Home Is Where the Heart Is by Freda Lightfoot

more and never have been. We don’t even get on terribly well, constantly falling out. And that was simply a thank you peck on the cheek for all the work he’d done. I’d been helping him run that charity event, as you know full well.’
    ‘Don’t take me for a damn fool,’ he shouted, in the kind of dismissively stern voice that denied argument. ‘Who else would it be, if not him? Some Yank perhaps? You did say when we were at the Ritz that there were plenty stationed near Manchester, and who attended the dances, so that’s a definite possibility.’
    ‘I also made it very plain that I was not involved with them in any way.’
    He shrugged. ‘Whoever the father is, like many other young women parted from their man by this dratted war, you’ve behaved like an absolute slut and betrayed me. Not even bothering to send me a “Dear John” letter. My motherwas right. This is the reason you wished to rush me into marriage, to find a father for
your child.
’
    Cathie felt herself start to shake, with anger now rather than nerves. Why wouldn’t he believe her, or even listen to a word she said? ‘I’m no
slut
! And it was
you
who said you were in a hurry to marry, the moment we met at the station. I didn’t at all mind waiting a little while, as it’s a job I’m most urgently in need of. You weren’t very sympathetic about that either, saying I wouldn’t even need one now we were about to marry.’
    ‘Well, I was wrong there. We aren’t going to be married, so it will indeed be necessary for you to find yourself employment fairly quickly, so that you can afford to feed this bastard child of yours.’
    At which point Cathie stormed out of the house.

C HAPTER E IGHT
    C athie felt utterly devastated as she poured her heart out to Brenda as they strolled around the market a week later, Davina absent for once. She’d thought of Alex as the love of her life, and believed that he felt the same way about her. Yet he was convinced she’d betrayed and lied to him. ‘All these years of waiting and praying for his safe return, and now he’s tossed me aside as if I were some sort of harlot. Why won’t he believe that little Heather is my
niece
? Nor has he offered sympathy for the loss of Sal, not even in any of his letters let alone in person.’
    ‘It sounds very much as if he’s turning his back on reality,’ her friend quietly remarked.
    ‘I can fully understand why Alex would have no wish to speak of his own traumas, whatever they might be, but why is he so dismissive of my own?’
    Had he been a touch more sympathetic she might have shared her own horror story with him.
    ‘Sometimes, the only way of coping is to “forget”,’ Brenda was saying. ‘To shut the horrors from your mind, just as everyone else who has suffered in this war does.’
    ‘I appreciate what you’re saying, and you know that I have first hand experience of grief as a result of this war, and other traumas too. I agree that locking away painful memories does often feel like the best way of dealing with the problem. But, as you’ve told me many times in the past, Brenda, sometimes talking about these issues can help, so why won’t he do that? Or properly listen to mine?’
    ‘He’s rather like Davina in that respect. Who knows what happened to that husband of hers? She won’t even tell us his name. I can talk endlessly about my beloved Jack to anyone willing to listen, if not about the manner of his death. Isn’t that how it should be?’
    ‘Oh yes, I’m happy to speak of Sal’s love of Christmas, of movies and singing, but not her accident. I prefer to remember her in life, not the manner of her death. With all the hardships I’ve had to face, and being forced to accept the wartime attitude of “we can take it”, it was the prospect of Alex’s homecoming that has kept me going.’
    Brenda nodded, her round face filled with compassion. ‘The problem is that despite the war being over, things seem to be getting worse, not