Living Like Royalty! You’ve Found Yourself a Wealthy Man Abroad and Now You’re Revelling in Luxury!

I knew my parents only from the faded photographs tucked in Granddads old, foxed album. The oddness of it all: my mother died giving birth to me, and my father, stricken after losing his beloved, refused even a glance at me, abandoning me at the start of my own story. It was Granddad who tucked me under his tweed coat, taking me home from the hospital, stepping into the shoes of carer in that peculiar, drifting world.
He couldnt give up his job of course, so he hired a nanny a stern but kindly Mrs. Weatherby, with hair like a startled dandelion who kept vigil over me until Granddads return. When nursery started, the house became less haunted, and lifes daydreams grew busier. The years tumbled by like dandelion seeds on the breeze; Granddad and I never once truly quarrelled. Even in my wild, tempestuous teenage years, we found soft landings always some middle ground, half-remembered, half-invented. I was quietly thankful for his steadiness, the strange comfort of a life that could have come unravelled without him.
My gratitude my odd devotion came out in small ways: a tidy room, homework always attempted, hands scrubbed before supper. He glowed with pride each time some teacher jotted my name on the list for the next Olympiad, or I dragged home another peculiar cup for winning the three-legged race.
He helped me choose a path, standing at those crossroads only dreams can conjure. Id been enraptured by biology for as long as I could recall, but was unsure where my talents lay. Granddad introduced me to an old friend of his Dr. Alton, a formidable figure in the world of medicine and after a conversation oddly tinged with echoing voices and windows opening in impossible places, I just knew: my soul belonged to medicine.
My university days shimmered by in a haze of books, skeletons in glass cabinets, professors whose faces kept changing. I completed my placement at a celebrated hospital its wards endless, doors opening onto meadows and libraries at random. Days were hard, time bent into odd shapes, but I pressed on, at last specializing in neurosurgery.
No sooner had I left university than the director of an esteemed private hospital phoned me out of the blue, offering work. It felt foolish even in the dream to refuse. My working days spun dizzily past: surgeries that danced, a year full of lectures for doctors old and young. My reputation rippled outward and, in three surreal years, my name became known even across international borders, as if whispered in the wind. Granddad and I werent surprised when, suddenly, a posting was offered in one of Americas top hospitals. After much cricket-on-the-village-green pondering, we decided wed give it a try.
We drifted across the sea to another country. Granddad didnt settle well; he missed the garden roses and the thrushes, and soon packed for home. I might have returned with him, were it not for Oliver. Id met Oliver at one of my lectures another surgeon, from a nearby hospital, hair like a hayfield after storm. At first, we were friends, exchanging curious glances and half-shared cups of tea; then we dated, wandering foggy city streets, and soon moved in together. We decided to marry back in England; I wanted Granddad to walk me down the aisle, leading me from the threshold in a swirl of waking and dreaming. Granddad, though, refused to leave, saying his days were numbered and he wished to be buried at home, beneath the old rowan tree.
On that surreal day, as Oliver and I played endless games of Cluedo and Monopoly with Granddad, the phone ranga call from my father. He began, bizarrely cheerful, with congratulatory noises about the wedding. I felt a sourness inside the dream, and asked bluntly what he wanted, bracing for the odd logic of dreams.
He replied, I want some money, love! Youre living like a queen these days. Found yourself a rich man from overseas, now youre rolling in pounds! Whats the harm in sharing some with your old dad?
I hung up at once, number blocked in a blur. The dream hung thick with the strangeness of it: how had he found the courage to call, to even say he was family, after hed cast me off to drift?
I have two souls in my familyjust two, Granddad and Oliverand for them, Id walk over glowing coals, through rain that falls upwards. My father is a shadow at the window, barely more than a whisper lost in the fog.