Mum sent me and Leighton a huge letter telling us that she was all right and how good the air raid wardens and the shelters were in the city, but made no mention at all of any of the questions I wanted her to answer. Henri suggested that she must be doing it to protect me, but I waved that off angrily every time he said it. I was sick of everyone trying to protect me, I wanted answers about my gift, my family, my father, and the war was getting in the way of it all. Worse than that, time was running out even faster than before for me and Henri. I cried buckets when he came home with his train ticket to get to Essex for basic training. He’d leave at lunchtime on September 30th to get there for the start of the next day and Bickerstaff had booked the same journey. Mam was the one to find me sobbing over Henri’s imminent departure, which made me feel all the more awful since she was still doing plenty of sobbing of her own when she thought no-one could hear her. She put her arms around me until I quietened down, whispering that everything was bound to be all right.
