didn’t know it.

The call came just a few days before, a voice she hadn’t heard in more than two decades, her uncle. Her father’s brother, the oldest of her father’s five younger brothers, the one that was closest to him in age and spent the most time with her family growing up. She hadn’t seen or heard from him since her father’s funeral twenty-five years ago, but in his defense, he had not heard from her either, none of their family had. A clean break wasn’t just needed, it was essential for her own survival.

And now here she was, back. Back amongst family, back amongst the memories, back amongst the pain. Fear was sure to follow. Oh, how she craved the solace of that basement, she could feel herself regressing, her palms sweating and the anxiety bubbling up into her chest from her stomach threatening to release the English muffin breakfast sandwich and too-sweet coffee she managed to eat on the drive. Suddenly she was no longer a strong, successful, independent businesswoman, educator, and author, she was a terrified little girl. Mentally she willed her husband to just put the car in reverse and get her the hell out of here.

She turned to him, ready to tell him exactly that but before the words could escape, the porch door opened and her uncle wheeled himself out of the house, watching her. waiting. He looked old she thought, frail. But of course, if she was now fifty, he had to be close to eighty and having been a paraplegic due to a mining accident since before she was born, she had to admit, frail or not, he looked damn good for his age and all he had been through. How much they all had been through. “Shit.”

“Mom!” chastised her eleven-year-old from the back seat, “You shouldn’t say that. Is that him?” His attention quickly shifted from his mother’s all-too-frequent foul language to the man sitting on the porch now staring at the car quizzically probably wondering what the hell they were doing just sitting there like that. What was taking them so damn long to get out of the car.

She wondered if he knew. Did any of them know? Did they know and not care or not care enough to know? These same questions had been permeating her consciousness for decades, every time she thought of her parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, even sweet Great-Aunt Alice… did they know? And if they knew, why didn’t they stop it? She looked again at her uncle who looked so much like her father and yet so vastly different. She had never seen this man raise a hand, say a harsh word or call anyone a useless bitch and yet… did he know?

“Yes, that’s him. Let’s go meet your Great uncle Steve.” And she got out of the car.

 

The Reunion

“I just don’t understand why no one told me! Why the hell am I just finding out about this now?” She was furious. Pacing around back and forth in front of the old oak table in her Great Aunt’s dining room, HER dining room, she could barely contain her fury. “It’s been over a fucking YEAR, A YEAR!” She slammed her hand on the table and stood glowering down at her uncles, both of them. Her husband gently put his hand on her arm, trying to calm her. He could feel her shaking inside of her silk blouse, could see the tears filling her eyes.

This wasn’t just anger, this was pain. This was the soul crushing emptiness of being confronted once again with the harsh truth – you just don’t matter; they don’t give a damn about you. They don’t care. They never did. Abandonment wasn’t just the physical act of leaving another behind, it was this. It was being ignored, being isolated, not just being made to feel as though you were inconsequential, but being inconsequential in their eyes, in their lives.

“We didn’t know how to contact you, Marie.” Calvin looked at his older brother Steve who looked away. “We looked but you were hard to find.”

“Oh, that’s such BULLSHIT!” Her voice was explosive, “I have a website for fuck’s sake! You could have found me with a google search – you just didn’t even bother trying until you absolutely had to. Bullshit.”  She sat, suddenly exhausted. She could feel her knees trembling and the tears threatening to spill over, she was not going to give them the satisfaction of seeing her cry. Not a chance. Too many tears had been shed over this family already, but it was unnerving how quickly they came to the surface. She blinked in frustration.

Visibly taking a deep breath, she lowered her voice and intentionally leveled her tone – a technique she learned over years of sitting across boardroom tables from men just waiting for her to prove she was ‘too emotional’ to hold an executive position. Interlocking her fingers and placing them on the table in front of her to stop them from shaking, she looked at both men. Elderly, visibly nervous and on the defensive, she took another tactic. Validate, collaborate, perform. Boardroom 101 strikes again.

“Ok, now you have found me. I am here. Tell me exactly what is going on.” She could hear the boys in the backyard, down by the lake, throwing rocks at the ducks seeing who could hit one first, she would stop them if she thought they ever had a chance of actually doing it, but right now, there were bigger issues at stake.

“When Alice died,” her uncle Calvin began. He was almost ten years younger than Steve, his early seventies by now she thought. He looked good for his age, tall, trim, tan – golf course, pickleball or both she guessed but living a leisurely retirement. She almost let herself get caught up in his charm, his perfect smile (dentures?) until she remembered. “Snakes can be charming too” she thought and focused back on what he was telling her.

“She left you her estate. The house, the contents, all of it. It’s yours, Marie, all of it.” He was gesturing around the room and the window looking over the lake and garden, the firepit with BBQ grills and custom benches – it looked more like a public park than a back yard in Northern Manitoba yet, here we were. Calvin smiled at her like he had just bestowed upon her a gift of his own making instead of hiding the fact that he and his son had been hiding this gift from her since aunt’s death the previous March.

The house and the grounds had obviously been updated since she had been here last as a child and was being meticulously maintained, on her dime. It was breathtaking, green grass boarding the dark blue depths of Lake Athapapaskow in Cranberry Portage, a town of just three hundred people more than an hour away from civilization. Her summer refuge as a child when her parents dumped her on her mother’s mother as soon as school let out and she in turn delivered her straight to her older sister, Alice. Her grandmother didn’t have time to manage such an unruly child and Alice with no children of her own, had unlimited patience.

Turning her gaze away from her children unknowingly recreating a scene from her own childhood, Elizabeth turned back to her uncles, bristling. “My name is not Marie.” She said this as though she WERE talking to one of her children, explaining something for the hundredth time and getting tired of doing it. They knew it. They were well aware that after her last (and hopefully final) stint in a drug rehabilitation centre when she was just 26, that she stopped using her middle name, the one she had been referred to since birth. She explained then and many ties since, when she left her drug-riddled past behind she was starting a new life, and that included a new name. Her given name. Elizabeth.

“But why?” She continued. “Why me? I haven’t seen her since I was a kid. I haven’t even talked to her.”

Calvin, who was a lawyer, and she assumed based on recent events, an unethical one, responded, “When she wrote her will she told me that you were the closest she ever had to having a child of her own and those summers you spent with her were some of the happiest she had ever had.”

Now the tears did spill over and as she wiped them away with the sleeve of her blouse, she could feel her husband’s hand squeezing her shoulder as he handed her a tissue from the box on the table. It was covered in a pink and yellow crocheted cover. She could almost see Alice watching Family Feud and wrapping the yarn around as she yelled out was most likely the right answer to the TV in front of her.

“She never told me that. I wish she would have told me that.” It might have changed so much she thought, if only she knew somebody actually cared. Digging deep into her reserve of boardroom coping mechanisms, Elizabeth pushed back the tears and focused on the task at hand. “Ok, let me get this straight. Aunt Alice died in March 2024. It is now July 2025. You say all of this is mine and has been for over a year and yet, I knew nothing of it until Steve called me last week.” She put up her hand to stop the protests she was sure to come from Calvin, defending himself yet again for not being able to ‘find’ the sole heir of his aunt’s estate, the one he had control of in her absence.

“I didn’t know, Marie.” She glanced at Steve sharply. “Elizabeth,” he corrected. “As soon as I found out, I found you on Facebook and then got your number from your website. It wasn’t that hard.” She shot a glance at his brother before continuing. “You needed to know and now here we are. I am glad you came, I am thrilled to meet your husband and sons, you look good, I am so happy for you, that everything turned out ok for you.”

“OK? OK?,” She was inwardly screaming. Things didn’t just ‘turn out ok’ for her. She went through hell to get where she was today, rehab, hospitals, psychologists, physical therapy, putting herself through school, raising her now adult child on her own with no help from any of them, another baby, a dead husband, a remarriage, cancer… and now they sit here in HER house telling her that her life was ‘OK’?

The entire situation was farcical, like an episode of Law & Order where the suspect finally cracks and then admits on the stand why she did it and wasn’t the least bit sorry. She gave herself a few seconds to fantasize about the revenge that that character was on trial for and how sweet it must have been, then snapped back to reality. She wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of stooping to their level. Never again.

 

 

The Insight

“Seriously though, can you fucking believe it? Any of this? I thought I had seen it all with this fucking family but seriously, I couldn’t even make this shit up.” Elizabeth was trying desperately to come to terms with all that was happening, all she had discovered, it was all so unbelievable but then again with her family, nothing was beyond the realm of the imagination.

“He just let his kid move in, to MY house. Without even telling me. Just help yourself to my inheritance why don’t you, you fucking crooked son of a bitch! ‘Essential caretakers for the estate’’, my ass!”

Elizabeth and her husband were side by side on a bench in the back yard, looking at the lake, watching their boys try to catch their first fish. Lake Athapap was full of jack, pickerel and even had some rainbow trout if you were lucky. Anglers from across North America towed their 40-foot boats behind their 100-foot luxury RVs to the little town every year to ‘rough it’ in rural Manitoba with their air conditioning and leather recliners for a chance to catch a few. But never from shore, at least not this shore Elizabeth thought, unless things had really changed since she was a girl because she surely never caught one from these banks, and not for a lack of trying.

“Well, at least he has done a good job taking care of it.” Always the rational one, the calm to her storm, Elizabeth’s husband gestured across the lawn to the house. She could see her uncles watching them from the dining room, probably discussing what they were going to do to calm her down and avoid a lawsuit.

“Well, he should have plenty of time considering that I don’t think he has ever had a paying job in his life. He plays with bugs for Christ’s sakes!”  Elizabeth was referring to Calvin’s son, Matthew, her cousin. Younger than her by about five years, she never really knew him, but she knew of him and had refreshed her memories by stalking him and his wife Melanie on their trip up here, when cell service allowed. An eight-hour drive allowed for some serious scrolling. Thank the Gods that their Tesla had an independent entertainment system in the back for the boys. She was on edge enough without having to try to entertain them too.

“Come on now, that’s a bit harsh. He studies cockroaches as a protein substitute for animal feed. It’s a legit job.”

“It’s a job only if you get a regular paycheque. Cranberry is hours away from the universities, and all the research is being done in the south. And don’t tell me he can work remotely – the internet service here is worse than the cell.” She wasn’t having any of it. No matter how logical his arguments were, any defense of her uncle or his freeloading kid just wasn’t happening.

“There’s a Starlink satellite on the roof. I doubt it was your aunt’s.” Again, with the fucking logic.

“I am probably paying for that too. Estate maintenance. We should sue them.” She glanced back at the window. Calvin was standing there in his white polo shirt and blue slacks like a model in a viagra commercial. She glared at him until he turned away. “The whole thing just pisses me off.”

“I get that but there’s nothing we can do. Your lawyer and your accountant both reviewed the records Calvin sent up – it’s legit. He even documented his ‘attempts’ to find you – through your sister, school etc.” He turned and put his finger across her lips and grabbed her hands anticipating her imminent protest. “Yes, I know it was a bullshit attempt, but apparently it was enough for the law and his records were impeccable.”

“He’s a sleaze ball.” And then couldn’t help but laugh at the look her juvenile comment drew from her husband. This was his superpower. He was the yin to her yang. She put her head on his shoulder as he wrapped his arms around her and watched as the boys started packing up their gear, no fish in sight. The sun was still high but starting to lose some of its bright heat. This time of the year in northern Manitoba, the sun rarely went down until well after ten and it was barely six, there was still plenty of light although to Elizabeth, the day had felt as if it had lasted a century. She could feel the familiar wave of fatigue start to creep through her.

“So, what do we do? I want to kick them all the hell out. Today.” This was her house, her land, they had no right to it, never had.

“Matthew and Melanie will be here soon. Your uncle said they were taking their kid, what’s his name?”

“Billy.”

“Yeah, Billy. They were taking Billy out to dinner after daycare before driving back to town to give us more time to talk.”

“Why do they need daycare anyway? He doesn’t even work.”

“Elizabeth…”

“Ok. I’ll stop. But still. UGH!” Elizabeth slapped her hands against her thighs in frustration. “It just pisses me off.”

“You have every right to be pissed off. But the question remains, what are we going to do about it? This place is amazing – a perfect summer house… but we live eight hours away. I can’t leave my job, not even just for summer and this place needs full time care, it’s huge. I mean, just the garden alone!”

Elizabeth hated to admit that he had a point. Her cousin and his wife WERE doing an amazing job. From what she had seen of the house, it was spotless. The garden was sure to bring in a harvest worthy of some serious canning and the lawn was immaculate. It probably WAS a full-time job, and they haven’t even seen the whole house yet. Maybe daycare for their 3-year-old was justified since her cousin-in-law worked in the neighboring city for Manitoba Hydro and her hours were scattered.

“And even if you can work remotely, you know that this is much more than you can handle right now and you shouldn’t be so far from your doctors.” The concern Elizabeth saw in his eyes both tempered and annoyed her. Yes, she had been battling cancer the past two years, which did make her less active online and probably harder to find (but she was NOT going to tell her uncle that), but she was fine now. Chemo and radiation had been a bitch, surgery was no small feat, but she was better now, cancer free and getting stronger every day. But… he was right, she couldn’t take this on. She had a life down south, work, and the boys had friends and school. This house WAS perfect. For retirement. Not now.

She felt tears streaming down her face, soaking into his shirt and he pulled her closer. The boys were walking back now, laughing, and pushing each other, probably looking for food. They were always looking for food. It wasn’t too long ago that Elizabeth was afraid treatments wouldn’t work, and she would never get to see them raiding the fridge again and yet here they were. She cried harder.

“I hate this. I really fucking hate this.

 

 

 

 

The Basement

It smelled the same. How could something smell exactly the same after forty years? And how is it possible for a smell to recreate memories, feelings after forty years? This is what Elizabeth was thinking as she stood at the bottom of the stairs with her eyes closed, just smelling. And remembering.

Her grandmother was a decent enough person, at least compared to the rest of the adults in Elizabeth Marie’s life. She never hit her, hurt her, or made her do things that Elizabeth instinctually knew she couldn’t talk about with her friends at school. If she had any friends. No, her grandmother was not a bad person, she just didn’t like Elizabeth, which was obvious, even to an eight-year-old.

She was a burden. She talked too much. She thought she was smarter than everyone else in the room. She interrupted adults to correct them, she boasted, she lied, she told tall tales, and she did not dress the way that a good Catholic girl in the seventies was supposed to dress. That and she looked too much like her father. Elizabeth knew that she and her brother with their olive skin, brown eyes, and dark skin, would never be loved by her grandmother, not like their blue-eyed blond-hair older sister was. Nope, she was the golden child, and they were, well, they were, dark. Like their father. And Grandma never tired of reminding them of that.

Elizabeth’s siblings were older than her by six and seven years. They were already in school when Elizabeth was born and that disrupted the lives of everyone. She was not expected, not wanted and a pain in the ass to have to put up with. How did she know this? They told her. Often. She had night terrors, screamed if a light was not left on because she was terrified of the dark. She wet the bed and routinely begged through tears to sleep in her parent’s bed and when refused, would curl up with a blanket on their bedroom floor like a dog just so she wouldn’t have to be alone.

When she was five or six, Elizabeth started spending summers with her grandmother. It was supposed to be fun, a vacation she was told but as a teen Elizabeth realized that was the age when her siblings were old enough to stay home alone and having her gone meant that they and her parents had freedom all summer long. Freedom from her. She was a burden. So off she went to Grandma’s house.

But that didn’t last long. After a single summer or two, Grandma realized that little Elizabeth Marie was no vacation to have around. She did not behave the way her friend’s grandchildren did. She was obstinate, contrary and had no respect for authority. So off she went again to Great Aunt Alice’s. They all thought they were ditching her, relieving themselves of a burden but what they didn’t know was that this was the best time of Elizabeth’s young life. When she cried out in the night, Aunt Alice held her and wiped away her tears. She didn’t yell or scold and never minded keeping the hall light on. When Elizabeth would wet the bed, she never ridiculed or berated her, she just helped her get clean, changed the sheets, and went back to sleep. Aunt Alice’s WAS a vacation. And then one summer, Elizabeth discovered the basement and that vacation became even better.

As beautiful as the lake was or the lawn like a park or how much fun it was throwing rocks at the ducks (yes, she did that too), it was the basement that excited Elizabeth more than anything when coming to Aunt Alice’s. It was an adventure. A great room filled with old furniture and collections from when Alice and her sister were little. Boxes of old toys, and clothes for countless hours of dress up and make believe. Oh, how Elizabeth longed to be anyone but Elizabeth Marie.

There was a long hall with doors that led to other rooms – a creepy old bedroom with dolls that looked like they might come alive the minute you turned your back, quilts from ancestors long forgotten and beds that sagged so low their mattresses touched the floor through their old wire frames. Aunt Alice was a hoarder. Elizabeth knew that now, but then? Oh no, Aunt Alice’s basement was a treasure. It was a place to be alone and alone meant safe. It was a place to be whoever and whatever you wanted to be, and no one ever came down to tell you differently.

Elizabeth found herself standing in the great room, overwhelmed by memories flooding back to her, she could almost feel the old fur coat she used to wrap up in pretending to be a movie star, just like it was yesterday. Was it still down here? She gave the dusty room her best royal wave and moved to an old table in the middle of the room. “Well, this is new.” She thought, running her hands over the worn wood, and practiced practiced hinges. It was almost eight feet long with two sections on either end that folded in or laid out on retractable legs. There was a lever at each end that you could crank to raise the two end sections up to different angles, like a fantastic laptop stand. If your laptop was four feet wide.

“That’s an antique drafting table.” The voice came from the bottom of the stairs. Elizabeth turned to see Melanie. Shorter than her own 5’7” frame but about the same 170 pounds, her cousin-in-law had long straight brown hair and big green eyes in a soft round face. She looked kind. She looked like the type of young woman Elizabeth would instantly want to take under her wing and mentor. Someone she could guide through life and protect from the harsh reality Elizabeth knew it could be. But at this moment, under these circumstances, she did not feel generous or benevolent, she felt annoyed. This was HER place, her space and Melanie was intruding.

“I researched it when we first moved in.” She walked toward the table, running her hand over its worn and stained surface much like Elizabeth had just a few moments before. “I don’t know why Alice would have it, but it’s glorious.”

“Yes, it is. It’s very lovely. I should bring it home with me. I have just the place for it.”

“No! You can’t!” Melanie seemed stricken by the mere thought of this glorious table leaving the basement. “I mean, well I guess you can, but do you really want this old thing? And how would you get it home?”

“I have no idea.” Admitted Elizabeth, and switching the subject upon hearing the boys banging around upstairs helping their father bring in the luggage said, “I assume you have room for us tonight?”

“Tonight?” Asked Melanie. “Yes of course we can make it work for tonight.”

And in that moment Elizabeth knew that the magic of Aunt Alice’s basement was gone. It was lost to her forever. This was no longer HER space, it was no longer a safe place. It was just a basement. A dusty, dirty basement crammed with tokens from decades passed that no one no longer remembered and maybe no one every should. Without a word, she turned and walk up the stairs never once looking back down.

 

 

 

The Negotiation

She stared at the men around the table. Her family. Her OLD family. She felt nothing towards them. No draw of familiarity, no deep seeded connection, no ‘blood is thicker than water’ crap. No. They were water, and they were running off her like the ducks in Lake Athapapaskow. Her two uncles, and her cousin Matthew, a tall string bean of a man who, based on his tan and calloused hands, obviously was the one out cutting the lawn and tending the gardens of Aunt Alice’s, no HER, house.

Matthew looked embarrassed to be there. He would not meet her eyes. They hadn’t seen each other since they were children – or maybe at her dad’s funeral? She couldn’t remember, so many of those years were a blur. His father, Calvin obviously thought and was right about his ability to speak for his son. Every time Matthew spoke up or started to apologize, he was silenced with a hand to the arm or a look that Elizabeth recognized as one of her father’s. It said, ‘Do not question me, or else…’ without making a sound. Elizabeth could only imagine what the ‘or else’ was in Matthew’s family, she knew what it was in hers and she did not envy him his position right now, no matter how upset she was.

Completely opposite to his younger brother’s smirk of condescension, her Uncle Steve looked uncomfortable. He may have been older but since his accident, he never held quite the same level of power of his able-bodied brothers and that realization saddened her greatly. If it wasn’t for Steve discovering and thwarting Calvin’s legal Hijinx, she may never have know what was happening, may never have known that her cousin and his family were living in HER house, or even that she had a house on Lake Athapapaskow in Cranberry Portage Manitoba.

She caught Steve’s eyes and smiled. That smile said everything that she wished she could, and maybe one day would, say, “Thank you. Thank you for finding me. Thank you for breaking the cycle and helping me. Thank you for going against the family, your brother, to do what is right. Thank you for helping me. This is not your fault. Nothing was ever your fault. And most importantly: I forgive you.” When her gaze moved across the table to her uncle, Calvin, it was not so benevolent.

Her husband was not with her. This was both by design and by necessity. The day had been long enough. Decisions needed to be made, terms to be agreed upon and children needed to be put to bed, whether any of them liked it or not. Elizabeth knew that if asked, he would be by her side, her would pick up a sword, go to battle with her and die with her if needed. He was her hero and like a true hero, he understood that what she needed tonight was to fight this war alone. She needed that. More than anything.

In no version of her childhood did a woman sit across the table from three men, regardless of age and have a say. In no version of her childhood did she sit across from anyone and be taken seriously, listened to, respected, heard. She knew this. She knew what she was facing, and she knew that the stakes were high. This was about far more than a house, about possessions, about property. They all knew it. “This is it,” She thought and took a deep breath.

Looking directly into Calvin’s eyes she started the negotiations. “I know you said you looked for me for the past year and in my absence as executor of Alice’s estate did what you thought best and allowed Matthew, “ she gestured to her cousin who lowered his eyes like a broken pup, “and his family,” Melanie was also absent from this meeting which did NOT surprise Elizabeth in the least, “to live in my house, THIS house, as caretakers.”

Calvin was about to speak, she knew how uncomfortable it made him to see her taking charge of this meeting, of leading the narrative. Internally, she relished every second of it, externally, she held up a hand to silence him (another internal ego stroke). “I get that, I concede the point, what is done is done, but the question is, where do we go from here?” She paused, looked each man in the eye, Steve, then Calvin and then finally resting her gaze on Matthew, keeping it there until he looked up and she could see the shame on his face. This time she was the one to look away.

“I love this house, this was the only place I ever felt safe, valued and protected as a child. It breaks my heart that Aunt Alice felt the same, that I never had the chance of knowing that, of knowing her as an adult. That I never had the opportunity to tell her how much she and this house meant to me. And that is MY fault. I own that. I will have to live with that forever. I turned my back on my entire family when not all of you,” she looked at Steve, “may have deserved it.”

“But regardless of what happened, this is MY house. I am here now, and Matthew,” he looked up, “you have been living here, rent free with your family for over a year. You must know how wrong that is, that Aunt Alice didn’t leave this property to you, that this is not your home.” He nodded. His father glared. Elizabeth continued, “But you have done an amazing job of maintaining and even improving the place. I cannot deny that. It’s obvious that you and your family love it here.” Again, he nodded. Elizabeth could see tears beginning to wet his eyes.

 

“I want to live here.” Elizabeth stated. “I want my children and my grandchildren to know the peace of this place, feel what I felt when I was a child. I want my family to make new memories here for generations to come.”  Matthew’s shoulders dropped and his head hung low.

“Now you wait a minute young lady!” Calvin roared across the table. Elizabeth thought for a second he was going to strike her, she was braced for it. His eyes were wild and there was spit starting to bubble at the corner of his lips. Behind him the sun was finally beginning to set on Lake Athapapaskow.

“No.” She was calm, composed and her hands were laid flat against the table. She looked her uncle square in the eyes and as scared as she was, she said it again, this time louder. “NO! I will not ‘wait a minute’” she mocked him. “YOU are in MY house, I am not a young lady, I am a grown woman, and you will either address me with the respect I deserve, or you will leave. I am NOT talking to you. You have no power over me.”

For a moment, the world was silent. Their lives hung on a precipice. Calvin’s face turned red, then dark purple, as though the anger was absorbing all the oxygen around him, faster than he could breathe it. Elizabeth watched him. Steve watched him. Matthew watched him. They waited.

And as quickly as it came, the color dissipated from his face, he took a breath and said, nothing. Not a sound came from him as he sat back on his chair in Aunt Alice’s dining room as the sun went down through the window, casting shadows all around.

“I want all of those things for my family, Matthew,” Elizabeth said softly, “but I don’t want them now. I am not ready yet. In five years, we want to retire, leave the city, and start living our dreams. Travel the world in winter and find a perfect spot at home for the summer.” Echoing her husband’s words, “This is the perfect summer house.”

“Five years?” Matthew asked quizzically, the reality of what she said slowly hitting him. “You want to move here in five years?”

“Yes. And in the meantime, we would very much like it if you, Melanie, and Billy would stay here, with negotiated terms of course. I want rent. I want a fair market price, discounted for the maintenance and upkeep of the property. I can hire someone to help clean out the basement and any of the other stuff up here you don’t want to use, ship everything to storage and sort through it as I have time. What do you think? Five-year lease? I can write it up tonight. “

Matthew looked at her eagerly and opened his mouth to respond when his father broke in, “RENT! Are you crazy? For everything he has done around here, YOU should be PAYING him!” Calvin’s eyes were on fire as they bore down onto Elizabeth’s.

“Pay him?” She spat, “I HAVE been paying him. My accountant and my lawyer have both gone through Alice’s estate and it’s obvious that you have arranged that I pay him and YOU handsomely for keeping up my secret estate so please do not talk to me about PAYING.” She looked at him resolutely, “I have paid enough to be a member of this family,”

Elizabeth pushed her chair away from the table and spoke directly to her cousin, “My offer stands until tomorrow at 8am, at which time I expect to be discussing rental rates or a date to expect your departure from my house.” She turned one last time to look her uncle dead in the eyes and said, “And if I hear one more comment about how I owe ANY of you a damn thing, you will all be hearing from my lawyer.”

And with that Elizabeth turned and walked from the room, carrying her power with her. There was nothing left to look back on, the sun was set.

 

*****

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