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

to clean the floor with a toothbrush. Seven months gone, I was.” She grinned. “It was worth it.”

Bernadette, without a trace of make-up, looked as if she had been scrubbed with carbolic herself. But she didn’t take her eyes off the baby.

“When I went into labour they took me to Broad Green Hospital. I was put into this big ward with a load of other women. Half of them had their babies already, and they sat there grinning with their kiddies. The rest of us couldn’t even have visitors. All we had was the nurses glaring at us because we were all bad girls.

“In the end they wheeled me off to the delivery room. They gave me gas and air. I had one last big push, and out came Patrick. They cleaned me up, wheeled me back to the ward, and put him in my arms.” Bernadette smiled at her baby. “He had this tiny little face, all squashed up and red. He smelled of soap, even then.

“Then the Mother Superior came and said I had to give him up for adoption. She said it was better to take him off me right then, before we got used to each other.”

Joel asked, “What did you do?”

“Punched her in the gob.”

Laura said, “So they brought you back here.”

“More floors to clean.”

“But they’ll take him away eventually,” Joel said dismally, still cradling Patrick. “They’re too strong. The nuns, the social services, the whole lot of them. They’ll even call the police. Take him off you by force. It would be horrible. It’s what they do.”

“No,” Laura said impulsively. “We can’t let that happen. There must be another way.”

“I knew you wouldn’t give up, Laura. Not you.”

The new voice was the nun who had been sweeping the floor. She was standing over them, her face masked, her brush in her hand.

Bernadette snatched her baby back from Joel and held him close.

“It’s all right,” said the nun. And she pushed back her wimple.

It was Agatha.

Laura stood up and faced her. “What are you doing here?”

Agatha’s thin face was strained, and she looked vaguely frightened. “Are you glad to see me?”

Laura said honestly, “I don’t know. It’s complicated.” Agatha was a figure out of a kind of nightmare. And yet Laura was tied to her. This was her daughter. Or would have been—or something. “I thought you’d go back to your own time machine.”

“I smashed it up.”

Laura frowned. “Why?”

“I came here to change the future, remember. I failed. And my future doesn’t exist; it never will, because there was no Sunday War. I can’t go home.”

Laura wondered if Agatha was telling the truth about destroying her machine. Agatha was an instinctive survivor. Even if she decided to stay here, she might have wanted to keep her options open. A time machine, hidden in 1963. What if it still worked? What if somebody found it?

“What will you do here?”

“I don’t know. Get a job. Make a few friends.” Her pale face was pinched. “Believe me, even if I end up sleeping in the streets, I’m better off than where I came from. And in the meantime I’ve come to help you,” she said to Bernadette.

“Help me do what?”

“Get out of here. With your baby. That’s what you want, isn’t it? Give it five minutes. The Mother Superior does her rounds, regular as clockwork. We have to wait until there’s a gap. Then we’ll get out the back.”

Joel grinned. “Ace. It’s like breaking out of Colditz. But what about your mum and dad? Aren’t they waiting out the front?”

“I’ll phone them,” Laura said. “They’ll understand.”

Bernadette looked bemused. “But what then?”

Joel looked Bernadette in the eyes. “Bern—look—there’s something I never told you. The way I feel about you. I mean—”

Bernadette touched his hand. “Poor old Joel. I always knew.”

He seemed amazed. “You did?”

“Of course. Everybody could tell. You’re no actor, you silly sod.”

“You chose Billy Waddle over me. I understand that. But now Patrick’s here I want to be with you. I want to help you raise him.”

“Oh, Joel. You’re just a kid.”

“I’m older than you,” he said. “A bit. And I want to help you. Even if, you know.”

“What? Spit it out.”

“Even if we’re never together. I’ll help you even so.”

“But,” Laura said awkwardly, “it’s not just that you aren’t Patrick’s dad. You aren’t the same colour.”

Joel said, “So people will give us stick for that. So what?”

Bern looked him straight in the eye. “People can all bog off. You’re on, soft lad. Tell you what, though. From now on, I’m on the pill.”

“Then it’s settled,” Laura said. “We’ll all help. I’ll twist Dad’s arm, to help get rid of the nuns and the social. Bern, I bet your mum will take you in if we can help support you. There’s that bit of money from Billy Waddle for a start. We’ll work it out somehow. All we have to do is get out of here.” She looked at Agatha. “But why are you doing this?”

“For you. She’s your friend.”

Laura nodded. “All right. But you look, well, frightened.”

Agatha forced a smile. “Not of the Mother Superior. I’ve been frightened every day since I decided to stay here.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Agatha said slowly, “history has changed under me. The world I came from will never exist. I shouldn’t have been born. I’m a sort of mistake in time. All this Catholicism is worrying me. What about my soul? Will I go to heaven or hell? If my timeline has gone, do I still have a soul at all?” Her eyes were hollow.

Bernadette was astonished. “Don’t tell me you were brought up a Catholic.”

Joel said, “Well, I’m still in CND. We got through the Cuban crisis but the bombs still exist. That’s what I’m worried about.”

“None of us knows how long we have,” Bernadette said.

Laura said, “No. And Dad says there will always be something to be frightened about, always some hideous threat of the end of the world, just around the corner. You just have to be sensible and keep