David Atkinson

There’s a crooked pōhutukawa just outside my window. It leans east, shaped by years of salt wind off the harbour. From my bed, I can see the curve of Evans Bay and, on clear days, even a strip of the South Island floating on the horizon like a distant promise. They gave me this room because of the view. Said I’d earned it. I didn’t ask what they meant by that. I’ve stopped asking for explanations.

I live in Wellington, New Zealand, have done so nearly all my life. Born here, worked here, raised my family here. The city’s changed, of course. More glass now, more noise, more people always in a hurry. But the bones are the same. The hills still lean in close. The wind still howls like it has something to prove.

I’m 92. And I’ve outlived them all—my Margaret, our daughter Anna, cousins down in Dunedin, and every mate I ever had a beer with. Even the younger ones I once trained at the post office have gone, or don’t remember who I am when I send them a birthday card.

The staff here are kind. Always calling me “Mr. Ellis,” even though I’ve asked them to just say “Tom.” They bring me tea, help with the shower, sometimes sit with me while the sun goes down. They’re good people, but they don’t know me—not really. Not who I was before this chair, this slow-moving body.

I think about Margaret most in the mornings. She always rose before me, put on the kettle with that little sigh she made only when she thought no one was listening. It’s been twenty years since she passed, and yet some days I still hear that sound. And Anna... I still see her smile, that flicker of light she never lost, not even in the final weeks. She was braver than all of us.

At night, when the corridor lights hum and the building quiets down, I lie awake and let the memories roll in like fog from the harbour. I don’t feel sad—not anymore. Just full of something I can’t name.

I never thought I’d be the last one left. But I accept it. This is how it goes. Not a punishment. Just the way time works. I wait now. Quietly. With the pōhutukawa leaning east, and the harbour still breathing below.