Clean Break Read online

  ‘This is very kind of you,’ Gran said. ‘I’m so sorry to put you to all this trouble. Em, you’re not bleeding, are you? Mind the upholstery!’

  The hospital wasn’t very far away. I wouldn’t have minded if Bob had driven us to a hospital in Timbuktu. I just wanted to stay cuddled up to Dad for ever and ever and ever.

  I was very scared that Dad might go as soon as we went into the Accident and Emergency area. Gran kept telling him to go.

  ‘I’m staying,’ Dad said firmly.

  ‘Let me phone Julie on your mobile. Em needs her mum, not you,’ said Gran.

  Dad handed it over and Gran started phoning. The second she told Mum, she said she was on her way. I was so relieved, but I still had to hang onto Dad.

  ‘I need Mum and Dad,’ I said.

  ‘So do I!’ said Vita.

  ‘So do I!’ said Maxie.

  I twisted my emerald on my poor throbbing hand and wished again.

  Dad saw what I was doing. ‘Still wearing your ring, Princess Emerald?’

  ‘Of course, Dad.’

  ‘You’d better take it off right this minute!’ said Gran.

  ‘No!’

  ‘You’ve got to. Your whole arm is starting to swell. You need to take the ring off or it’ll get stuck on your finger for ever.’

  ‘I want it to be stuck! No, Gran, please, don’t take it off! Ouch!’ I tried to jerk my hand away from her and jarred my broken arm unbearably.

  ‘Hey, hey, leave her. Calm down, Em. Your gran’s right. Come here, darling, I’ll ease your ring off. Don’t worry, you’ll be able to wear it every day for the rest of your life, just as soon as your poor arm gets better.’ Dad tenderly wriggled the ring around until he’d slipped it right off my finger. ‘Have you got a pocket?’

  ‘Can’t you keep it for me in your pocket, Dad?’

  ‘OK, I’ll keep it safe for you, sweetheart. And I’ll take Dancer to the reindeer hospital, Vita, and get her poor bent antlers fixed, and make sure she has a discreet little nose-job.’ Dad looked at Maxie. ‘How are your felt tips, little guy?’

  Maxie wouldn’t answer, just burrowing his head hard against Dad as if he wanted to bore right into him.

  ‘They’re all used up because he wrote you so many letters,’ I said.

  I thought Dad would be pleased but he looked as if he might start crying again.

  ‘Yes, well might you weep,’ said Gran bitterly.

  The nurse came up to us and said they were ready for me to go and have an X-ray.

  Gran got up and started trying to pull Vita and Maxie off Dad. ‘Come along, you two, we have to go with your sister,’ she said briskly.

  ‘No, I’m afraid they’re not allowed. Just Emily – and maybe Daddy can come too?’ the nurse suggested.

  ‘Oh, yes please!’

  So I got to go off with Dad. We stayed together while I had my arm X-rayed and then I was taken to a little room where we waited, just Dad and me.

  ‘Are you too grown up a girl to sit on my lap?’ said Dad.

  ‘I’m not a bit too grown up,’ I said, climbing on his knees. ‘Just make sure I don’t squash you.’

  ‘There’s nothing of you now, I’m telling you. Where’s my little chubby-cheeks gone?’ Dad gently poked my cheeks with his thumb and forefinger. ‘Ah, at least you’ve still got your dimples!’ he said.

  ‘You’ve got thinner too, Dad,’ I said.

  ‘Ah. Well. It’s because I’ve been missing you,’ said Dad.

  I reached round to the back of his neck with my good arm. I tentatively ruffled the back of his shorn spiky hair.

  ‘When did you have your plait cut off, Dad?’

  ‘The other month. Hannah kept nagging me, saying it was sad and pathetic, an old guy like me hanging on to his hair like a hippy, so I cut it off to shut her up.’

  ‘Hannah?’ I said, puzzled.

  ‘My girlfriend.’

  ‘She’s called Sarah!’

  ‘Oh. No, Sarah and I split up soon after I went up to Scotland. So then I came back down south and eventually fetched up with Hannah.’

  I thought it all through in my head.

  ‘What is it, Em?’ said Dad.

  ‘So you could have come to visit us all this time?’ I said.

  ‘I wanted to, darling, I wanted to so much. You’ve no idea just how I’ve missed you and Vita and Maxie – and your mum too.’

  ‘So why didn’t you?’

  ‘I knew I wasn’t wanted. It was going to be a clean break, remember? That’s what your mum wanted.’

  ‘She just said that because she was cross with you then. She didn’t really mean it.’

  ‘You were all pretty cross with me. I felt dreadful. I thought maybe you were better off without me. I didn’t want you all getting so upset and angry. I honestly thought it was for the best.’

  I looked at Dad.

  ‘Don’t look at me like that, Em, I can’t bear it,’ said Dad. ‘All right, all right, I didn’t really think that. I just couldn’t stand all the rows and the sadness and feeling that it was all my fault. I always want everyone to be happy. Then I’m happy too. So I tried to put you all out of my mind, and I know I should have kept in touch, I should have sent your mum money, though I truly didn’t make much. That’s another reason why I went – I’ve been such a failure, I can’t make a go of anything, I just don’t seem to get the breaks. So I thought a fresh start, a new love, it would all work out for me. Only it didn’t.’

  ‘It would never work with that Sarah, she was horrible,’ I said.

  ‘Well. I’m no catch,’ said Dad.

  ‘What about Hannah?’

  ‘I don’t know. It’s early days.’

  ‘Dad. Come back to us.’

  ‘I want to, Em. But it’s not that simple. There’s your gran for a start. We all know she can’t stand me.’

  ‘Gran’s got this boyfriend though. He lives in Spain, she’s talking about living over there with him. She’s even spending this Christmas with him – she won’t always be around.’

  ‘Ye gods, your gran’s got a boyfriend?’ said Dad. ‘I don’t believe it!’

  ‘His name’s Eddie. We all thought he was after Mum at first, but it was Gran he fancied.’

  ‘He must be mad!’ Dad paused. ‘What about your mum? Has she got her own boyfriend now?’

  ‘Oh, Dad. Mum doesn’t want any boyfriends. She wants you.’

  ‘I’ve been such an idiot, haven’t I, Princess Emerald? How are we going to make everything end happily ever after, eh? How are we going to reunite foolish King Francesco with poor long-suffering Queen Juliana?’

  He started spinning me this long fairy tale. My arm was starting to throb so painfully it was hard to concentrate. The rest of me was hurting too, my arms, my neck, my head. It was as if I’d been shaken up all over.

  I tried so hard to believe what Dad was saying, but I didn’t know if he meant it or whether he was just making up a fairy story. I didn’t know what was real any more. When I closed my eyes all my dreams had come true and Dad had his arms round me, telling me a wonderful story and making everything better. But when I looked at him properly he seemed so different, not really like Dad. He was just this pale thin man with short spiky hair and a grubby denim jacket, telling me a whole lot of stories.

  It was easier keeping my eyes closed. I was so worn out with all the amazing things that had happened I could feel my head nodding.

  ‘That’s it, sweetheart, have a little sleep,’ Dad said softly.

  I think I must have napped for a while, because I was dreaming I was running after Dad all over again, and then when I hurled myself at him he stepped sideways and I found myself tumbling down a hole in the pavement, down down down in pitch blackness, and I started screaming.

  ‘Em, darling! It’s all right, I’m here. Does your arm hurt really badly?’ said Dad. ‘The nurse has just come, pet, they’re ready to plaster you up.’

  I clung to Dad, scared that it might be very painf