Rachel was having a particularly stressful day at work. She seemed to be dealing with too many disruptive pupils for her liking, but she knew this was likely to be because of the wet and windy weather outside. This always did seem to make it hard for the pupils to settle down and focus.
She was just eating her sandwich whilst checking through her emails when she had a call from Lily's teacher saying that she was unwell and needed picking up.
Lily had said she wasn't very well that morning but Rachel had told her to go to school and see how she got on.
Rachel sighed, Lily being poorly really was the last thing she needed at the minute. She had a meeting with the governors after lunch and once she was done there she had to take Sadie to one of her counselling appointments.
After closing down her laptop Rachel put on her coat and picked her bag up before telling Joyce where she was going and then rushing to her car.
Luckily it was only a ten minute drive to Lily's school from Waterloo Road so Rachel could get there quickly.
She went straight into reception where Lily was sat on one of the sofas. Rachel noticed immediately how pale she looked.
Rachel went over to her and sat down and wrapped her arm around Lily as she looked as though she needed a cuddle.
As soon as Rachel did this though Lily burst into tears.
"Are you not feeling very well love?" Rachel asked and Lily shook her head
"Oh dear, let's get you home then"
Rachel signed Lily out before taking her to the car and driving her home.
Lily fell asleep on the drive home so Rachel ended up carrying her in from the car, luckily she wasn't very heavy.
Rachel took her upstairs to her bedroom to change her out of her school uniform and into pyjamas so that she was a bit more comfortable.
"Do you want to get into bed or lie on the sofa?"
"Lie on the sofa"
"Okay, do you want me to bring your quilt down?"
"Yes please"
Rachel got Lily's quilt off her bed and then took hold of Lily's hand to walk downstairs.
Once Rachel had got Lily comfy she went out to get her a glass of water and then came into sit with her for a bit.
"Grandma should be here soon love to look after you, and then I've got to go back to work"
Lily's bottom lip started to wobble when Rachel said this.
"I don't want you to leave me though Mummy"
"I'm afraid I've got to, but only for a few hours"
"I can come with you like I did last time I was poorly"
"No because I've got an important meeting so it's a bit different to you sitting with me in my office for the last hour of school"
Suddenly Rachel heard Steve's Mum's voice.
"Hello" Steve's Mum, Susan, said as she opened the front door
"Hiya Susan, we're in the lounge" Rachel replied
By the time Susan had taken her shoes and coat off and come in Lily had climbed onto Rachel's lap.
"You not feeling too well love?" Susan asked her grand daughter
Lily didn't reply, but instead buried her head into Rachel's chest. She did tend to become quite clingy around Rachel whenever she was poorly. She always was a Mummy's girl, but especially when she wasn't very well.
"Right then Lil, I'm going to go back to work now so why don't I put a film on for you to watch with Grandma?"
"I want to stay with you"
"That's not an option love because I've already told you I've got a very important meeting that I have to go to. I won't be too long though"
Rachel tried to lift Lily off her lap but she only held on tighter.
So in the end Rachel had to be quite firm and she stood up with Lily and passed her to Susan.
Lily was in floods of tears now.
"Just go Rachel, she'll be fine"
Rachel hated leaving when Lily was like this but she didn't really have much choice because she really did have to be at the meeting.
"I'll be back soon Lily, and then we can cuddle all evening. Thanks for looking after her Susan"
Rachel got her coat and shoes on and walked out the door despite Lily's protests.
By the time Rachel got in the car she realised how tight on time she was, so she put her foot down a bit to get back to Waterloo Road as quickly as she could.
She managed to get back just in time and luckily when she got into her office Eddie was in there getting everything sorted.
"Joyce said you had to pick Lily up from school, is she okay?"
"Yeah just a sore throat and a bit of a temperature" Rachel said "I've just remembered though I didn't even give her any medicine, what kind of a Mum am I?"
Rachel quickly rang Susan who said she would give her some as soon as she woke up, but apparently she'd got herself so worked up over Rachel leaving that she'd exhausted herself and ended up falling asleep.
The governors had soon arrived so Rachel and Eddie went down to meet them.
The meeting lasted a couple of hours so as soon as the meeting had finished Rachel had to leave school straight away to pick Sadie up from school to take her to her appointment.
Rachel knew how much Sadie didn't like having to speak to a counsellor, but she was making good progress which was good.
She'd stopped making herself sick, although sometimes she did still want to however whenever she did she'd go to Rachel and Rachel would help her and calm her down.
Rachel had only been waiting a few minutes when Sadie got in the car next to.
"Hiya, how's your day been?"
"Not too bad, how about yours"
"Busy, and Lily's not well either just to add to all the things I had to do today"
"Only one more day and it's the weekend"
"Thank goodness for that"
When they arrived Rachel went in with Sadie and waited in the waiting room with her.
They'd been waiting for ten minutes or so when Sadie's counsellor came out.
"Hi Sadie, do you want to come in"
"I'll see you in an hour" Rachel said as Sadie stood up
"Okay"
Rachel gave Sadie a reassuring smile and then watched as she went in.
Once Sadie had gone into the room Rachel went back to the car and drove to Tesco.
She really wasn't in the mood for cooking much tonight so she just picked up some jacket potatoes for them to have.
By the time she'd finished her shop it was nearly time to pick Sadie up again because she'd done a fairly big shop.
Rachel was back in the waiting room when Sadie came out.
When she did Sadie's face told her that she'd found whatever they'd been talking about today quite difficult however Rachel didn't say anything now when there were other people around.
The two of them walked back to the car and when they got in Sadie put her seat belt on before facing away from Rachel and staring out of the window.
Rachel decided it best not to say anything for the minute, thinking Sadie probably wasn't in the mood for talking.
Sadie presumed Rachel was just going to drive home however after five minutes Sadie realised they were going in the wrong direction from home.
"Where are we going Rachel?" Sadie asked
"I thought we could go for a quick walk in the park before we go home, I don't know about you but I could certainly do with a bit of fresh air"
The truth was Rachel thought that Sadie could do with a bit of space before going home; she knew if she drove her straight home she'd only go straight up to her room.
Rachel drove to one of her favourite parks and parked in the car park.
As soon as they were both out of the car Rachel wrapped her arms around Sadie and as soon as she did she burst into tears.
Sadie cried into Rachel for a few minutes and eventually pulled away.
"I could tell that's what you needed, as soon as you came into the waiting room" Rachel said as the two of them started to walk
"It's just the stuff we were talking about today was really hard, I don't get why she needs to drag up all the bad details of my life"
"Because she wants to help you love, so she needs to understand everything that's happened to you to make you start doing what you did"
"But we were talking about when Mum and Dad got divorced and I hate talking about that" Sadie said still in tears
Rachel knew that Sadie had a lot of bottled up feelings and, although she couldn't see it, getting her to talk about it was the only way she was going to get over it.
Sadie opened up to Rachel about how hard she found it when Steve moved from Newcastle back to Manchester, as they walked around the park.
Rachel was the one person that Sadie felt completely comfortable with sharing her feelings with, something that she usually found so difficult to do. There was just something about Rachel that made her so easy to talk to.
After a while their topic of conversation changed and they were soon talking about what they were going to do at the weekend.
Rachel suddenly noticed Steph walking towards them walking her dog, so she waved.
"Do you know her?" Sadie asked
"Yeah she's one of the teachers at my school"
"Don't stop and talk to her, I bet I look a right mess"
"I can't exactly not speak, wait there"
Rachel wiped away Sadie's smudged mascara with her thumb.
"There you go, you look fine now" Rachel said. It was obvious she'd been crying but she knew Steph wouldn't say anything.
"Hi Steph" Rachel said as they got close enough to speak
"Hi Rachel" Steph said smiling at them both
"This is Steve's daughter, Sadie"
"Hello" Sadie said politely
"Hiya"
They stayed and chatted for ten minutes and then they carried on walking.
Once they'd had a walk they returned back to the car.
Even though it was cold, it was a really nice day so it would've been nice to stay for a bit longer really but Rachel knew she should be getting back to Lily.
Rachel was glad to see the smile had returned to Sadie's face.
When they got in Rachel took the shopping into the kitchen and then went straight into the kitchen.
She was still lying on the sofa and fast asleep.
Susan was still there talking to Steve.
"How was she this afternoon?" Rachel asked
"She's been asleep for most of it, probably doing her good though"
"Thanks for looking after her"
"It was no problem, you know I'm happy to help anytime"
"I really do appreciate it, do you want a cuppa?"
"No I really must be going, I need to cook tea for me and John"
Rachel saw Susan out before going to put the potatoes in the oven and unpacking all of the shopping.
After that she went upstairs to speak to Emily as she hadn't seen her yet.
Emily was sat at her desk doing some homework.
"Have you had a good day Em?"
"It was okay thank you, Rachel is it okay if I go for a sleepover tomorrow night?"
"Yeah of course, who's having one?"
"It's Bethany's Birthday tomorrow so she's having one for her Birthday"
"That will be nice, are you going straight from school or are you coming home first"
"I'll come home first so I can pick up my stuff. Could we maybe go into town first so I can buy her a present?"
"Yeah of course, I should be able to finish work a bit early again tomorrow so we I'll pick you up from school and we can go straight away"
Rachel chatted to Emily for a bit longer before going to change out of her work clothes and then going downstairs.
When she went into the lounge Lily was awake so she went over and sat with her.
"Mummy" Lily said happily as she snuggled up against her Mum
"How are you feeling love?"
"My throat still hurts and so does my head"
Rachel put her hand to her forehead and realised she did still have a temperature.
"I'll get you some more medicine, and then do you fancy a quite bath before tea?"
Lily nodded "but I'm not hungry Mummy"
"Well you don't have to eat if you're not hungry, but maybe just try and eat a bit"
Rachel went and got the calpol and measured it out before giving it to Lily before going up to run her a bath.
Once it was run Rachel went downstairs and helped Lily to come up the stairs and into the bathroom.
When Rachel took Lily's pyjama top off she noticed a rash all over her stomach and chest.
"What are you looking at Mummy?"
"You've got a rash all over your chest and stomach look"
Lily looked down and saw it and then got scared.
"Oh no is it really bad, am I really poorly?"
"No I'm sure it's fine, we'll just keep an eye on it and if it's not gone by tomorrow we might go to the Doctor's"
Rachel got Lily into the bath.
Usually Lily would be playing and splashing around but she was just lying there as she really was feeling quite poorly.
Rachel sat with Lily whilst she had a soak, and then got her hair wet before gently massaging the shampoo in.
Once Lily's hair was washed Rachel got Lily out and dried her off.
"Let's go and get you into some clean pyjamas then shall we?"
Once Lily was in some clean pyjamas Rachel dried her hair off and then Lily climbed onto her bed for a lie down.
Rachel picked up Lily's school bag to sort through it as her lunch box was still in it.
She had a quick read through the weekly newsletter and read that Scarlet fever was going around the school. Rachel quickly googled the symptoms of it on her phone and realised that Lily had quite a few of the symptoms so wondered whether this was what was wrong with Lily.
She decided it was best to take Lily to the doctor's in the morning so that they could find out.
"I need to go and get tea sorted, do you want to stay here or come down?"
"I'll stay here"
Rachel tucked her into bed before going down to the kitchen.
She put some baked beans in the microwave and started grating some cheese before shouting to Emily and Sadie to lay the table and get drinks sorted.
Once it was all ready Rachel shouted to Steve and then went to see if she could get Lily to come down.
As much as she didn't want to, Lily did come back downstairs with Rachel however she only managed to eat a few mouthfuls of her jacket potato.
"You can go and lie on the sofa if you want love, I'll come in when we've finished eating"
Lily got down from the table and went to lie on the sofa.
"Is she going to school tomorrow?" Sadie asked
"No I don't think so, I think she might have Scarlet Fever apparently it's going around her school at the moment so I'm going to take her to the doctor's in the morning"
"Is it contagious? Could we catch it?"
"Possibly, but I think it mainly affects young children"
Once everyone had finished eating Steve said he would clear up so Rachel went in and sat with Lily for a bit.
"Shall we get you up to bed then love?"
Lily nodded, when normally she would try to stay up as late as possible.
Once Lily had been to the bathroom she got into bed and Rachel tucked her in.
"Hopefully you'll feel a bit better after a good night's sleep, but I'm going to get you a doctor's appointment in the morning so we can find out what's causing this rash. If you don't feel very well in the night, come and wake me up okay?"
"Okay Mummy"
Rachel stayed with Lily until she'd fallen asleep, which didn't take long.
Rachel then went downstairs and watched EastEnders, which was just starting, with Steve and Sadie.
Emily came down about halfway through after having a shower.
Everyone was really looking forward to tomorrow being over and half term starting.
They spent the evening together in front of the TV but when the girls went up to bed Rachel and Steve did as well.
Rachel was so tired after a busy day, and was definitely looking forward to a week off work especially when Steve had the week off too.
They were taking the girls to Centre Parcs on Monday for the week and she knew they were all really looking forward to that.
In the middle of the night Rachel was woken up by Lily who said she was feeling really poorly.
"Why don't you jump into bed with us?" Rachel suggested as she was so warm and cosy that she didn't feel like putting Lily back to bed.
Rachel moved up closer to Steve so that Lily could get in and then wrapped her arms around her.
Luckily Lily went back to sleep fairly quickly and slept through until the morning.
The next morning Rachel rang the doctor's surgery as soon as it opened and managed to get her an appointment before she even needed to be in work, however it meant that they had to leave straight away.
They went into see the doctor who said that Lily did have Scarlet fever so prescribed her with a course of antibiotics.
"Mummy why is it called Scarlet fever?" Lily asked
"Do you know what love, I have absolutely no idea"
Rachel dropped Lily off to Steve's Mum's house and although Lily wasn't entirely happy about Rachel leaving her, she wasn't as upset as she had been yesterday which Rachel was glad about.
The day passed reasonable quickly and it was soon time to leave school to go and get Sadie and Emily.
Sadie had decided to come with them too rather than catching the bus home.
"Right then, what do you want to get for Bethany?" Rachel asked once they were in town
"Well I don't really have much money, so I was just going to buy her some chocolate or something" Emily said
"Oh love, you don't need to pay for Bethany's present I'll buy that"
"Are you sure?"
"Yes of course, how about we head to Boots and buy her something in there?"
"Yeah can we get her some makeup, Bethany really likes makeup"
"I would think so, as long as she's allowed to wear it"
"Yeah she is, but her Mum doesn't let her wear very much to school"
Emily picked out a nice makeup set for her.
While they were in there Rachel picked up a few toiletries that they needed. She also picked up a mascara for Emily, without her realising as she wanted to surprise her.
They didn't stay in town for long as Rachel wanted to get back for Lily and Emily was meant to be getting to Bethany's for 5.
Once they'd picked up Lily from Steve's Mum and Dad's house they drove home and Emily went straight upstairs to get changed and pack her stuff.
Rachel followed her up.
"I picked up this for you while we were in Boots" Rachel said handing her the mascara
A big smile spread across Emily's face.
"Thanks Rachel"
"That's okay love, when you said about Bethany wearing makeup I thought you'd probably like to start wearing some too?"
"Yeah I just didn't know if you'd let me"
"I don't mind, as long as you don't wear too much because you're beautiful enough without it but I know you're at the age now where you're bound to want to wear a bit"
"Rachel what do you think I should wear tonight?"
"Just wear whatever you feel comfortable in, how about that black dress with the bit at the top we bought the other day? That will look nice but it's not too dressy"
"Oh yeah that's a good idea I'll wear that, thanks Rachel"
Emily got ready for her sleepover and once she was ready Rachel dropped her over before going back to enjoy the first evening of half term.