May That Sinking Feeling Last Her A Looooong Time
CONTENT WARNING: Suicide, Death (Actually takes place within the story events)
This could be a novel, so here’s to brevity. My wife, our three kids, and I had a home on a large lot in the city. New neighbours moved in, and as ours was a corner lot, our back fence was their side fence. “Bob” was a retired gentleman, and he quickly became my “old guy”. He’d see me out in the yard and call to me, we’d waste time talking over the fence about stuff, he’d tell me the same old stories, and such. I’d mow the grass in the ditches for him and make sure his driveway was cleared of snow in winter. Life was good.
He had a partner, “Gwen”, who was a bit strange. Gwen had a daughter who was a single parent to a girl, “Wren”, who was about a year younger than my youngest, say three years old when we first met her. Gwen worked, and her daughter was working/going to school, so Bob became the defacto babysitter. He loved that child as if she was his own and doted on her. She reciprocated, calling him “Gump” for grandfather. Bob had a good retirement package and bought a used boat — a twenty-four-foot cabin cruiser which he restored and got shipshape for little excursions on the sea, fishing, and the like. Gwen didn’t like it, but Wren did, especially since the boat was named “Wren’s Nest” after her. After a couple of years, Bob, in declining health, had the boat put up on blocks in his driveway as marina fees were too much.
Things between Gwen and Bob went downhill, and she left him. That, he could take. But losing the girl he considered a granddaughter shattered him. He got to drinking and ended up with some “friends” who wound up robbing him blind of money and possessions and leaving him broke, though I didn’t know it at the time. My own marriage had broken up, and though I lived a few blocks away, I didn’t see Bob that often, until that night. Bob called me after work on a Tuesday and asked if I’d meet him at a local pub for fish and chips, his treat. We had a nice meal, a pint of beer or two, and a lot of laughs, and I walked him home carrying the twenty-four-pack of beer he insisted on buying. He asked me to stay for a couple, but I begged off as I had to work early. He was still happy as we parted. As his daughter later told me, he had already made up his mind and wanted to go out having had a good night with a friend. Bob took his life that night.
Bob’s two daughters came from their faraway cities, and I was able to take time off work to sort through his house. Anything worth money had been stolen, so it was more or less throwing stuff in the dumpster. My job was to go through a few boxes of documents in the crawlspace to try to find a will, as Bob’s daughters hated Gwen and hoped he hadn’t left everything to her. Success! The will I found left everything to the daughters. I insisted that “Mary”, the eldest daughter, take the remaining papers home instead of tossing them as she suggested. Good call, as it turned out.
Mary hired me to do repairs, painting, and other stuff to prepare the house for sale as she lived about 800 miles away. We communicated by email, but one night, she called me laughing with glee. Turned out Gwen (who didn’t bother to attend Bob’s memorial service) called Mary and, in a snotty tone, demanded payment as half the boat was hers. Mary told Gwen that she was still going through Bob’s papers and would let her know. Mary dug through the disorganized mess and struck gold. For whatever reason, Bob had put the boat in Gwen’s name, even though he paid for it entirely.
Through her laughter, Mary told me how the conversation with Gwen went when she called her back.
Mary: “Gwen, good news! I found the paperwork, and it’s in your name. You own all of it!”
Gwen was ecstatic until Mary added:
Mary: “You have ten days to get it off the property.”
Gwen had to hire a boat mover (the thing was on blocks, no trailer) and rent somewhere to store it. And the market was glutted with old boats at the time, so good luck with that.
I can still, almost two decades later, hear Bob’s voice calling me over to have a chat across the fence, and his laughter if he had known what an albatross he’d left for Gwen. Rest well, my old guy.
