10.

Day Seven – Catherine.

"Lindsey!" I holler up the stairs at my 'beautiful angel,' who is currently blaring obnoxious pop music so loudly from her room that I can hear it in the kitchen, where I am procrastinating before I have to go to work, something I really don't feel like doing tonight. I wasn't just trying to flatter Sara – the atmosphere is that little bit darker without her there, and I don't know about the others but whenever I walk past the glass-fronted labs, I keep expecting to see her in there hunched over a table, chewing her lip as she examines whatever piece of evidence she's desperately trying to make sense of. She's part of our team, our family, and the strain of one of us being in a bad way is showing in everyone.

"Mom? Did you say something?" Lindsey yells down the stairs, without lowering her music.

"It's almost time to go to Nancy's sweetie. Do you have your stuff ready?" I choose to ignore the issue of her obnoxiously loud lollipop music. That's another mom point for me, right?

"Yeah" she huffs, and I can tell she's rolling her eyes right now.

I walk up the stairs to her room, and knock on her door, waiting patiently for her to open it. I would hate it when my mom would just barge in on me without knocking, as she so frequently did. Actually now that I think about it, she still does it whenever she gets the opportunity. Typical mom.

I hear Lindsey's music stop and my ears feel happier. She pulls open the door and instead of the frown I'd come to expect she gives me a small smile. I'm still getting used to this lighter Lindsey. "I'm sorry sweetie. I'd much rather be spending the evening with you, at home" I tell her, coming into her room and sitting on her bed.

She sighs. "Really?" She sounds as if this is the last thing she would believe.

"Of course baby" I say, unable to stop the grin that forms as she wrinkles her nose at the nickname. I pick up one of her stuffed animals – a purple unicorn that I bought her years ago - and start fiddling with it while I try and talk to my little girl. "Linds, I'm sorry if I haven't let you know this enough, but you are the most important person in my life. Everything I do: working these hours, doing overtime; is so I can spend as much time as possible with you while making as much money as possible for our future."

"I'd rather have you at home and not have any money" she says to me quietly.

I smile at her naivety. "It might seem like that, but if I didn't do my job, we wouldn't be living in this house. You wouldn't have this bedroom and all the things in it, and you wouldn't be looking forward to going to college when you're older." It's her turn to smile a little at this and I continue, "Don't get me wrong, I like my job, and I like providing for you and me; I'm happy to do it. That's what mothers do for their daughters: give them their best." Fathers should of course come into play here too, but even if Eddie hadn't died I don't think he would have been too concerned with providing Lindsey with security; he certainly never gave me any. I shiver, as ghosts of arguments and occasional violence run through my mind.

Lindsey's looking at me oddly, like she wants to believe that I would give her the world if only I could but has seen too much evidence to the contrary, and I hate myself just a little that my little girl has ever doubted my love for her. All efforts must be doubled, I tell myself. Negative five mom points. "Linds, I. Love. You," I tell her nice and slow. "Have you ever thought differently?" The way her eyes sweep guilty around the room looking everywhere but at me tells me all I need to know and I pull her into a hug. Blinking back tears, I ask her "baby, when?"

She pulls back and looks me in the eyes, so much like my own, and shrugs her shoulders. I exhale slowly, and embark on the words every mother dreads having to say: the ones that acknowledge that they have fucked up royally with their child. "Sweetheart, I know you've had a really tough time since dad died, and even a bit before that. I know that we haven't been spending enough time together, and that's my fault. But I also know that somehow, things have been better between us for the last month or so. I haven't been all 'crazy mom' and you haven't been quite so sullen at least."

"Oh mom, you're always crazy" she tells me, making us both smile. That's my girl, trying to look after us both.

"Watch it, cheeky" I say, obviously joking. "What I think is important is that things don't get that bad again. Which is why I think that it might be a good idea for you to go and see someone."

"What do you mean, see someone?" she asks, suspicious now.

"I think it might help us in the future if you had someone to talk to, who you could tell anything to without feeling guilty, like you shouldn't be thinking the things you are." Lindsey immediately screws her face up into a frown at my words. "Now, I know what you're probably going to say, but I really think if you give it a try just once, you might be surprised at how helpful it could be. And then you can decide whether or not you want to go for another session" I manage to get out.

"I don't know, mom…" Lindsey sighs again. She looks at me for a long time, and whatever she sees in my eyes - hope, pleading, sincerity, guilt – obviously strikes a cord, as she says "okay, I'll try it once."

"Really?" I ask, smiling big.

"Yeah. But if I hate it, I'm not going back, ok?"

"Deal" I tell her, pulling her down onto my lap for a hug. "Now, there's something else I wanted to talk to you about."

"I'm not going to school in a convent if that's what you're about to suggest."

I smirk at her. "Actually, it's about Sara. She's been having some problems lately…"

And so it begins.