No Longer Your Live In Maid

Summary

Five years. That was the length of time I’d given Elena, only for it to feel like a lease that was finally running out.

My mother’s voice was a jagged edge over the phone, sharp with a frustration that had been building for half a decade. In the living room, Elena was hunched over the coffee table, deep in a game of Jenga with Toby. My cat, a tabby I’d raised since he was a kitten, was curled contentedly in Toby’s lap. They looked like a portrait of domestic bliss.

I was standing on the balcony, separated from them by a sliding glass door, feeling less like a partner and more like a ghost…