Cuckoo by Julia Crouch Page B

when she was sixteen, Polly had been there, thank God. The news Rose gave her father was so terrible to him that he would probably have killed her, had she been alone.
     
    ‘Slut,’ he hissed, holding Rose by the hair, raising his clenched fist, ready to bring it down hard into her stomach.
     
    Tiny as she was, Polly launched herself across the room at him and physically stopped his arm.
     
    ‘NO,’ she yelled, so forcibly that he was shocked into silence.
     
    She stood right in front of him and spat up into his face. Rose, still cowering by the sofa, her arm over her head, looked on in a stunned silence.
     
    Her father turned and fled the front parlour of the family flat at the bottom of the tall dark Regency guesthouse, straight into the arms of his selectively blind wife.
     
    Muttering about how they would never again be able to hold up their heads in Brighton, her parents put the guesthouse on the market. They moved up to Scotland, to her mother’s home town, a small place north of Edinburgh. They did not invite their daughter to go with them, nor would she have gone had they done so.
     
    If it hadn’t been for Polly, Rose wouldn’t have known what to do. Polly’s mother had been put into hospital, so Rose moved into their flat. Polly took care of everything for Rose, sorted everything out. Yes, if it hadn’t been for Polly, she wouldn’t be where she was today.
     
    Rose finished feeding Flossie, carried her to her little bedroom and lay her down in her cot. On her back, her eyes closed, her arms flopped out to either side, the baby looked dead to the world.
     
    There was something in that position that triggered an unwelcome reverberation of the car crash Rose had witnessed earlier. She had forgotten about it until then. She closed her eyes and thought about that whole family, wiped out in one wrong move. It was all so fragile.
     
    She touched Flossie on the cheek. After a couple of moments, she murmured and smacked her lips, telling Rose she was still alive, and freeing her to leave.
     
    She went back down to the kitchen. Polly was once more in the armchair, staring into the fire, a glass of whisky in her hand. The washing-up still needed to be done, and Gareth was nowhere to be seen.
     

Seven
     
    By the time Rose managed to prise Anna and the boys apart, it was gone eleven. While Anna got ready for bed, Rose showed Polly and the boys to the Annexe. She had tried to make the space as homely as possible, scrubbing it clean and putting a load of Anna’s old toys and books in the boys’ room. Before she left for the airport she had lit a fire in the woodburner they had installed when they first moved in. She was pleased to see that it was still giving off some warmth, hours later.
     
    ‘Where’s my room?’ Nico asked.
     
    Rose showed him the little bedroom off the main room. ‘In there. You two will have to share.’
     
    ‘So tell me something new,’ he shrugged.
     
    ‘Wicked, a bunk bed. Can I go on top?’ Yannis looked up at Rose.
     
    ‘Get to bed now, you two,’ Polly said from the main room. ‘Don’t worry about teeth or pyjamas for tonight.’
     
    After a little tussle, they worked out that Nico should sleep on top as he was bigger, so if he fell off it wouldn’t seem so far. Finally, Rose managed to get them both settled down. She leaned over and kissed each of them.
     
    ‘And we can stay as long as we like, you say?’ Yannis whispered from deep within his duvet.
     
    ‘Longer,’ Rose smiled.
     
    She came out of the bedroom to find Polly pacing around the main room.
     
    ‘I know it’s rather small up here,’ Rose said, ‘but the boys are welcome to come down to the house to join us when they wake up, if you want to sleep on. I’m up at six with Floss, anyway.’
     
    ‘No, it’s lovely. It really is. I don’t know how to thank you,’ Polly said.
     
    ‘And look!’ Rose said, opening the fridge with a flourish. ‘Bonne Maman crème caramels.