Read Online Birmingham Blitz by Annie Murray - Free Book Online Page B

remember that the mother of God is always near to catch you when you fall.”’ Micky had never seen his mother again after walking out with that lovingly wrapped tile at the age of twenty.
    ‘Anyway,’ Teresa’d said. ‘He met Mom his second day in Birmingham, so someone was looking out for him.’
    Teresa pulled a chair out for me at the table between her and Micky.
    ‘’Bout time,’ she said. ‘We haven’t seen you in ages.’
    ‘Some of us work for a living you know.’ Now I was at the pawn shop I worked most Saturdays. ‘No time for gadding into town to try on hats in C&A. Come to think of it that might be a good reason for moving on!’ I glanced nervously at Micky. You never quite knew what mood he was going to be in.
    He frowned. ‘I thought you were at that pie factory?’
    ‘I was – for a week. There was this bloke opposite me with a great long dewdrop in ’is nose. I reckon there was more snot than meat in some of them pies. One week of that and I was off.’
    The others groaned and laughed, even Stevie, Teresa’s older brother who was usually either in a daydream about shiny new Lagondas or being a self-righteous pain in the neck. I saw Teresa looking nervously at her father for his reaction and I wondered if I’d walked into the middle of something. ‘You wouldn’t want your seat getting too warm anywhere, would you?’
    ‘I have to be kept busy.’
    ‘You’ve practically done the lot already!’ Teresa said. She sounded envious, and her eyes strayed once more over to Micky. He was holding a hunk of bread in his strong hands, pulling off pellets and half throwing them into his mouth.
    I looked round the table. ‘It’s quiet, isn’t it?’ And then wished I hadn’t said the one thing they were all most likely trying not to think about. Vera’s eyes turned to pools of misery.
    But God, it was quiet. Normally when I went in there eight pairs of dark brown eyes turned to look at me, but now the four younger ones were missing and I felt the loss almost as if they were my own brothers and sisters. In terms of noise you barely noticed Eric being gone because he was such a mouse most of the time. Micky and Stevie weren’t all that vocal, but those Spini women were LOUD. Even Giovanna at seven had a voice on her like a foghorn, and Teresa was about the noisiest of the lot. Great blast of a voice and sandpaper-rough as if she’d smoked forty a day since birth.
    ‘I can hardly look at Teresa in that dress for wondering how they are and what they’re doing.’ Vera’s homely face was crumpling.
    The dress was crimson with a white lace collar and Vera had made three to match, so other Sundays Francesca and Giovanna had been turned out in theirs too, matching and all lovely with their dark hair, Teresa’s long and loosely tied back, Francesca with plaits and Giovanna’s in a pert, swinging ponytail.
    ‘Will they be able to go to Mass where they’ve gone?’ I asked.
    Tears started running down Vera’s cheeks. She shook her head and shrugged. ‘Don’t know, love. I told Francesca to ask, but with them down Wales . . . Don’t know that they’re all that keen on Catholics down there. I can’t stand thinking about it. At least they’ve been kept in twos – Francesca’s got Luki, and Tony and Giovanna are together. I s’pose I should be thankful for that.’
    ‘They’ll be all right, Mom,’ Teresa said, putting her hand on her mother’s plump arm. She was such a happy woman usually. You’d see her in the shop even in the depths of winter, blowing on her hands to keep warm, songs billowing white out of her mouth. And she hugged and kissed those kids like no one had ever done to me in my life.
    ‘I don’t know why I sent them,’ she went on. ‘Nothing’s happening. Only I kept on thinking about what they did bombing Spain and I thought it’d be the same here. Every day I have to stop myself going to fetch them back.’
    ‘No good thinking like that,’ Micky said more