Read Online Conditional Love by Cathy Bramley - Free Book Online Page B

tributes. Relief had washed over me as I tidied up all the flowers, picked out the dead ones and re-arranged them neatly. Great Aunt Jane had obviously been popular, there must have been eight bouquets and wreaths around her plot. I was glad she had had loved ones to mourn her. I flicked through the hand-written cards to see if my father had sent some and found nothing.
    A knot of fury punched at my chest. He knew she had passed away. My father was one of her few living relatives and he hadn’t acknowledged her funeral.
    I didn’t think I’d ever heard my mum say a good word about him and now I was beginning to understand her annoyance. Perhaps letting a man like that into my life would be a mistake, however brief our meeting? Who knows what would happen afterwards, I might never get rid of him.
    I gazed at the grave. The mound of earth still looked fresh. I felt like I should say something. What was the protocol of talking to the deceased? There was no one around to hear me, but it felt weird speaking normally. I decided to simply think a message and assumed it would be just as valid as saying it out loud.
    I wish I’d met you properly, before now. Then maybe all this will stuff wouldn’t be so confusing. I’m in a right pickle, you know! My friends are no help and no one can agree on what I should do next. The only thing I’m definitely sure of is that that horrible estate agent is not getting his hands on your little house.
     
    My tea was cooling and I took a big slurp. The bungalow keys sat on my bedside table. Usually on a Sunday morning, I Skyped my mum. I hadn’t called her for three weeks; I hadn’t worked out how much to say about the will yet and was convinced that she would be able to tell something had happened and would instantly wheedle it out of me.
    Jess had declared that meeting my dad would cause too much trouble and Emma was so sick of me going on about it that I dared not mention it at all.
    Why was it when you read about people inheriting property and money from a distant relative, it always seemed like they’d won the jackpot? Now it had happened to me, it felt more like a millstone round my neck.
    Oh heck, I’d started the morning feeling as carefree as a spring lamb and now I felt more like a weary old piece of mutton.
    I needed a second opinion. Technically, the estate agent had given me that, but I hadn’t liked what he said so it didn’t count.
    I gave my radio alarm a whack to make it play some mindless pop music to distract me. A news programme came on instead and I groaned automatically.
    ‘Yes, there’s a housing deficit, and yes, we need more houses at affordable prices,’ said a male voice, ‘but the Government needs to accept that giving planning approval for all these social housing projects is like putting a sticking plaster on a broken leg.’
    Normally, the words ‘crisis’ and ‘Government’ were enough to have me reaching for the dial, but my new preoccupation with houses meant that I was actually quite interested, so I kept still and listened.
    ‘The architecture of our city is being sacrificed for the sake of short-term solutions. These tiny new houses may be cheap but they are poorly designed.’ He had a nice smooth voice, youngish, professional, and definitely clever. But what struck me most was his passion.
    ‘They won’t stand the test of time like our Victorian terraces, which have been providing accommodation for over a hundred years. In ten years’ time…’
    ‘Ha, take that Mr Smarm-Face Estate Agent,’ I said, remembering the brochures I’d had foisted on me.
    ‘Thank you, Nick Cromwell,’ interrupted the radio presenter. ‘Can I turn to you, Malcolm Shaw from the City’s Housing Department? How do you respond to the claims that these new houses are not fit for purpose?’
    ‘Our housing policy is clear: to provide clean modern accommodation for the people of this city,’ droned the councillor. I could almost see him thumping the desk for