The Mysteries of Brambly Hollow

turned right when she left the bathroom, and went to stand outside Cassie’s bedroom door. Placing her ear to the wooden panel she listened for sounds of movement inside. She could just make out the creaking of the floorboards, indicating that Cassie was up. Spinning round she returned to her own room.
    Flicking through her wardrobe, Meli selected a thick knitted red jumper to go with her jeans before ripping off her dressing gown and changing into them before her whole body turned blue like the little man in the Liquorice Allsorts packet. Sliding her jeans over her narrow hips and buttoning them up, she found that she had to tighten the belt a notch. She shook her head morosely.
    She was distracted by the sound of raised voices from downstairs. Cassie screeching at her brothers. Why couldn’t her daughter hold a normal conversation without raising her voice like a pre-menstrual banshee? Picking up a brush she ran it through her hair as she made her way down the stairs.
    Cassie had hold of a squirming David, her pudgy cheeks beetroot with anger as she swung him round by his collar.
    “Cass, put your brother down,” Meli ordered as she crossed the cold quarry tiles, heading for the fridge. Resisting the urge to hurl the heavy hairbrush at the feuding siblings like a pair of scrapping dogs, she dropped it on the worktop. Scowling, Cassie released David and stormed from the room, but not before giving him a sharp parting clip on the shoulder with the back of her hand. Filling her arms with butter, a pack of ham and some tomatoes, Meli listened to the fading echo of her daughter’s weighty feet as they stomped up the stairs. No one made any comment. David, oblivious to the fact that he resembled a failed execution, with the slash of vermilion blazing around his throat where his twisted collar had almost garroted him, grinned smugly at George. Meli bit her tongue and refused to ask what had triggered the assault; after all there was no blood, no lasting damage. Today was bad enough without the added ordeal of getting into a head to head with Cassie. Meli shuddered at the prospect. The two of them were both as much victims of today as each other, but being a teenager, and with her unstable hormone levels, Cass was like a volatile phial of nitro-glycerin which could explode at any time.
    Meli suddenly registered the time, and then it was all systems go to get lunches and kids organised for school. Working at top speed Meli magically turned slices of honey roast ham, tomatoes and granary bread into nutritious clingfilm wrapped sandwiches that rivaled anything you could purchase from the best petrol station. Deftly, she arranged them in the boys’ lunchboxes besides packets of crisps, penguin bars and apples. Just as she snapped the lids shut, the boys bowled back into the room.
    “ Now don’t forget to eat all of your lunches today, including the sandwiches,” she preached her usual morning sermon with a meaningful look and a wagging finger, wondering as she did so, why she actually bothered. Every evening was the same. The untouched sandwiches and apples would look as though they had been on the losing side in a food fight, and would be fit for nothing else but the bin. But, like all good mothers she went through the same thankless regime because hope was eternal, or so she vaguely recalled someone once saying. She watched as the twins both nodded their heads in unison like two blond headed angels, who had about as much intention of doing this as she had of swallowing a live goldfish. Whizzing round she got them into their coats, tucked David’s collar in, handed them their lunches and in record time bundled them off towards the door. Pausing at the bottom of the stairs, she shouted up to Cassie to hurry up, while donning her mac.
    Pulling back the door, Meli was blasted by the rampant wind as it hurled itself passed her in its haste to breach the opening, tossing a mixture of soggy leaves and bruised flower petals, snatched from the pots on the drive, whirling around her legs. Meli found herself momentarily frozen, stunned by the wildness of the storm as it ravaged the wooded hillside soaring up to her left, the dual onslaught of wind and rain crumpling the grey misty tree line until it appeared that it was almost flattened against the landscape like strands of wet seaweed. It was beautiful in a rugged hostile way, and it certainly complimented her mood.
    Turning her gaze she saw her sons huddled on the wet