‘I’m relieved this is why you got us home, Mum,’ Ginny confessed. ‘Finding out about what happened with Dad and discovering we have a half-sister isway better than what I assumed was going on – I thought perhaps things were really bad with Grandad, that he really was sick.’
‘Your grandad will go on for years yet,’ said Loretta with a dismissive wave through the air. ‘Although you should know it was his idea to have him as the excuse to bring you all home.’
‘Might’ve known.’ Fern laughed.
‘The sneaky old thing,’ grinned Daisy.
Ginny realisedsomething else. ‘I’ll bet he doesn’t even need a Christmas quilt either, does he?’
All three of them were looking at her and Loretta admitted, ‘We talked about how you girls used to work together, so very happy, and it was his idea to pretend his quilt was ruined in the wash. We didn’t intend to involve Carrie though – she overheard us talking about the special quilt and then she ended up tellingDaisy.’ She shook her head. ‘I feel terrible making up all these lies.’
‘You did it for our own good,’ said Fern, surprising everyone.
‘I like Carrie,’ Ginny said all of a sudden. ‘But knowing the truth does explain a lot.’ She told Loretta how jumpy Carrie usually was, how unsure of herself.
‘I’m glad you’ve all made her feel welcome so far,’ said Loretta tentatively, because she wasn’t surewhat would happen now that they knew the truth. She stood up. ‘I’ll leave you three to talk, without me. I’m taking Busker for his walk.’
As Loretta shrugged on her coat and pulled on her boots, Daisy posed the question Loretta had been waiting for, the question each of them had probably wanted to ask for the last half an hour as the truth came tumbling out.
‘Where does this leave us, Mum?’Daisy wondered. ‘What about Carrie?’
She grabbed Busker’s lead. ‘That, my girls, is up to you.’
Loretta arrived home with Busker and from her position in the hallway she could see her daughters were back in the lounge at the far end of the house, all down on their hands and knees, working away to finish pinning the quilt. ‘So far so good,’ she whispered to Busker as she ruffled the fur on hishead. ‘They haven’t all packed up and left the house.’
But Loretta had only just unlooped her scarf from her neck when she heard the girls talking and the unmistakable wordbombfrom Daisy’s lips.
She didn’t pause to take her coat off. Instead she burst into the lounge.
‘Mum!’ Fern clutched a hand against her chest. ‘You scared me, I didn’t hear you come in.’
‘Daisy, what’s going on?’ Sheput up a hand before her youngest daughter could say anything. ‘I’ve respected your privacy, tried to trust you, but when a parent hears the wordbomband her daughter has been sneaking off at every opportunity, it wouldn’t be right to leave it.’ She waited, tipped her head to let Daisy know she could speak.
Daisy didn’t deny it but she did smile and tell her mum, ‘Keep your coat on.’ She securedthe last pin to fix the snow-white block against the bright red block with a Father Christmas figure and a sackful of presents, a candy cane bulging out of the top.
Judging by the way Fern and Ginny were grinning conspiratorially as they went to grab their own coats and shoes as well as hats and scarves, constantly giggling because Loretta was the only one still in the dark, Daisy’s sisters werein on this.
Before they filed out of the door Loretta pulled Fern back. ‘Please tell me we’re not going to a protest or anything like that.’ She had visions of paint bombs being slung at businesses or politicians as they protested the cause.
But Fern’s reassurance that this was a good thing had Loretta believing in all three of them. Because seeing Fern, Ginny and Daisy pull together on anythingwas exactly what she’d wanted this Christmas.
Telling them about Carrie hadn’t broken them, it hadn’t driven them running off to their own lives and ripped another seam that barely held tight enough to keep them attached.
And that was all she could really ask for.
