Читать книгу Snow Foal - Susanna Bailey - Страница 7

Addie couldn’t see much at all now that they’d left the town, with its pale streetlamps, and vivid neon signs. Just glimpses of flat fields and shadowy forests; of spiked hedges and trees edged with white, wavering like ghosts in the beam from the car headlights.

‘Not much further,’ Penny said. She glanced over her shoulder at Addie. ‘We should see the farmhouse soon.’ She squinted out through the windscreen again, adjusted her round glasses. ‘This weather’s slowed us up a bit. You must be so tired.’

Addie shrugged, watched the wipers whip back and forth through the sleet and snow. Penny’s car struggled on, taking her further and further away from her brown brick home.

Further away from Mam.

They hadn’t let Addie go in the ambulance with Mam. They’d made tea with too much sugar; made Addie sit down in the wrong chair in the lounge. Addie hated them. Hated their radios that crackled and hissed, their silver buttons that flashed in the light. Their eyes that swept the room and decided things.

‘Penny, can we ring Mam when we get there?’ Addie asked. ‘Tell her I’ll be back in the morning?’

‘It’s late, Addie. Your mum needs to rest, sweetheart. I’ll check on her first thing. And then I’ll come and talk to you. I promise.’ Penny slowed the car, turned it to the left. Her long nails flashed red on the steering wheel.

‘I can’t stay here tomorrow,’ Addie said. ‘Mam’ll worry.’

Penny sighed. A soft, sad sound. Was she even listening?

The car bumped along a rough track. Addie’s stomach lurched. She chewed at the skin around her thumb nail. Where were they?

A white light cut through the darkness, revealed a wooden sign on a tall pole. Penny leaned forward, slowed the car down. ‘There we are,’ she said. ‘They’ve left the gate open for us. We’re here.’