“And Nana B hopes Nana T sleeps well in the spare room tonight”
 
By the time Tina returns she has managed to compose herself, she sits back down on the sofa next to Bette and puts Alice back on her knee.

Leaning over she quickly pecks Bette’s cheek and whispers

“Sorry babe please don’t make me sleep in the spare room”  Tina knows there is not a snowball chance in hell she will be sleeping in there but plays along anyway.

“Hmmph…We’ll see…..” Bette flips over the page and instantly her whole body tenses.

“ Why don’t we take a break….you want to go watch a movie in the hologram room”  Tina quickly suggests.

“Yippee”  Alice has already jumped off Tina’s knee and is halfway across the room before she beckons Shane.  “Come on slowcoach”  

“Are you ok Nana B” Shane enquires.

Bette ruffles his hair, and admires her grandsons  level of sensitivity and compassion for one so young.

“With you here how could I not be ok”

Shane seeming appeased runs after his sister.

Tina removes the book from Bette’s lap and puts it on the floor, puts her arm round Bette’s shoulders and draws her head to her.

“50 years T….she left 50 years ago and I remember it like it was yesterday

England 1979

Elizabeth flips herself over onto her tummy and pulls the pillow over head, anything to try drown the screams and shouts coming from downstairs.  They had started the minute she had come to bed and had continued constantly for what seemed like hours.

She had thought for a second that the pillow had actually worked as the shouting had stopped, that was until she heard her bedroom door open and her mothers voice.

“Elizabeth are you asleep”

She flipped her self back over and sat up.

“No”

She can tell her mum has been crying as she moves along the bed and her mum sits up on the bed next to her and pulls her in to her chest.

“I’m so sorry sweetheart you shouldn’t have to listen to all that”

She can feel her own anxiety dissipate and takes great comfort by the fingers that are currently running through her hair.  They both lay there in silence for a few minutes.