Rock a Bye Baby by Mia Dolan

different angles were reflected back at her. If it hadn’t been for the fact that Rita and her father were coming to pick her up, she would have flung herself down on the bed and cried. As it was she got out her black and white dress, the one she had made. It wasn’t as short as the one she had on, mainly because her grandmother had supervised the making of it. She wiped most of the heavy make-up off her face hoping it would be enough to pass her father’s inspection. Once it was all done, she sat on the bed, not daring to go back downstairs until the Taylors arrived.
    Annie was now sleeping in the cot in the corner of her parents’ room. Marcie went in there – looking down at her half-sister helped her calm down.
    The curtains were drawn against the last of the sunset. Annie looked so peaceful and without a care in the world. Perhaps it might be better to remain a child for ever, she thought to herself. Being sixteen was more difficult than she’d ever bargained for. She’d expected her father to be proud of her, to think she looked pretty. Only now on reflection did she remember seeing his look of surprise when he’d first come home. Oh yes, he’d sent her presents that any teenager would love. But he’d failed to face the truth. She was no longer the little girl he’d doted on. She was a young woman.
    Hearing footsteps on the stairs, she went back into her own bedroom and closed the door.
    The footsteps crossed the landing. Her grandmother entered the bedroom without knocking and went straight to the wardrobe. As a widow and true to Mediterranean tradition, she always wore black, though the black dress she wore during the day was a different one to the dress she wore in the evening. Whereas her day dress was plain, the one she wore in the evening was trimmed with black beads around the scooped neckline.
    She began to speak as she brought her best black dress out of the wardrobe. ‘Marcie. Do not be angrywith your father. He has not seen you in a while. Now he sees you and is very much afraid.’
    Marcie slumped down on the bed. ‘He’s treating me like a child!’
    ‘He’s surprised. You are different than when he went away. You have left school. You have grown. He thinks only of what is best for you and you will do as he says.’
    ‘I am doing that,’ Marcie said sulkily, arms folded across the dress she had once loved. How things had changed. It now represented her father’s dictate, the suede mini-dress her own rebellion.
    Her grandmother seemed to be thinking deeply. The sound of her voice suddenly interrupted her thoughts.
    ‘I presume your stepmother did not tell you she had received the offer of a council house?’
    Marcie looked at her in surprise.
    ‘No,’ said her grandmother, shaking her head. ‘I did not think so.’
    Marcie couldn’t help smiling. Was that why Babs was sporting the beginnings of a black eye and a split lip? She wondered if they’d always fought and she’d just forgotten how bad it could get. Perhaps she’d been too young to notice or regarded overheard arguments as merely that – arguments, not out-and-out fights.
    ‘Your father will not move from here,’ said her grandmother resolutely. ‘He will not leave me herealone. This is where he was born. This is where he will stay.’
    ‘So was I – I mean I was born here,’ said Marcie. To her own ears her voice sounded far away. Thinking of her birth, she suddenly felt a great urge to ask her grandmother if her father had ever hit her natural mother. Was that why she’d run away? It occurred to her that her grandmother was not the right person to ask. Antonio – Tony Brooks – could do no wrong in her eyes.
    ‘No. You were born in hospital. He brought you here.’
    ‘With my mother?’
    Rosa Brooks slammed the wardrobe door and turned the key. She had a tight smile on her face when she turned to face her granddaughter.
    ‘Come along, Marcie. No more questions. Out while I dress.’
    Marcie frowned. Her