A Home Without Servants
Chapter 14 - A Home Without Servants
Rose rented a small two-bedroom house near Thomas’s school.
The Mercer estate contained forty-three rooms.
Thomas preferred the smaller house.
He could hear Rose cooking from anywhere.
He struggled with ordinary life.
At the estate, someone tied his shoes, selected his clothes, and cleared every plate.
At Rose’s house, he made his bed badly.
He burned toast.
He learned the trash went out on Tuesday.
Rose sometimes missed the certainty of serving him because motherhood required choices he could reject.
They argued.
That was new.
It was also safe.
Thomas kept Daniel’s toy train on a shelf.
The pocket watch was gone, but the ring remained.
Rose wore it again.
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She did not call herself Daniel’s widow in every room.
She began training as a legal records clerk, determined to understand the documents once used against her.
