Previously:

Bette hovered outside the girls bedroom door, muttering to herself, “Lottie … I’m sorry …” she mumbled, “Lottie … I never meant to upset you … of course I don’t think ‘you’ think like that …”
    

After hearing her out there mumbling away for a good five minutes Lottie flung open the door … “What?!?”
    
Bette tried a smile in the hope that it might appease her, Lottie stood with her hands on her hips, clearly not convinced,
    
“I’m sorry …” said Bette honestly, “can we try again?”
    
Lottie shrugged, acting like the true teenager she was,
    
Bette leant against the doorframe to the bedroom, “I got mad …” she said, “and I shouldn’t have … I should have waited and listened to you first …” she paused, “can we try again? … please?”
    
    
Lottie scrutinised her closely, Bette was the only hope left of them not drowning in a sea of rules and regulations, she knew she didn’t have the strength to do it on her own,
    
“Okay …” she replied simply, indicating that Bette still wasn’t completely forgiven,
    
“Good,” said Bette relieved, “Now … where do we get a hold of this letter … I want to read it …”
    
Lottie grinned … “Roger …!”

Chapter Nineteen – part a

Bette shifted uncomfortably in her seat, Tina’s head lay like a dead weight against her shoulder, her body rising and falling gently with each rhythmical sigh of sleep, Bette smiled, gently stroking Tina’s soft cheek,

She rubbed the back of her neck, working out a knot of tension, there was a lot of tension, it seemed like since coming back from New York just over a week before her life had been filled with nothing but tension,

And it centred on Lottie, the sister she never knew she had, her mothers second child, a daughter who she’d also ultimately ended up leaving, for different reasons but still leaving alone none the less,

Bette stretched her muscles, yawning, she glanced across the aisle at where Lottie sat, her eyes closed and headphones in her ears, Angie lay against her, curled up and sound asleep,

She had an unsettling feeling of responsibility towards her new kid sister, one different to anything she’d ever experienced with Kit. With Kit the responsibility came from Kit’s own lack of it, Bette picked her up when she fell, she defended her, she stood up for her, she watched with baited breath for many years wishing that Kit would one day come to her senses and act her age,