The Ops Room Girls by Vicki Beeby

Author:Vicki Beeby
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Canelo Digital Publishing Ltd
Published: 2020-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

Evie had hoped the train journey to Oxford would give her the space to work out what to say to her mother. However, the train was so crowded and noisy, she hadn’t been able to think at all. By the time she climbed off the bus on Hollow Way, her stomach was tied in knots. Her feet dragged as she turned into George Street and saw the familiar green gate halfway up the street. She didn’t have a key to the front door, so she squeezed through the narrow side passage and into the back garden.

Her mother was standing outside the back door, running clothes through the ancient mangle. She had her back to Evie, and as the handle of the mangle made an ear-splitting shriek, she obviously hadn’t heard her shut the gate.

Evie stood and watched her in silence for a moment. Dora seemed to have shrunk in the intervening months. She was hunched over the mangle, wearing a faded pinny, her salt-and-pepper hair scraped into a straggly bun. She looked tired and old. A wave of sorrow swept over Evie at the sight of her brisk, active mother so reduced.

She slung her kit bag down and took off her tunic. ‘Here, let me do that, Mum. You look all in.’

Dora had been about to wring a tattered pillowcase. She dropped it onto the paving slabs and straightened with a gasp. ‘Evie!’ She looked her daughter up and down, her mouth working. ‘Oh, look at you, all grown up.’

She seized Evie in a hug. Evie returned it, swallowing back the tightness in her throat. Dora’s damp hands left clammy patches on the back of Evie’s shirt, but Evie didn’t care. For now she could forget her anger and simply enjoy the comfort of being held by her mother again. ‘It’s good to be back.’

Dora eventually released Evie and stepped back, subjecting her daughter to an assessing gaze. ‘You’re too thin. What have they been doing to you?’

‘Nothing.’ Evie was immediately on the defensive. ‘I had flu.’

‘In August? They can’t be treating you right.’ Dora fed another pillow case into the mangle; the bearings screeched with every turn of the handle. ‘If you’d only got a bank job—’

Evie didn’t wait to hear more. Muttering something about finding oil, she darted into the shed but soon realised her mistake. The mingled scent of linseed oil, wood shavings and pipe smoke evoked her father’s presence so strongly, she could almost believe he was there beside her. A wave of loss threatened to overwhelm her, the last thing she wanted when she needed unclouded wits to face her mother.

She closed her eyes. Oh, Dad. You always used to keep the peace between me and Mum. How am I going to get through the week without you?

She hadn’t seriously expected any reply, but a sudden deep sense of calm washed over her, and the scent of pipe tobacco grew stronger. In that moment Evie could almost imagine her dad was beside her, his arm around her shoulders, telling her everything would work out for the best.

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