"Is that my Orabelle in her senior school uniform?" I heard a voice say from behind me as I walked from the bus stop to the factory after school. I turned around to see Michelle crossing the road with her arm linked with Ciaran, her boyfriend as she walked towards me.
"I didn't know you were home." I said as I ran back down the street towards her. She let go of Ciaran and put her arms out, embracing me as I reached her. "I missed you." I whispered in her ear as she hugged me.
"I missed you too Ora." She whispered back, before letting go of me. "Now, I've just been told that I need to go and have a chat with your Mum. What's happened?" she said, before holding onto both of my hands. She lifted my left arm up and pushed my blazer up my arm. "What happened to your arm?"
"I broke my wrist." I told her.
"Playing netball, I presume?" she asked. I shook my head. "So, what happened then?"
"Frank, Frank did it." I told her.
"Frank Foster? The guy who was working at the factory?" I nodded. "Orla what is going on? First Sean's off with me in the pub and now you. Will you just tell me?" Michelle said, still holding my cast in her arm.
"Chelle, it's really not my place. You really need to talk to Mum." I said.
"Right, come on then, is she in the factory?" she asked, taking my arm in her hand and practically pulling me down the pavement.
I unlocked the factory door and went inside with Michelle and Ciaran behind me. The place was dark, but the lights in the office were on. I knew Mum was here as she'd text on my way home and said to meet her here.
"Well look who it isn't? Nice tans." Mum said, clutching a cup of coffee in her hand as she sat at her desk. I walked over to her, and she pulled me onto her lap as I put my school bag on the floor. She wrapped both arms around me and kissed my cheek as I let the back of my head rest on her chest. "Was school ok?" she whispered. I nodded as she kissed my cheek again.
"I found this one outside with a broken arm and she's given me very little explanation as to how it happened." Michelle said as she pulled the other desk chair around and sat opposite Mum.
"It's her wrist actually." Mum said as she stroked my cast with her thumb.
"Still doesn't give an explanation Carla." Michelle said. Mum didn't say anything. "So come on then, why's the factory closed?"
"Oh, it's complicated." Mum told her.
"Complicated enough to sack your whole workforce?" Michelle enquired.
"I didn't sack 'em." Mum said as she stroked my hair against my head.
"Well, that's not what your staff think." Michelle told her.
"That's because they lack imagination, I did in fact save them." Mum replied. I knew that she had been struggling at the factory since everything had happened with Frank, but I didn't know it was this bad.
"I don't understand, save them from what?" Michelle asked.
"From the curse, that is yours truly." Mum said.
"Mum, that's not fair." I told her. She kissed my head, but I knew that me saying that wasn't going to make her believe it. She had been so down on herself about everything since Frank. "Mum, just tell them what happened." I said as Michelle nodded.
"Where to begin?" Mum wondered.
"Try at the start." I said quietly before she kissed my head again. Michelle reached out and held onto Mum's hand.
"Come on, take your time." Michelle told her. Mum let out a big sigh.
"I'm glad you guys are back." She began. "Things have been a bit…"
"Carla, talk to me." Michelle said, leaning forward towards Mum.
"We can't help you unless you tell us what's wrong." Ciaran said from the other side of the room.
"Oh, you can't help me love. There's no fixing what Frank's done to me, to us." Mum said, clutching tightly onto my hand and kissing my head again.
"Frank Foster, the same guy who broke Orla's wrist?" Michelle asked, looking puzzled.
"The very same. You always did have a good memory for names, didn't you?" Mum said.
"What's he done to you? Carla, I know what he's done to Orla, but what's he done to you?" Michelle asked her. Mum kissed my head again as the room fell silent, both Ciaran and Michelle staring at Mum and waiting for an answer.
"I suppose you're right; the beginning is probably the best place to start." Mum began. "After you left, Frank carried on helping out and well, the two of us spent a lot of time together. We started seeing each other and then in August, we got engaged, planned to get married in September, short engagement, long marriage and all that." Mum said sarcastically. "But I didn't want to marry him, I never did but I couldn't tell him, I couldn't tell him until the night before the wedding and then when I did, when I told him that I didn't want to marry him, then he, he-"
"It's alright." Michelle said as she clutched Mum's hand tighter.
"He raped me." Mum told her. A silent cloud hung over the room. Mum kissed my forehead again, not able to see the tears rolling down my face. "And that was when it all went downhill really. I tried to take an overdose, which didn't work." She kissed my head again as I heard the cracking in her voice as she began to break down. Michelle leant forward, letting go of Mum's hand and wiping the tears from my eyes with her thumbs. "Hey, I'm sorry, you don't have to listen to this again Orlie." Mum said as she turned me to look at her.
"I'm ok Mumma. I just want to be with you." I told her, resting my head back on her chest as she kissed my hair.
"Anyway, since he owns 50% of the business and he's not allowed anywhere near me because of the police investigation, I can't keep this place afloat without something, which is why I had to let everyone go." She told Michelle.
"What have the police said?" Michelle asked.
"They're investigating. He's pleaded not guilty to rape so they'll be a trial. They're in the process of gathering information." Mum explained.
"And Orabelle's arm, what happened with that?" Michelle questioned.
"A few days before the wedding was supposed to happen, he got angry with her, because he wanted to know where I was and Orla didn't know, and he grabbed her arm and broke her wrist. It wasn't until after the police started to investigate that we realised it was broken." Mum told her.
"It was fine. It didn't hurt that much." I said.
"Except when you lay on the ground in tears halfway through a netball match." Mum said to me.
"Orla Connor, not playing in a netball match, the world must have been upside down." Michelle said, as she leant forward and stroked my cheek with her thumb.
"She hasn't been able to play properly since she broke her arm last year." Mum said, "But don't worry my girl, we will get you back on that court, won't we?" I nodded as she kissed my head again.
"You two look very close." Michelle said, stroking my cheek again and then holding onto Mum's hand.
"Well, I was so close to losing her. I'm never letting her go again." Mum said, "How about getting some chips on the way home?' she asked, and I nodded. We packed up everything at the factory and locked up. Ciaran went to the pub for a drink with Peter while Michelle, Mum and I went back to the flat, via the chippy.
Mum and Michelle shared a bottle of red wine while I had some lemonade and the three of us chatted over our chips. We didn't talk about Frank or the police or my broken wrist. We listened to Michelle tell stories of what she got up to on the cruise ship. We laughed and giggled just like we had done before any of this happened. And then that night, Mum climbed into my bed as she had done every night since Frank attacked her. I snuggled into her as she sent me to sleep.
"You cannot even begin to think about dropping the charges against him." I heard Michelle's voice say as I opened my bedroom door the following morning. Mum hadn't been in my bed when I woke up, so I'd got ready for school and made my bed before going to find her. "Think about Orla, what this is teaching her? That if someone hurts you or upsets you, you just back down." Michelle continued.
"I already showed her that by trying to top myself." Mum replied.
"No, she knows why you did that. She understands." Michelle said.
"Chelle, she's 11. I'm not even entirely convinced she knows what the word rape means. She sure as heck doesn't understand what it feels like to what to end your life. All she sees me as now is the mother who tried to kill herself and leave her only daughter behind, eleven years old without any parents. How rubbish does that make me look?" Mum told her.
"Carla, she loves you, you're her Mum. She will never ever stop loving you, I promise you of that because you're an amazing Mum, despite what you believe about yourself." Michelle said. She spotted me through the gaps of the banister standing outside my bedroom and smiled. I quietly went down the stairs and climbed into Mum's arms as she sat on the sofa.
"She's right Mumma. I won't ever stop loving you." I said to her.
That evening, when I got home from school, Michelle and Ciaran were still at the flat, sat on the sofa together. Michelle got up and hugged me before getting me a couple of biscuits and an apple out. I sat down on one of the bar stools.
"Where's Mumma?" I asked as Michelle leant against the kitchen counter opposite me. She pointed her head in the direction of Mum's bedroom door where she stood with her suitcase beside her and her handbag over her shoulder. She walked towards me, dragging her suitcase behind her and then put both of her arms over my shoulders and kissed my ear.
"I'm going over to LA for a little bit, to see Suzie, just for a little bit and then I'll be back alright?" she said. I spun the chair around, so I faced her.
"How long?" I asked.
"I don't know my girl, a few weeks. But Chelle will look after you, give you two some special time together, I know you've missed her. And I'll be on the end of that phone every day and if you really need me, I'll be straight on that plane home, ok? I'll even bring you back some of those sweets that Suzie always buys you." she explained, and I nodded.
"You will come home Mumma?" I asked.
"My girl, I will always, always come home to you." She said.
"I love you Mumma." I said as I hugged her. She hugged me back, kissing my ear as she did.
"I love you too my girl. I love you so much, more than anything ever angel." She whispered. "You be good, ok? Keep Michelle in line." She joked as she pulled away.
