THE H-BOMB GIRL by Stephen Baxter (beach books txt) 📕

“Yes, I’ve got my work. But it’s not, you know, a rival for you. You’re my only daughter, chicken, and you come first. But I have to keep at it. For your benefit. And Mum’s, and everybody else’s, in fact. And that’s why,” he said, “you have to wear your Key.”

“Dad, if you’re going to start that repeating thing again—”

“I won’t. But I’m going away tomorrow, chicken, and I don’t know when I’ll see you again, and I have to be sure you’re safe. Even though I’m not here. You know what to do with it?”

She knew. She’d been told often enough. If the worst came to the worst—though Dad had never spelled out what that “worst” might be—she was to call a phone number he had made her memorise, which would put her through to somebody called the “Regional Director of Civil Defence.”

“Then tell him the Key’s War Ministry code number.” She’d had to memorise that too. “If you tell him my name, and tell him you have the Key, and give him that code, he will have you found and brought to safety. Make sure you always know where the nearest telephone is. And keep a threepenny bit in your sock to pay for the call. But keep it secret.”

She didn’t know what the Key actually was. He had never said. But it was an important enough bit of military hardware that if the government or the air force or the police found out she had it, they would come looking for her and take her in. They would protect her, not for herself, but because of the Key she carried. “They’ll probably arrest you,” Dad said, “but at least you’ll be safe.”

To Laura the key was just a Magic Token that would keep her safe, even if Dad couldn’t help her himself. At least, that was how Dad wanted her to think of it.

It was scary to think that Joel might actually find out what the Key was for. Scary, and exciting.

She’d wear the Key to keep Dad happy. But she resented all this confusion and worry.

Maybe he sensed what she was thinking. He hugged her to him, and kissed the top of her head. “Mmm. Always did like the taste of Vosene.”

That made her giggle.

“Oh. Sorry, folks.”

Laura pulled away from her father. Mum and Mort, the American, were standing in the doorway. Both had drinks in their hands, ciggies in their lips. Mort was holding a parcel, wrapped up in silver paper.

“It’s all right.” Dad stood up, supple.

Mort eyed Laura. “We got off to a bad start, little missy. In the line for the bathroom, remember? I’ll try to stay out of your hair. In the meantime—” He held out the package. “Peace offering?”

Laura took the parcel and opened it. Inside, in a plastic box, there was a doll, with a pointy chest, long legs, beehive hairdo and high heels.

“It’s a Barbie,” Mort said. “New toy. All the rage in the States.”

Mum giggled. “Isn’t he something? He always brings such great stuff from America. Used to bring me nylons during the war.”

Laura stared at the doll with disbelief.

Mort shrugged. “So. Did I do wrong? Look, I don’t know diddley squat about kids. I guess you’re more of a bobbysoxer, right?”

“Say thank you, Laura.” Mum sounded desperate.

Her bedroom was just a box with her stuff still in a suitcase, or in heaps on the floor. The wallpaper was stained yellow. It looked like somebody had smoked themselves to death in here, and maybe they had.

She threw herself on the bed and opened her diary.

Friday 12th October. 6 p.m.

It makes sense to have It here. The Mort-Monster. That’s what they all say, all three of them.

It works with Dad. It is in Liverpool to see about “civil defence preparations,” whatever they are.

And It knows Mum from the war, when she was in London.

Mum and Dad were well off before they split, but now everything is divided in half and we’re all poor. To keep the house, we need the rent It will pay.

How sensible.

Here’s what I think of It.

She started a list of every spiteful, obscene thing she could think of to say about Giuseppe Mortinelli the Third, Lieutenant-Colonel, US Air Force.

Her diary was a thick book bound in real leather that Dad had given to her on her eleventh birthday. She was embarrassed now by the early entries with their round handwriting and pictures of horses and dogs and stupid boys’ names. But the diary had stuck by her through the Separation, and was still with her, a little bit of home.

She felt like crying. None of that.

Her list of swear words looked stupid. Childish. Bernadette could surely do a lot better. She crossed it all out.

She hated Mort, though. She hated the way he had come into her home, his murky old relationship with Mum coming between her and Dad.

And she hated the fact that her whole life was shaped by two huge wars. The German war had been over before she was born, but people like Mum still wandered around going on about it, as if shell-shocked. And then there was this scary war in the future that they all worried about, and Dad spent his life trying to avoid. Laura thought of it as a wall of hot atomic light that might end her life before she had a chance to live it. She hated living with such a horrible prospect in her future.

She needed something else to think about.

She remembered the newspaper Nick had given her. She dug it out of her inside blazer pocket. Mersey Beat—Merseyside’s Own Entertainments Paper—Price Threepence. It was a fan thing, cheap and flimsy and the ink came away on her hands. She flicked through it until she found a small boxed ad:

LIVE ON STAGE

DIRECT FROM BOOTLE

JOHN SMITH AND THE COMMON MEN

&

NICK O’TEEN AND THE WOODBINES

Saint Edward’s College, West Derby, Liverpool 12.

Sunday 14th October 1962. 6:30 p.m.

Admission One Shilling. No