"Come on Rose, we ain't got reserved seats," her mother called as other people were still getting off, some just waking up by the look of it Rose was thinking as they made their way to a doorway where no-one was coming out of.
Jackie was putting their luggage in the rack, pointing for Rose to grab the first two sets of seats with a table in the middle so she could keep an eye on their cases and Rose was trying to put the rest of their things including two shoulder bags on the overhead rack and getting in the way, a man stopped to help her.
"Thanks," Rose grinned at him as people were squeezing past.
"No problem Miss, they seem quite heavy," the man replied as Jackie sat herself down opposite as she didn't want to go backwards all the way to Glasgow as it made her feel sick.
She'd made a point of noting where the restroom was when walking down the platform and how she did it, Rose had no idea but she'd done the same when they'd gone down to Jimbo's caravan. Rose was sure her mother had crammed most of the remaining trinkets and other junk into the shoulder bags, explaining why they were so heavy.
Rose sighed as she sat down next to her mother and hoped whoever sat opposite wouldn't try to spread their legs out but being so near the front, people were forgetting about the seats and walking past, thankfully. As the guard blew the whistle as he slammed all the doors shut, Jackie motioned for Rose to sit opposite, getting two bottles of soda out of her large handbag.
Rose smiled, dragging luggage from home hadn't been her idea of fun, especially when she'd not wanted to move in the first place.
"Might as well save it for later," Rose told her mother. "How long does the train take to get to Glasgow? We don't have to change do we?" she asked, hoping not and that Bob, no matter how she disliked him would be on the platform at the other end to meet them.
"It's a long way Rose, it's gonna take a while sweetheart, I did warn ya. We can start making our plans for when you start your new school. Bob said I can apply for a grant to get ya a school uniform and I called the grammar school, you'll have to take a test so I hope you were paying attention last term and not messin' around," her mother warned her.
"Great Mum, now I'll have to hope it'll be enough to get me in. Is that the only school then?" Rose asked.
"No but it's the best one so Bob said," Jackie replied.
Rose was already fed-up at Bob said this and Bob said that, she already wanted to strangle him before they moved in with him.
"Well when we get settled, we'll get you a library ticket and you can get some books out to catch up," her mother continued.
After the conductor came round, followed by two women with a trolley of tea and coffee and snacks, Jackie splashing out and getting something then moaning to Rose about the prices, Rose was looking out of the window at where they were passing then the train had a longer stop when it got to York, Rose wishing she could get off and stretch her legs but a woman with a small boy was looking for a double seat so Rose got up and let them sit where she had been, smiling at what looked like a two year old.
"Thanks love," the mother told her as she settled the boy, him putting two toy cars on the table. "Not many youngsters would bother moving. Mind you, not many adults would either, I came from the carriage in front and men were spread out talking to each other across the tables and leaving the outside seats."
"Tell me about it," Jackie spoke up. "It was the same last time we travelled by train, remember Rose?"
Rose had no idea what her mother was on about, she'd only been on two trains in her life – on holiday and back and not being well on the return journey, after the damp caravan.
The train carried on, stopping at Newcastle Rose thought the platform sign said and thought it seemed like they'd been on for days, not hours. The train had got busy, some people were standing in the doorway and between the carriages, glaring at Rose but her mother told her she'd paid for two seats and the people staring had only just got on at the last stop.
The conductor called out for those who had just got on, Rose seeing a man in the doorway say something to him and the conductor looking at Rose. Jackie saw them.
"He'd best not ask ya to move or they'll be trouble," her mother told her.
A man and a woman were now sat opposite as the woman with the boy had got off at Newcastle.
"Children are expected to stand and give up their seat to their elders," the snooty looking woman wearing a hat said to no-one in particular.
"I've paid for her seat," Jackie replied to the woman as the conductor was waiting for the man with her to show their tickets.
"Madam, I already pointed out to the gentleman over there that the young lady is not a child," he smiled at Jackie, making the other woman look up as her husband nudged her. "If you ask me, it's the men that should give up seats if ladies are standing but there's no manners left in the world."
"Well my husband's not standing, he has a bad leg," the other woman spoke up.
"It's fine dear, if there are any ladies standing, I would let them have my seat," her husband replied.
Rose was quite amused, geez, if she ever got married, she wouldn't show her husband up like that, well unless it was Mickey Smith, then she might make an exception. She'd not dared tell her mother Mickey had dropped that bombshell on her and told her if she'd stayed, he was going to ask her out when she turned sixteen. Great, that was something to look forward to – not, she thought.
It had taken a drastic move by her mother to drag them to Scotland to get her out of it though, maybe her mother had already had a premonition and was trying to prevent it? The woman opposite was still glaring at Rose and her mother, Rose dying to pull a face but then the man with her might take his wife's view and demand the conductor made her stand up regardless if a woman was standing or not.
Finally, Rose losing track of the time, the train was pulling into Glasgow, the conductor shouting as he walked down the carriages. Rose wished someone would invent a sign that told you what the next stop was or a map like the underground, she could ride that with her eyes closed.
It was just like her mother to guess which platform the train would pull into and they'd be sat on the right side, Jackie watching out for Bob and waving madly when they passed him as the train pulled to a halt, rather abruptly Rose thought, glad she'd remained seated as people were gathering to get off.
Then Jackie turned her attention to the luggage rack, a few more cases piled on top of theirs and people pulling them off.
"Rose I'll get the bags off the rack, you go help Bob with the cases when everyone's got off," her mother suggested as people were making their way off.
Rose wondered if her mother thought the train was there for the remainder of the day. Bob was soon able to get on but went to help Jackie pull the bags off the overhead rack, leaving Rose standing by their three cases, two large ones and one smaller and wondering how the hell they'd managed on their own earlier. Bob put one of the bags on his shoulder as Jackie nudged him to lift the cases off.
"Hey, sorry Rose, want some help?" he joked.
Rose knew better than to say something sarcastic back to him but was considering making an exception. Instead she just nodded. He took the cases down, Rose grabbing the smaller one and getting off before he had chance to object and stood back on the platform to let some stragglers off including her mother and Bob.
Bob led then through the barrier, having got a platform ticket and Rose not working out how they had the cheek to charge people for greeting friends and relatives off a train when at smaller stations they could just walk on. He had parked his car in a short-stay car park and put the cases in the back, Rose had been wondering what type of car he drove and was surprised how big it was.
He drove them out of the city and through the suburbs until she saw a sign for Paisley with a 'Welcome' on it. Then it finally hit her – they were here to stay, not just for a few days. Bob drove on and turned down a reasonably decent street and pulled into a driveway of a block of apartments, Rose quickly counting there were eight floors and hoped there was a lift and they were not on the top floor if there wasn't.
She thought it was a far cry from where they'd just come from, there were separate balconies every other window or so, some next to each other as Bob stopped the car in what she assumed was his parking spot, a large notice saying 'Residents only' on it.
Once they got the luggage out, Bob showed them both the code to get in and told Rose not to forget it.
"I've got you two keys," Bob told them as they rode up in the lift to the third floor. "Don't lose yours Rose."
Rose wondered what her mother had been telling him but she'd had a key since she was twelve and never lost it but maybe he'd had to pay to have the keys cut or the landlord had charged him for them. Once they carted everything inside, both Jackie and Rose stood in the entry-way looking around.
"You never said your place was so posh," Jackie joked as she put the case and shoulder bag down, Rose still convinced she'd brought things they didn't need with them.
"I'll show you around then?" Bob suggested.
He led them to the kitchen, about the same size as their old one but a slightly different shape, then the bathroom, considerably larger then a storage cupboard, half empty and Rose laughed to herself he'd expected her mother not to leave much behind. Then he opened a bedroom door containing a single bed and wardrobe, plus a set of drawers and a desk.
"This is your room Rose, I expect you to keep it tidy," he told her.
They left the door open and he led them to the lounge, nicely decorated and not cluttered like their old one had been but if her mother kept her old habits, that would change. There was a nice TV, not like their old one Rose had no idea who had claimed it, a hi-fi on a black unit along with some records and a rack containing cassettes and some ornaments and vases amongst other things then Rose noticed he'd put a picture up of him and her mother that must have been taken in the pub.
"Come on Jackie, I'll show you our room," Bob suggested, going to put his arm around her.
Rose guessed she wasn't invited so she went to get the smaller case and trusted her mother would unpack the other two and hand her the things she'd had to cram into one of them. She closed her new bedroom door and sat on the neatly made bed and tried to take it all in. Her mother had told her before they'd left London that Bob would have a list of rules she was expected to follow and they weren't up for debate but he'd already made that much clear.
She expected one of them would be if she managed to make new friends, she wouldn't scatter things over the floor but that had been her having more things than there had been room for before. Now she had a larger wardrobe and behind the door was a built in cupboard so she really had no excuses she supposed.
Her mother knocked on the door.
"Rose, Bob's going to the takeaway for some food, then tomorrow he'll show us a round the town."
"Yeah, fine, guess I'll have to know my way around? How far is it to this school I'm supposed to go to?" Rose asked.
"I think it's in walking distance, I'm not sure though but you'll get a bus pass. First ya have to get accepted."
Rose wished she hadn't been reminded. So after being shown around the next day and finding out where the local library was, she went to get a library ticket and got the books out she was going to need when her mother called the school the day before to ask about an entrance examination, hearing her mother's end of the conversation.
~~~~{ silversurfer60 }~~~~
Even after a week of the holiday, Alec was already bored. He'd been with his aunt to the cemetery and she'd left him on his own to cry when he'd put some flowers in the vase and she'd taken the others away and she'd told him it was okay. So the following Tuesday, he decided to meet one of his friends at the library and spend some time there as they'd been told what subjects were coming up the next term so they'd met outside.
"Maybe this wasn't such a good idea?" his friend Jamie told him as the library seemed fairly full but they were going to the reference books after they'd been to the desk to alter their tickets, since they now qualified to move up from the junior library.
"Well it will give us an advantage," Alec was trying to persuade his friend.
"Maybe but maybe you came here to watch the girls Alec," his friend grinned as two girls were sat in a corner pretending to read something.
"You're as bad as my aunt," Alec replied, running his fingers through his too long hair and seeing the girls hide their grins behind their books.
"What about her over there?" his friend nudged as Alec tried to find one of the books on his list.
Alec turned and looked at a blonde-haired girl sat at a table on her own. He wasn't that interested in girls, he was shy in that department but he could talk to the girls in his class when they didn't tease him about his spiky hair, especially when Kristy did it, egged on my her friend Moira.
"I don't think she's from our school," Alec replied, turning back to the shelf and trying to convince himself and his friend he wasn't interested.
"She's probably from the local comprehensive school," his friend surmised. "As if we'd want to been seen with one of them."
"Don't be so stuck up Jamie," Alec told him. "Just because we passed our exams, they can take them later and still get in our school. She might be here studying."
"I suppose so. Let's hurry up here and go down to the river," his friend urged him.
Alec wasn't so keen. It reminded him of family days out when his mother would pack a picnic and they would walk a mile or two downstream.
"Let's go hang around the park instead?" Alec suggested, not that that didn't remind him of his mother pushing him on the swings but it wasn't as bad.
"Maybe we should ask her to come with us," his friend teased him, looking at the girl who seemed not to have noticed them.
Alec thought the girl was probably tired of boys trying to pick her up, especially if they didn't go to her school.
"Leave her alone, she might go to a better school than we do," Alec replied, going to check out two books he thought he may need.
Rose had seen two boys around her own age but had taken no notice, what would they want to do with her, she probably wouldn't get into the grammar school, which was probably where they went. She saw them get up and leave, she'd probably see neither of them again but the one with blondish spiky hair seemed cute.
She thought back to Mickey's revelation he'd been going to ask her to be his girlfriend when she was sixteen but she didn't think she'd actually agree, there was more to life than the estate she'd grown up on and now she was getting to experience it. While Rose was at the library, her mother was having an interview at a hair studio a ten minute walk from where they'd gone to live and she was showing the owner, Marlene her portfolio she'd made of her clients posing and some with Rose, whom she'd often roped in to show off her skills.
"Well Jackie," the other woman began after looking through the dozen or so pages with 'Hair by Jackie' on the fancy cover. "Is that your daughter?" she pointed to a photo of Rose.
"Yeah, she's thirteen now, this has been a big move for her," Jackie confided.
"I can imagine. Well you seem to have the experience and the certificates, how do you feel though about confining yourself to a salon?" she was asked.
"Well, I have to start somewhere, it's a big move for me as well," Jackie admitted. "That's all I ever did really, after my first job I decided it would be easier for my daughter if I worked around her, she's old enough to fend for herself now."
"Including school holidays?" the woman asked her.
"Oh don't worry about her, she'll make friends and she'll be out all the time. She's gone to the library to study for her entrance exam to the grammar school."
Jackie was trying to impress her potential boss.
"Well Jackie, I think then that you'd fit in here rather well, shall we give it a try? If you're sure your daughter will be okay on her own? What's her name?"
"It's Rose, she can get her own lunch, she's done it before and she's got a key," Jackie replied.
"So what made you both move here?" she was asked.
"My boyfriend lives in the town, we met when he was working near where we lived in London, we hit it off right away," Jackie smiled.
Her working hours were arranged and she was to start the following Monday, having Wednesday off when she assured Marlene that Rose could make her own breakfast and get herself off to school after the holidays. Well she hoped her daughter could and so far, she'd managed to keep her room tidy but it was early days yet.
Jackie set off back to her new home. Bob had said they needed to talk and she wasn't looking forward to it now they were actually living together. When he'd been just visiting and staying over the odd time or two, it had been different and when he'd suggested before he'd left that he wanted to take the role of Rose's father, she'd been keen at first until they got to the finer details, which were still under some discussion.
Now she knew this 'talk' was about those discussions and she knew he was capable of throwing her and Rose out if she didn't comply or came to a compromise, which she hoped he'd accept. She was doing it for Rose, she had convinced herself. Rose had done well so far but she was a teenager now, she needed a father figure as she'd seen the way the other girls on the estate were turning out without someone to keep them in line and she'd not wanted her daughter to turn out like them.
She was determined though that Bob was not going to get all his own way but from what he'd been saying, it looked like he'd get most of it but there was one thing that was going to be made clear – that they stuck to their initial agreement about Rose and that was never going to change.
