CHAPTER 56
Cathy and Nell had left us with one mumbled apology, and that was for their failure to pack up and head home immediately after their term had finished. Nell in particular had done her unsuccessful best to hide a sly smile.

“Leo’s never been to Scotland, so, well… lot’s of places to explore”

Cathy had burst out laughing at that remark, leaving Nell blushing even more fiercely than she had done at that infamous New Year’s Eve party. She started to stammer something else, and I shut her up with a hug and a finger to her lips.

CHAPTER 54
To my surprise, Tiff wouldn’t talk to me when she first arrived. A small, huddled figure reeking of fear, she almost clung to Kim, who looked at me over the child’s shoulder with a little smile that clearly said “Leave me to deal with her”

“Tiff?”

“Yeah?”

“Going to take you out the back. Quieter there, just us girls, OK?”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. That OK?”

“S’pose so… Is there a door?”

CHAPTER 52
Heidi came over a week later, having spent some time digging out the necessary paperwork Frank had asked for. We settled down in the kitchen cum airlock with a cuppa and, purely by the slightest of random coincidences, a couple of Gemma’s treats

“Took some time with one of the family court judges, Debbie. He’s someone I’ve dealt with before, a bit more switched on than most of the others. This is good! Would it, by any chance, be some of Gemma’s work?”

I grinned and nodded.

CHAPTER 50
There was an inquest, of course, and by that I mean the one in Heidi’s office. Paul dropped me a word after we had returned from the mountains, and I was relieved to hear that two women I had grown to feel a deep affection for were out of the firing line. It wouldn’t be the last time we lost a girl, by far, but at least that time we had someone to blame, blame properly, rather than a family member.

Enough on that subject. Old wounds still hurt, hurt even more, when they are opened again.

CHAPTER 48
Three days after that, on a rest day from work, there was a hammering at the back door. When I looked through the spyhole, Sparky was standing outside in the light rain that had made the last few days a miserable experience. I quickly unlocked everything and waved him into the warmth of the kitchen, but before I could offer him a cuppa he was holding up a hand for silence.

“You got a number for that copper of yours, Debbie?”

“Paul? Yes. What’s up, love?”

CHAPTER 46
I could see some of Alicia’s face in him, but he was much taller, his hair a shade lighter, what was left of it. He paused immediately in front of me for a few seconds as he scanned the room, looking for his ‘son’, no doubt. I looked over to Alicia, and caught her nudging Heidi. That answered one question, at least, for I had wondered whether he had been sitting in her office for his chats or if she had been keeping the same arms’ length relationship that I tried to. One Dearest Daddy calling at the House had been more than enough.

Heidi turned to Alicia, and I could read her mind as her eyebrows lifted in mute enquiry: are you sure about this?

CHAPTER 44
The weather was once more closing in, along with the calendar. I was getting old, I realised, and everything was telescoping. Time was shortening, each month flying past, but the House was buzzing with life, each of my girls opening up at their own rate, but opening, nevertheless. They formed a little phalanx each morning as they headed off to the school Heidi had found for them, and while I was still working my full range of duties for Bert, I was spending very little time at Ruth’s. It had always been my go-to for a decent breakfast, but with so many teenagers to be fed each morning, it would have been awkward. Fester would have lost his mind, though, over what they chose to eat.

CHAPTER 42
I will freely admit that I was terrified. The girls had not been living as themselves for that long, and so far it had been in a protective bubble. Their sixth form studies had been just down the road from the rest of us, and there had always been an available escape route in the forms of Marlene and Ruth. Their new place would be without such safety nets, as well as being a long way away from us. Oily and the rest had gone above and beyond the expected in sorting out their little car, and they still had each other to look to at University, but I was still sweating blood until their first return home for a weekend.

CHAPTER 40
That party went exactly as I had expected, with no issues beyond a prospect having to smile a but less than nicely as a guest from another club spent a bit too much time investigating how close he could get to Nell, while Kim spent a sizeable part of the evening looking wistfully after Oily, and much of the rest trying not lo make her lust too obvious.

CHAPTER 38
Paul’s confession was another little wedge knocked into the cracks in the armour I had erected around that filthy bastard Cooper, another little sign others could suffer as badly as I had. I had gained some understanding of that simple fact watching Gandalf after Sam’s murder, and as I dug out the story out around the two rapes, I found my perverse top-victim game crumbling.

CHAPTER 36
It was a little bit quieter on the ride home, as tired bodies recovered from hangovers, and nobody was really in a rush to leave such a lovely spot. We took a break at the top of the first real climb, where the quarries looked out over the flatter lands to the North, before descending to the busier ‘Amman’ towns and the faster roads back to Cardiff. After we got home, both bathrooms had queues for the balm of hot water, but I made the girls lay the tents out to dry and air before they indulged in steam and soak.

CHAPTER 35
I suppose that Maisie’s arrival was the start of another new life for me. I had managed to get through to Kim by a simple process of empathy, for she was me, in so many ways. There was a fire in her, one I had seen when she had called me a nonce and issued directions about sex and travel. Each time she snarked at someone, I heard myself passing a comment about a horse to a woman whose looks were more Clydesdale than filly.

CHAPTER 34
Life got a little more complex with three guests, but they really seemed to settle with each other. Kim and Cathy clicked immediately on the music, while the latter’s studious nature chimed with Nell’s own shyness. Kim pleased me once more, with an offer of simple kindness. Rather than have Cathy as the first occupant of the second house, Kim moved her stuff into one of the bedrooms there and handed her own room to the newcomer. Such strength in one so young.

CHAPTER 32
The boys set off home on Boxing Day, timing their departure to match my own exit on the way to work. Graham had worked with Kim the day before to prepare the vegetables in the boot of his car along with the beef joint I had spotted hidden away in the back of the fridge, so our Christmas Dinner had been as good a meal as we could make it, and in as traditional a wat as possible, my lunch box carried sandwiches made from cold offcuts of the roast, prepared by Nell as the rest of us slumped over-full in front of the usual Bond film.

CHAPTER 30
I went out of the back door and around the end of the terrace, which allowed me a look down the street at whoever was knocking, rather than taking the risk of opening the front door. It was a middle-aged man, suit and tie under a long raincoat, topped off by a golfing umbrella.

“Can I help you?”

He turned to stare, then smiled.

“I recognise that voice. We spoke on the telephone. Rhys Thomas?”

CHAPTER 28
The tops were drifted with white, as far down as the Heather Terrace on Tryfan, the sunrise pinking everything and almost dazzling in reflection from the eastern faces. Kim had the smug look that all newcomers to a place exhibit when they find someone even newer to gloat over.

“What you think, Nell? Good, or what?"

CHAPTER 26
I felt a little stupid at first, but then reconsidered. What did the idiot think he was doing collaring me there and then? I could see half of the people we wanted to warm up starting to drift away.

“Kim, Nell? Look after the urn, can you? And you, copper, passenger seat now, if you don’t mind!”

CHAPTER 24
We stayed that way for the rest of the morning, alternating a few of my more ‘lyrical’ albums with a couple of Nell’s tapes. There was one I did like, as bits of it were almost like heavy rock, but the others were a bit too fiddly for me. Nice tunes, especially in the one she had started with, but not really my thing.

“What was that loud one called again, Nell?”

“Sinfonia da Requiem. Britten wrote it for the Japanese, and they didn’t like it. Too Christian, they said. You liked it?”

CHAPTER 22
I watched the new arrival, and her gaze went straight to Anita, who shrugged in the most obvious of ways before pointing at me.

“Debbie’s house, Eleanor. Her call”

I turned to Kim, smiling as gently as I could manage.

“Upstairs here makes sense. Eleanor?”

Her reaction was delayed, so I asked myself how long she had used that name, at least openly.

CHAPTER 20
The bike ran sweetly as we swept over the Severn Bridge, that wind once more surprising me by its absence, Kim sitting in a far more relaxed way on the pillion, and then we were pulling up behind what was now our house. Luggage in, a quick shower each, using both bathrooms, and then I pulled the tent out of its bag to hang from the shower head to dry out. All of our used clothing went into the washing machine, and then we walked the short distance to Ruth’s place for something nice.

“Special tonight is sausage and mash, girls. How was the camping?”

Kim grinned.

“Magic! I don’t think my legs will be working properly for a few days, though!”

CHAPTER 18
Our early evening meal was just as I had grown used to with my old friend, but it was made so much easier with her new double-burner stove. We had the usual mix of a couple of tins of stew, perked up with the addition of curry powder and a tin each of sweetcorn and button mushrooms, served over some reconstituted ‘savoury rice’ and some plain pitta bread to wipe out our bowls. That sounds boring, but there is something about being outdoors that always gives me an appetite, and the mixture was tasty and filling. I caught Kim smiling to herself.

CHAPTER 16
I was back there a week later, leaving Kim to do some extra work with Ruth, and this time Nita was with a middle-aged woman she introduced as Heidi. I stared a little when I heard the name, and she shrugged.

“My Mam was a bit conventional as a girl. I’m just glad it wasn’t Pollyanna. Now, Nita’s been giving me a bit of background, and I have done my own checks. Can I just say one thing before we go on?”

“What do you want to say?”

“Sorry.

CHAPTER 14
The plan in question wavered a bit the next morning, as Kim seemed a little worse, and I realised that the run out to Southerndown might have been a bit premature. I raised that with her when I got in from work, no longer quite as worried that she was planning on a midnight flit. Once again, a pot of tea was produced as soon as I had my boots off.

“Kim?”

“Yeah?”

“I was thinking about yesterday. You think we were a bit early taking you out in the cold?”

CHAPTER 12
When I returned to the living room, she was still there, wrapped up tightly in the sleeping bag, a light sheen of sweat on her face. I handed her the hot chocolate I had prepared, along with the first of the antibiotics, and watched her face light up at the aroma rising from the mug.

Her voice was clear, as Sparky had observed, but still weak.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Later, girl”

Another twitch at that word. I pressed on.