A Brief History of Tina

1 - Monday

It really has been one hell of a week and more to come maybe, though I really am not sure how this is all going to work out. An awful lot has happened since last Monday, I am just beginning to make sense of it. Or at least, some sense.

On Monday I decided to 'shake myself out of it'. Out of the depression of the past six weeks at least. I have been living here, in my Uncle Jack's house, since that awful day six weeks ago. Since the car crash.

Both my parents were killed. OK, at my age, I should have been able to cope with that, but on top of all my other problems it was a massive shock. Just before that my Dad's business folded, the shop we were running together had to close. Blasted hypermarkets, no good at all for the small retailer, the business I had helped start and get going fifteen years ago, it just couldn't compete. Then just after Christmas it really went wrong, unsold stock, bills, Dad just had to give it all up to pay the creditors.

Which left me jobless. Then to top it all two days later that big motorway pile-up, my parents' car was right in the middle of it. At least that put paid to any stories about suicide, the television pictures proved that. But the insurance money, what little there was, all got taken to help sort out the debts. The house too, the extra borrowing to try to keep going had eaten up that too.

Which left me on my own, Not entirely penniless, I know now why Dad insisted I keep an account in my own name, he wouldn't let me put everything of my own back into the store. Thankfully Uncle Jack, who had married Mum's younger sister, he took pity on me at the funeral, offered me a place to stay, he is on his own right now. He has had his own share of tragedy. His wife, my Aunt Jean, herself died about four years ago, a terrible wasting illness which left her fading and in some pain for about three months at the end. But at least he still had Emma, lovely Emma, she was away at college. He was on his own in this big house and welcomed some male company.