If I Let You Go by Kyra Lennon

weeping. But when a tiny hand began stroking my hair, my awareness of my surroundings came streaming back. Tilly sat down beside me, and clutching her monkey with one hand, she comforted me with the other. I straightened my legs in front of me and pulled her onto my lap.
    “Did Daddy make you upset too?” she asked.
    “No, sweetheart,” I told her. “It wasn’t Daddy’s fault.”
    It was all me, trying to make sense of everything.
    “I thought you might need Mungo,” she said, handing me her favourite toy.
    I smiled as I stroked his brown, mottled fur. “Thank you. A cuddle from Mungo is exactly what I need.”
    “Daddy made me upset.”
    “Oh, baby girl,” I said, pulling her to me. “Daddy doesn’t mean to make you upset.”
    “I’m not a baby,” she mumbled into my shoulder.
    She said the same thing to Dominic on Friday. We really had to stop calling her that.
    “If Daddy didn’t want me to be upset, he wouldn’t be making me move to New York.”
    “The thing is, sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do. It’s like … when I have to do the ironing. I don’t like ironing, but if I don’t iron, you’ll have to walk around in wrinkly clothes.”
    The scepticism in her eyes made me laugh, and I went on, “Okay, bad example. Remember when you first started school? You didn’t want to go there, but you had to because there are things you have to learn. Things me and Daddy don’t know how to teach you. And after a while, it started to get easier and you made new friends. Now you like school.”
    “I do. But I want to stay at my school, with my friends. I want to stay with you. Daddy’s mean.”
    “Listen to me,” I said, leaning back just a little so I could see her face. “I know you don’t want to go away, but Daddy isn’t doing it to be mean. He loves you very much, you know that don’t you?”
    She shrugged. “I suppose so.”
     

 
    Chapter 6
     
    The second half of my week with Tilly was equally as challenging as the first. She was happy when we did things to keep her mind off moving, but the moment we stopped, she became withdrawn and moody again. There were many more tantrums, and she still wouldn’t eat properly. On Wednesday night, I heard her crying in her room. It broke my heart, but I let her be. On Thursday night, she was so upset that she came into my room and slept beside me, snuggling as close as she could until she drifted off to sleep.
    When Friday came around, Tilly woke in a slightly more chipper mood. She was spending the night at her best friend’s house, which gave her something to look forward to. Dominic had asked me to arrange for Tilly to be out because some people were coming over to value the flat. Frankly, I wished I could have been out too because the idea of someone else living in our home made me feel sick. Lucy, was the first friend Tilly made at school, and when I asked her mum if Tilly could spend the afternoon with her, she offered to keep her for the whole night. I knew there was a strong chance I’d have to pick her up at some point, but after explaining the situation to Mrs Cook, she promised to take good care of her.
     
    The apartment was spotless when the estate agents came over. I’d worked my arse off to make sure every surface sparkled, every speck of dust was removed from the carpets and there wasn’t a single item out of place. I even managed to be polite – a challenge when what I wanted to do was tell them to bugger off.
    Once they’d gone, all I had left to do was wait for Dominic to get home. He was due back around six, so when the phone rang at five-thirty, I figured it would be him, asking me to order a pizza. He’d emphatically told me not to cook after rushing around to get the house tidy.
    “Hello,” I said. “What topping would you like?”
    Instead of Dominic’s familiar laugh, there was an awkward cough that somehow managed to make me feel like an idiot.
    “Hello. I don’t know if this is the right