They Thought I Was Dead: Sandy’s Story

17 July 2007 — Looking back

So, even though the money from my latest pay cheque was now in my bank account, and despite my growing anxiety over what I was going to do about my debt and the baby, I avoided the temptation to nip into the Casino d’Azur and try to improve on it. Instead, listening to the sensible voice in my head for once, I headed straight home from the surgery, stopping only to buy a tuna mayo wrap for my lunch at my favourite deli. Not that in those dark days I had any appetite at all. Food had become nothing more than fuel. I ate mechanically, to live.

Arriving home around 1.30 p.m., I scooped up the mail from the floor, and sifted through it, standing up at the kitchen table. It was mostly bills and the usual rubbish — but among all the takeaway fliers, along with a renewal notice for our fridge warranty, was a plain envelope, classy paper, with my name typed. It caught my attention as it included a reference to my maiden name on the envelope.

I opened it, quite carefully, but the first thing I saw as I opened the double-folded letter, on equally classy paper inside, was the name and address of a Brighton law firm. Hobart-Widders, Solicitors and Commissioners for Oaths.

I instantly had a sinking feeling. Was I being sued? For the money I owed?

Then I read on:

I sat down and read the letter again. Then a third time. Several thoughts and questions were flying through my mind. The first was who the hell was Frau Antje Frieburg? Had the solicitors made an error and located the wrong beneficiary? And how much money might I have been left?

I googled the name, but nothing came up that remotely matched. But as my mother’s parents were German, I figured if we did have a relative of this name, she would know. After some hesitation I called her.

It wasn’t something I did that regularly, because, to be honest, calling my mother was never a great experience. I would always have to endure a litany of moans about something. Last time, a few weeks ago, it had been a list of all her ailments, followed by moans about her long wait for appointments with all the specialists she was certain she needed. It was followed by complaints about the Seaford bus service, about the rise in costs of just about everything, the weather, the paint flaking off their house a year after it had been repainted — by my father, to save money — and their car, falling to bits and my father too mean to replace it.

It took a long time for her to answer and I expected it to go to the answer machine. Although it turned out it had long since ceased to work ever since my father, a serial bodger, had tried to fix something on the volume control. She was a little breathless and as joyless as usual at hearing me. She greeted me with, ‘I was in the garden, weeding. You cannot believe how the weeds come up this time of year.’

‘I have the same problem here,’ I said.

‘No, we have really bad weeds. We have particularly tough weeds in Seaford — they have to be resilient to cope with the corrosive sea air.’

We actually lived closer to the sea than my mother and just a few miles along the coast, but I wasn’t interested in arguing about weeds. I was too excited by the letter, although I was trying not to get over-excited. ‘Does the name Antje Frieburg mean anything to you, Mum? If I’m pronouncing it correctly?’

There was a long silence. I thought for a moment we’d been cut off or, as she was prone to do when annoyed about something, she’d just hung up. ‘What did you say?’ she asked, finally, her voice sounding a little shocked.

‘I asked if you knew the name Antje Frieburg — like, who she is?’

‘Antje Frieburg, did you say?’ She repeated the name slowly and disdainfully.

‘Yes.’

There was another long silence. I finally broke it by asking, ‘Do you — did you — know her, Mum?’

‘Why in God’s name are you asking me about that bloody bitch?’