Throw Away the Key

Search Engine Fiction is back for 2009 and the first prompt is - throw away the key. Here's my flash fiction story.
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Keeping the key safe and the goods locked up was the number one priority, at least according to her. “There’s nothing more sacred that a woman has,” was her mantra.

She’d handed her key to my grandfather, “the one special man”, and together they partook of the goods for three weeks until he was shipped off to the frontline and unceremoniously gunned down by a German with a stronger destiny. She locked the chest up tight after that because “the right man only comes along once”.

My mother fared no better. She met my father and within hours she’d given him her key. He stuck around a few days, and then said, “I need to get some cigarettes”; 35 years later he’s still looking for the right brand. My mother waited the nine months it took for me to find my way here, and then died in a bathtub of crimson water, her wrists slit open, evidence to my Gran once again of the sacredness of the goods. “She gave it away to easily.” A thinly veiled warning for me.

I waited patiently for 35 years for fear of making the wrong move; waiting for the special man created by destiny only for me. Gran’s gone now, but her words resonate in my head. Nevertheless, I gave her plan half my life and it didn’t produce much. Today is the day for a change.

Today’s my birthday, my true birth day, a day of transition. Time to see what is inside that sacred chest. It is time to throw away the key.