Her aunt held her arms open wide, her one hand still gripping her maple fish-headed walking stick. As soon as Pippa reached the top step, her aunt enveloped her in her arms, squeezing her with a vice-like grip she didn’t know her aunt was capable of.
‘When did you get here, my lovely?’
‘About an hour ago.’
Footfall at the bottom of the stairs made her aunt pull away to look down into the cellar. Oliver waved up at them with a big, cheesy grin.
Aunt Morgan held Pippa at arm’s length and looked from Oliver to Pippa with raised eyebrows. ‘An hour, eh?’
Pippa was mortified by her aunt’s innuendo, and pulled her away from the cellar doorway, past the bar, and towards the stairs up to the living quarters. ‘Come on aunt. I’m gasping for a cup of tea. Is dad awake yet?’
‘He’s just in the shower, love.’
Pippa glanced back over her shoulder. ‘Ginger! Come on, boy.’
Ginger ran between their legs and bounded up the stairs ahead of them. Pippa linked arms with her aunt and braced herself ready to be inundated with emotions and memories when she saw the multitude of photographs of her mother covering every square inch of the walls in the home she’d grown up in above the pub.
But when she walked into the lounge of her childhood home, most of the photographs had been removed. Pippa’s jaw dropped as she looked from empty wall to empty wall.
Her aunt was at her side, squeezing her hand. ‘I’m sorry, Pippa. I forgot to tell you in the letter that I’d had to take most of the photographs down. They were upsetting your father...Well, not exactly upsetting him, more overwhelming him.’ She squeezed Pippa’s hand a little harder. ‘You do understand don’t you, Kiddo?’
Pippa turned to look into her aunt’s worried green eyes. She smiled through thin lips, barely able to contain her relief. Now, she could grieve for her mother in her own way without the constant sad reminder she was no longer there. ‘Of course I don’t mind, aunt. The house is exactly as it was when mom was alive. It’s perfect.’
Aunt Morgan’s shoulders appeared to visibly drop about two inches as she exhaled a relieved sigh.
The sitting room door clicked open and Pippa’s father, Brett, came walking into the room whistling with a towel draped around his shoulders. He halted in his steps when he saw Pippa and stood motionless, staring at her. Pippa’s heart all but stopped. Didn’t he recognise her anymore? Then the corners of his mouth lifted from ear to ear.
‘Pippa. My baby girl.’
Brett opened his arms wide and Pippa ran into them as she desperately tried to swallow past the lump in her throat whilst trying to stop the tears that had magically appeared again from falling.
‘What are you doing here?’
Pippa’s face was pressed against Brett’s chest and her answer came out muffled. ‘I’ve come to spend my annual leave here with you and aunt Morgan, maybe a bit longer. Is it okay if I stay in my old room this time, dad?’
Brett’s arms squeezed her even tighter. ‘Of course it is, my darling girl. Your mom will be over the moon.’
Pippa glanced over at aunt Morgan. Her aunt mouthed silently, ‘Just a slip of the tongue,’ and then she closed her eyes. Pippa noticed her nostrils flare and wondered if she was silently praying that was all it was.
