Page 63 of Mad Mabel

She holds out her baby finger, forcibly entangling it with mine.

“What on earth are you doing?”

“Say: pinkie promise,” Persephone instructs, her tone firm despite the sleep creeping into her voice.

For the love of God.

“Pinkie promise.” I remove my finger. “Now I think it’s time you went to bed.”

I have to push her into a standing position, then she scurries over to her bed and slips under the covers.

“Want to hop in?” she asks me.

“No,” I say. “The chair will do fine.”

“Mummy hops in with me.”

“Well,” I say, adjusting my nightie as I settle into the chair. “I’m not Mummy.”

I flick off the light and lean back into the armchair, which is surprisingly comfy. The tension in my temples eases just a little as I let my eyelids close.

Persephone lies on her side, her hands steepled beneath her cheek, eyes fluttering closed.

“I love you, Elsa,” she murmurs sleepily.

I open my eyes and see that she’s watching me in the darkness. For pity’s sake.

“Sleep well, child.”

Her eyes close, and her breath evens out. Only then do I allow myself the smallest of smiles.

38

Keys rattle in the lock, jolting me from sleep. For a moment, I forget where I am. But as the front door creaks open, instinct takes over and I shoot to my feet, running out of the room with impressive speed for an elderly woman. Nugget, who’d been asleep in the hallway, also leaps up and starts barking maniacally.

By the time I get there, Roxanne is peering around the door, which is blocked by the chair.

“What the—?”

The dog is still barking. I can’t think straight. “Nugget, would you knock that off?”

By some miracle, she does. I move the chair from the door and Roxanne comes inside.

Roxanne looks bewildered. “Elsie? What are you doing here?”

“Mama?”

From where we stand we have a clear view to Persephone’s room,so when we look we see her sitting up in bed, rubbing her eyes. Her voice is thick with sleep.

“Hi, baby.” Roxanne walks into Persephone’s room, and sits at her bedside, smoothing a hand over her daughter’s hair. “Sorry I woke you. I wasn’t expecting to see Elsie, and it gave me a fright.”

Persephone lies back down. “A man came here. Elsie protected me. I asked her to stay with me until you got home.”

The air shifts. It’s hard to see Roxanne’s expression in the dark, but I can tell from the way her spine straightens that this isn’t just a misunderstanding. She meets my eye, then quickly looks away.

“Well,” she says, her voice carefully level, “I’m home now. So why don’t you go back to sleep?”

She pulls Persephone’s quilt up over her shoulders. I wait for Roxanne to get up but she stays there, watching her daughter sleep. It continues long enough that I leave the room, with Nugget at my heel, and wait for her in the kitchen.