Jess hurried to the front door of the house. ‘Everyone to the van, please. Luke, will you take Annapolly while I get Ella and her stroller? We’re going to the hospital.’
‘What did you let happen to her?’ Luke asked the question fiercely.
‘She filled her nose with tissue paper and may have harmed her sinuses.’ Jess hurried away to get her daughter. The boy didn’t need to accuse Jess of anything. Jess was already accusing herself.
The other children asked questions as Jess drove the van towards the hospital. Jess explained, and felt even guiltier as they all fell silent.
‘I want to phone Dad.’ Luke bit the words out. ‘He has a right to know about this.’
‘I was about to ask you if you’d do that. He phoned earlier and said he was on his way home. It would be good if he could meet us at the hospital.’ Jess dug her mobile phone out of her pocket and passed it to the boy.
Luke tried but after a few minutes he’d had no luck.
‘Will you text him, please, Luke, and ask him to come to the hospital? He might be in a low reception area but he should be close to home by now.’ Jess didn’t have time to wait for the luxury of Dan’s opinion, or Luke’s approval. She had to get Annapolly checked now. ‘At least we’re almost there.’
‘She’s all right, though.’ Rob said it as though he needed to believe it. ‘We won’t be leaving her there or anything.’
‘No, we’re not leaving her there.’ Luke said this. ‘She’s coming home with us straight after, Rob. Don’t be stupid.’
Jess might have chided the boy for the ‘stupid’ comment, but, if anything, Robert appeared reassured by his brother’s harsh words, and Jess had enough to worry about right now so she left it alone.
The whole family fell silent as they stepped through the doors of the hospital’s emergency entrance. Jess searched each face; saw their fear, Luke’s fury and accusation. Behind his surly expression she saw Luke’s fear, too.
Oh, Dan, what else have I added to your family’s stress?
Why hadn’t she just watched everyone more closely?
It was three minutes, Jessica, and you knew Annapolly had gone to use the loo. Filling her nose with tissue paper while she was there wasn’t something you could have anticipated.
Maybe not, but it was Jess’s job to anticipate, wasn’t it?
Jess had Ella in the stroller. Luke had taken Annapolly into his arms. Jess eased the little girl from his hold and asked him to please watch his siblings while she spoke to the nurse. ‘I may need to go into the examination room with her.’
‘Dad had better get here soon.’ With the brief words, Luke led the others to seats against the wall.
The lack of trust inherent in his statement didn’t escape Jess.
‘What have we here?’ A friendly woman in her forties gestured Jess over.
Soon Annapolly was being examined. Her nose was declared to be sore, but the tissue paper was all out. No permanent harm had been done. The necessary germ-and-infection-repelling steps were taken. A few more tears were shed.
Jess could see the waiting room through the glass section of the doors and she saw when Dan arrived. There was a low-voiced conversation with Luke. The boy looked furious and was gesturing wildly. Dan also looked upset.
And the other children were all chattering at once.
They were probably telling Dan what a bad caregiver Jess had turned out to be, and they were right.
‘You can go now, love.’ The nurse looked at Annapolly. ‘No more sticking things up your nose. Do you understand?’
‘Yes.’ Tears welled in Annapolly’s eyes and she held her arms out to Jess.
Jess cuddled the little girl and would rather have liked to join in with the weepies, at least for a moment.
Instead, Jess thanked the nurse and took Annapolly, and Ella in the stroller, out to the waiting room where Dan was in the process of trying to break away from his children, no doubt so he could come and find out about his daughter.
‘Dan. I’m so sorry.’ Jess handed Annapolly over. The little girl was already reaching for him. ‘The nurse says there’s no permanent damage. The others have probably told you what happened.’ Jess explained what the nurse had done.
Annapolly was going to be fine, but right now her nose hurt and that was Jess’s fault. Dan would sack her for this, and Jess would deserve it because she’d let Annapolly get out of her sight and hurt herself.
‘Let’s all go home.’ Dan’s gaze went from the daughter in his arms to the other children. ‘Hospitals—’ He didn’t say more, just hustled everyone outside.
Jess drove the van back home while Dan drove in his other car, Annapolly, Luke and Rob with him.
Jess never lost track of a child when she looked after them at the cottage. She supervised everything. Well, she’d failed to do that at Dan’s house, hadn’t she?
When both vehicles stopped outside the house a few minutes later Daisy took Annapolly by the hand and said the little girl could come and lie on her bed with her and she’d read to her. Mary went with them.
Luke and Rob had still been talking to their father when the car pulled up. Rob disappeared outside to ride his pushbike and Luke cast a furious glance in Jess’s direction before he turned back to his father. ‘I don’t like her. I don’t want her here. She can’t even take care of everybody and you seem to think the sun shines out of her, Dad. You don’t even know her.’
He got on his bike and rode off to the far reaches of the property before Dan could do more than start to rebuke him.
That left Jess, Dan and Ella, who’d fallen asleep on the way back. Jess changed her and put her down to nap in the travel cot and went back to face Dan. There was nothing else for this but to take full responsibility and hope Dan could get over her negligence enough to trust another person with his children. She didn’t know what to do about Luke. He would end this short association disliking Jess.
Well, Jess would just have to accept that, she supposed.
Dan was in the kitchen.
‘You’re eating cookies.’ Jess blurted the words with a complete lack of comprehension.
‘They’re very good cookies. I don’t get home baking like this very often and since my eldest just did his best to make sure I have a three-day heartburn, anyway, I think I deserve them.’ Dan took another cookie and, with his other hand, poured two cups of tea. His mouth was still tight. ‘Potato crisps are my usual addiction. I can go through packets of those in a day. I’m surprised the children left any cookies for me.’
‘We’d only just got them all out of the oven when we had to leave for the hospital.’ Jess glanced around her. She’d spotted empty crisp packets in Dan’s den and thought it was the children. ‘I didn’t tidy up, just rushed out.’
‘No, there tends to be a sense of panic.’ He said it as though he knew. Dan handed her one of the cups of tea. ‘Sit down, Jessica.’
Jess sat. She didn’t think she could drink the tea, yet she found herself sipping the sweet brew and taking comfort from its warmth. But Dan. Why wasn’t Dan yelling? Or very cold towards her? Something?
‘You’re going to sack me kindly but there’s no way anyone is to blame but me.’ That knowledge