Gut Feeling by Victoria Browne

her grandparents. Her grandmother had been battling against cancer successfully for so long but everybody had known that it was only a matter of time before the cancer would take a firm hold upon her frail body and it had become increasingly hard for her to fight it. Mary was a lovely lady and Ash was very fond of her.
    Ash still remembered the day when Rachel found out her parents had been killed, and how her grandmother was a tower of strength for them. The weekend that they died Rachel and Ash had both stayed over at her grandparents’ house in the Wiltshire countryside near Salisbury where Rachel and Ash both lived while Rachel’s mother and father went to visit friends in Scotland. Rachel’s father loved flying; it was too expensive for them to buy a helicopter but they flew his friend’s helicopter whenever they visited. Rachel’s parents hadn’t been up to see their friends in Scotland since her mother had become pregnant with Rachel; her father would plead with her mother but Rachel’s mother couldn’t bring herself to leave her only child while she was so young.
    ‘When she’s older,’ she would promise.
    When Rachel was approaching seven, she decided the time was right and Rachel wouldn’t mind so much if they left her for a weekend—they didn’t know that they would never return.
    Ash still vividly remembered that dreadful day. It was midday Sunday afternoon when Ash, Rachel and her grandparents had returned from church. Ash and Rachel ran laughing into the house, heading upstairs to play with the big old—fashioned doll’s house they both loved. Ash remembered hearing the phone ringing downstairs then what sounded like crying, but being only six and a half she took no notice, only stopping to listen for a split second.
    Rachel’s grandmother didn’t tell them until that evening after she had composed herself in order to be strong enough for her only grandchild. As the girls grew up together they both developed a great respect for Grandma Mary, as Rachel only knew her really as a mother. She was a strong, dignified woman—a hero in both Rachel and Ash’s eyes, who would help any soul in need, often putting others’ needs before her own.
    The news of her grandmother’s death had hit Rachel hard and she was not coping with her loss quite as strongly as Mary had over the death of Rachel’s mother all those years before. For Rachel, her pillar of strength had been taken from her and she wanted Ash with her for support.
    ‘Rach, of course I’ll be there. D’you need me to drive you?’
    ‘No thanks,’ Rachel sniffed. ‘I’m leaving now.’
    ‘Are you sure you should drive? I can come with you. I’ll just get my things togeth—’
    ‘No, Ash, really—I want to go on my own. You stay. Come down tomorrow. I’ll be fine. Promise.’
    ‘OK, if that’s what you want. I’m so sorry, Rach.’
    Ash hung up and broke into sobs on the floor.
    * * *
    Ash woke before her alarm, then packed some things for the journey. She called work, explaining as best she could before breaking down again into sobs over the phone. Eliza understandably told her to take time off and to be with Rachel and her grandfather, reassuring her that she would manage without her.
    Late that morning Ash set off for the countryside.
    The journey through London was slow. She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as she sat sandwiched in between two juggernauts. The traffic fumes she was breathing sat heavily around her as she waited in the queue edging forward bit by bit until she finally reached the slip road on to the M4. Putting her foot down she picked up speed and before she knew it, the juggernauts were far behind her as she whizzed down the fast lane. So many thoughts danced around in her head and she switched on the radio to distract herself, but couldn’t drown them out.
    Memories of Mary playing with her and Rachel when they were younger made her smile, thoughts flashed in her mind of riding Tarquini,