It’s Thursday now.
Yesterday was spent making arrangements. The practical kind. The kind that pretend this is manageable. I sat in the same seat I sat in when we planned Dad’s service. Same chair. Same room. Same strange detachment. My body clocked it immediately—muscle memory for grief.
Different death. Same shape.
I feel numb.
Not peaceful. Not strong.
Just empty. Like something vital has shut down to stop anything else getting in.
Tomorrow is my birthday. Forty-two.
That feels meaningless right now.
Tomorrow is also my long-awaited specialist appointment. Or it should be. Except the insurance still hasn’t authorised it. Still asking for more paperwork, more justification, more proof that I deserve answers. So it’s still limbo. Still waiting. Still suspended between something is wrong and nothing we can do yet.
Victoria and I will get Dad’s share of the inheritance. It’s strange. He left me with debts and bad memories, and now—years later—this will help. I don’t feel grateful. I don’t feel guilty. I just feel flat. Money doesn’t soften anything, but it might steady the ground a little. Every little bit does. Especially lately.
I’ll get the tattoo I’ve been planning. A mark for Gran. For Dad. A reminder to live. To love. To stay. Something permanent, because everything else keeps leaving.
I wish I could feel something about it.
Anything at all.
Tilly’s upstairs chatting to her mates. The older she gets, the more she seems to drift further away. I know it’s normal. I know it’s healthy. Tonight it still feels like loss layered on loss.
Tonight is lonely—but not the kind that wants company.
Just the kind that echoes.
I don’t really want to be awake.
I don’t want to feel this numbness.
But I don’t want to feel anything else either.
Tomorrow I turn forty-two.
It will be a strange day.
All I can do is put on a smile and move through it like a ghost in my own life.
That’s where I am.