Hit and Run - страница 18

‘You’ve got to tell him; she was in his class.’

‘I know – but don’t say anything till I’ve had chance.’

‘Why didn’t they stop?’ Eleanor stepped back, an edge of outrage in her expression.

‘They didn’t want to take responsibility for what they’d done.’

‘Will you catch them?’

‘We’re trying. It was a stolen car so it’s a bit more complicated.’

‘That is so mean,’ Eleanor said, shaking her head, her face miserable. Janine nodded. You couldn’t protect children from the grim realities. Maybe they heard more than their fair share because of her job though she made it a habit not to bring home stories from work – or only the funny ones. But even if she hadn’t been in the job, the daily news was still saturated with examples of cruelty, inhumanity, death and strife. Most of the time people compartmentalised the two worlds: the safe, private, domestic one and the big bad place out there, where awful things happened to other people. But with something like Ann-Marie’s death the two spheres collided, the divisions dissolved. The wolf wasn’t at the door, he was in the house.

On cue Charlotte kicked off just as Janine sank into sleep, the baby’s cries jerking her awake. She felt the familiar lurching feeling: a combination of resentment at being woken and fear that her child was in distress. Picking her from the cot, she tried settling her with words, rubbing her back and feeling the tiny wings of shoulder blades beneath the babygro, circling the soft, downy head with her palm.

She tried her with a bottle but the baby didn’t seem interested, there was no sign that her nappy needed changing and Janine hadn’t the energy to go through the ritual of trying to resettle her in her cot. Without Pete there was always plenty of room in her bed. Opinion-makers couldn’t agree as to whether sleeping with a baby was a good thing or not: a rod for your own back, dangerous even, or a natural state of affairs. Janine knew she probably got more sleep sharing her bed than if she spent time getting up and down to Charlotte who regularly woke three times a night. On that particular night, in the light of the tragedy she had witnessed, it seemed a precious thing to be able to take the child into her bed and fall asleep aware of the small presence nestling beside her.

First thing the next morning Janine went through to Tom’s room. Plastic dinosaurs, action-men figures and small soldiers littered the carpet. He slept on his bunk. His cheeks looked flushed; his arms were flung up behind his head.

‘Tom,’ she said gently.

He opened his eyes. Gave her a sunny grin. He scrambled out of his duvet and down the ladder, clutching a beanie-baby dragon.

Janine sat on the sofa-bed beneath his bunk and patted her knee. ‘Come here a minute.’

‘Why?’

‘I want to talk to you.’

He gave a small sigh and wriggled onto her lap.

‘You heard about Ann-Marie’s accident?’

He nodded, bounced the dragon on her leg and then his own.

‘Well, Ann-Marie was very badly hurt.’

‘Where?’ Tom was always literal, and curious.

‘Everywhere,’ Janine said. ‘And the doctors tried to make her better but she was too poorly.’ Janine paused a moment, trying to assess how direct to be. Tom put both his hands on the dragon and held it close.

‘It’s very sad,’ she went on, ‘you see Ann-Marie died. Everybody is going to be feeling very sad about it.’

Tom was very still. She gave him time but he said nothing. She put her arms round him pulling him back for a cuddle. ‘OK?’ she asked.

He murmured, stood up and stretched the dragon’s wings wide. ‘Mum?’

‘Yes,’ she steeled herself for difficult questions.

‘You know when I’m eight; for my party, can we go to Laser Quest?’

She bit down on the laughter rising in her throat. Bless him. ‘Yes,’ she said tightly, ‘course you can.’

He nodded and shot out of the room holding the dragon aloft.

Once she was dressed, Janine took Charlotte down and suspended her in the baby bouncer from the kitchen doorway. That gave Janine a chance to get on with the kids’ breakfasts. ‘Put those two slices in when you’ve got yours,’ she said to Michael who was hovering by the toaster. Eleanor and Tom were just finishing off their cereal and arguing about the puzzle on the back of the packet.