Home Front Girls

and fro, wise enough not to push any more until the girl was ready to open up of her own accord. And finally she did.
    ‘I’ve done something really terrible,’ she said hoarsely, her eyes deep wells of pain. ‘And because of what I did, Joel’s life is over before it’s even begun.’
    ‘I’m sure it couldn’t have been anything that bad,’ Miranda soothed. ‘And they do say there’s a solution for every problem if you face it head on.’
    ‘Not for this one there isn’t!’ Lucy took a great gulp of air as if she was coming up for breath. She had carried her secret for so long but now the weight of it was bearing her down, and despite the promises she had made to Joel and her mother she knew that she couldn’t carry it any longer. She seemed to be struggling with something deep inside her as Miranda watched varying emotions flicker across her face, and then she said in a voice so quiet that Miranda had to lean close to hear it, ‘My mum didn’t kill my dad . . . I did!’
    Miranda’s heart was threatening to leap out of her chest, but she kept her expression calm as she waited for the girl to go on, and eventually she did.
    ‘I once told you that my dad was a bully, and that bit was true,’ she whispered. ‘What I didn’t tell you was that after my mum became really ill and took to her bed, Dad started to come into my room in the night and he . . . he raped me. He told me that if ever I said anything to Mum or Joel, he would deny it and I would get into trouble. I believed him, so I kept quiet. I was really scared of him. It started when I was just thirteen. Eventually I missed a period and I didn’t know what to do, but eventually Mum noticed my swelling stomach and asked outright if I was pregnant. I so wanted to tell her then – in fact, it was the nearest I ever came to it – but her heart was so weak that I was afraid the shock would kill her. She still loved Dad, you see? So I made up some story about this boy I had been seeing after school and told her that the baby was his. Obviously, Mum didn’t want it to become common knowledge about the baby, so I stayed in for the rest of the pregnancy then, and on the night that Mary was born Dad paid someone to come in and deliver her, then they told everyone that Mary was Mum’s baby.’
    Lucy blew her nose and took a trembling breath. ‘I’d just left school by then and no one questioned it as I’d never got out much, what with looking after Mum and everything. So Mary wasn’t really my little sister, she was my daughter – and the odd thing was that the second I set eyes on her, I loved her. Yet all through the pregnancy I had prayed that the baby would die.’
    The girl stopped again as more tears threatened. ‘The good thing was that Dad stopped coming to my room for a while. But then one night when I was feeding Mary he came in again and something inside me just snapped. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to bear to have him touch me again so I started to scream and fight him. But he was stronger than me and he had just knocked me onto the bed when Joel heard the commotion and burst in.’
    She screwed her eyes tight shut as the memories flooded back before forcing herself to go on. ‘Joel saw straight away what was going on and he pulled Dad off me and started to punch him. Then suddenly Mum was in the doorway and I shall never forget the look on her face for as long as I live. Mary and Mum were both screaming by then and Dad was thumping Joel about the room. I thought he was going to kill him and I think he would have done, but suddenly I saw the pair of scissors that I had been using to cut out material for some nightdresses for Mary on my bedside table . . . and I snatched them up and I . . . I stabbed Dad right through the heart. I swear I didn’t mean to kill him. I meant to stab him in the arm so that he’d stop hurting Joel, but he turned and . . . Anyway, he went down like a lead weight and we all just stood there hardly able to believe what had happened. It was then that Mum told us we must say that she had stabbed him. I argued and said I wouldn’t agree to it but she told me that her life was almost over anyway.’
    Lucy stared at the tabletop, clearly seeing the scene in her mind’s eye. ‘And then there was knocking at the front door. The neighbours had heard the rumpus and had called the police. Mum picked up the scissors and when the police came upstairs they found her still holding them and arrested her for