‘Well, that’s not going to happen now,’ she replied tightly. ‘And I think that the sensible thing for everyone, ourselves included, would be to come to terms with it.’

Chapter 17

After Rob left, Colin went into town for dinner, and the other members of her family once again went their separate ways. So Penny had no one to turn to for comfort but her mother. Or rather her mother’s diaries. She’d moved them all into her old bedroom by now, and was able to read at her leisure and without fear of being discovered by Elle or her father.

The particular volume she was reading covered the days leading up to Elle’s birth, and in this entry her sister was just about to be born.

May 14, 1976

I think the time is near – and while I have never done this before, I’m fairly sure that labour has started. Amazingly, I have this incredible sense of calm about it all. As if I understand my body knows what to do and how things are supposed to go and I’m not nervous, just excited. I can’t wait to meet him or her. Imagine me with a baby?

Of course, Ned is a different story. He’s tuned tight as a fiddle. Keeps running around the place, double, triple and quadruple-checking my hospital bag, making sure I have everything. He stocked up on film for the camera (he has made four trips to the chemist alone to buy more in case they run out) and in between every errand he runs, he comes in to check on me, and he has also been putting on records from his collection – what he insists are the baby’s preferred songs. Seems baby is a big fan of Yellow Submarine, and A Hard Day’s Night. In any case, I have no doubt that this baby will be a Beatles aficionado the minute it’s born. If it comes out with dark hair, a bowl cut and a grey suit, I won’t be surprised in the least . . .

There it was, mentioned again. Ned’s collection.

Penny’s mouth broke into a smile at the idea that her father played Beatles music in preparation for Elle’s birth. Did he have her name in mind at that point then? Likely. She’d often wondered how he’d managed to talk her mother round to naming them both after Beatles songs. While Eleanor had quickly been shortened (she couldn’t remember anyone but school teachers calling her sister by her full name), and Elle wasn’t enamoured of her birth name, Penny’s original moniker had been retained. As it happened Penny liked both her name and the song that inspired it. It could have been worse; at least neither of their names had resulted from a song about LSD. She continued reading.