Motherlove Read Online Free Page A

that girl hand and foot for the next month. Spoilt bloody princess, if you ask me.’
    Gillian turned on the hot tap and washed plates with concentrated vigour. Concentration on something else always helped her keep her temper. ‘I want her to be able to get on with her studies.’
    â€˜A bit of proper work wouldn’t do her any harm for a change. Instead of all that messing about with books. Not what I’d call work.’
    Gillian took a deep breath. ‘Most of Vicky’s course is done in hospitals, not with books. None of it is messing about, and she works a bloody sight harder than you ever did!’
    â€˜Ha! You don’t know what hard work is. Slave labour in that factory. Keeping a house, and you brats, and a crippled husband on next to nothing. And what thanks do I get? This lot today—’
    â€˜Don’t know they were born,’ Gillian completed the sentence for her. Did Joan really believe a word of what she’d just said? She had spent her factory years happily slagging off the management, flirting with the overseers, skiving off down the Blocker’s Arms with her mates. A slave to housework? Gillian would come home from school to find a ten bob note thrust into her hand to buy fish and chips, while her mother, without bothering to look at her, filled in the Pools coupon. A husband crippled enough for a scant pension, disappearing each night down the dog track.
    Gillian thought of her daughter, diligently, obsessively working eighteen hours a day for her medical qualifications, and though it was pointless she had to say it. ‘Vicky is a clever dedicated girl, who is going to make something of her life, and you should be bloody proud of her.’
    Joan stubbed out her cigarette before it burned her fingers. ‘Don’t see why she’s extra special just because she’s got a few snotty exams. I’ve got seven grandchildren, and five greats. Proper ones, my own flesh and blood, not like her . Thinks she’s so smart, but when’s she going to get herself a man, eh? Not so clever in some departments, is she? I don’t suppose you give a toss about grandchildren. Wouldn’t be the same for you.’
    Gillian stared at her, a chill in her stomach, realising, as Joan spoke, that they were not alone.
    She turned her head to the kitchen door, where Vicky was standing.
    â€˜Vicky, darling, I thought you were working.’
    What had she heard?
    â€˜I’m going out. To the chemist.’ The girl’s voice was as emotionless as her face. Showing nothing, even when her grandmother glanced challengingly at her. ‘I’ll see you later.’
    â€˜Yes. I’ll have lunch ready.’ Gillian smiled, that bright, determined false smile that she had mastered over the years. ‘Take care.’
    Vicky left. Gillian stood still, tea towel clasped to her until she heard the front door click shut. Then she turned on Joan. ‘Why can’t you shut up? Why can’t you ever bloody well shut up?’
    Joan shrugged. ‘Don’t know what all the fuss is about. Well, I can’t stand here gossiping all day. Meeting Bill at ten. You want this tea?’
    Vicky walked. The one good thing about the Marley Farm estate was that if you wanted a walk, you could walk for miles, without getting anywhere. Only five hundred yards to the chemist on the Parade, but she took the long way round. And round. Walking fast. It was good exercise. She made a point of exercising every day. It was something that she could control. Drown out the past.
    Drown out Joan. Surely she had learned to do that by now? She’d thought she’d reached the stage where the old witch was invisible to her, her snide comments nothing but the faint drone of distant traffic.
    But Joan could still sting like a viper’s fangs. ‘Seven grandchildren…proper ones…my own flesh and blood, not like her.’
    Gillian always called her