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𝑇𝑊𝐸𝑁𝑇𝑌 𝑇𝑊𝑂

Settling in with her mother and brother had been easy. They talked of anything, of what the sea was like crashing on Australia's beaches, their favourite foods and drink and even how different their lives had been when all three had been apart. But no matter how much she loved her time in Small Heath with her family, Anna couldn't ignore the dark cloud that was cast over their home- she walked into it every time she crossed the threshold.

Something had happened, she'd gathered as much from Michael's reluctance to spend time alone in the house without her there. But the nature of the event in question, Anna didn't have the faintest of ideas about what it could have been. Polly refused to talk of anything before she had come that didn't have to do with Anna directly, and as the days flew by, evidence of Polly Gray's self warranted seclusion would resurface, blaringly obvious to Anna's watching eyes.

Michael would come and go as often as he pleased. He always wore a navy suit, the expensive kind she'd seen the first time they'd greeted, so she knew he had to be important in some way. Each time he walked into the house, a smile on his face, his shoulders would tense and Polly would insist they do something 'worthwhile'.

"Come on. Michael will drive us to the house in Sutton. We could go out for a day somewhere, take the car and a picnic," Polly said, leaning forward to grip her hands happily. "What do you think?"

Anna couldn't help but smile. Her mother loved to talk about her home as if it were a third child. There was something about that building, she'd said, that made her believe that things were meant to be. Anna herself had felt that before, so she could do nothing but agree.

"I'd love to," she said, gripping her hands as her mother did.

Polly was on her feet instantly, slipping around the coffee table and into the kitchen, her strong voice echoing against the red walls. In the time since Anna had returned home, she'd straightened herself out noticeably. Even Anna could see.

"Brilliant. Grab your coat. You did have a coat, didn't you?" she said, turning to shout up the stairs. "Michael?"

Michael slipped through the doorway, hands in his pockets, face grimacing.

"I'm here mum," he snapped, the hint of an eye roll behind his bothered look.

"Don't whine," Polly said as she bustled across the kitchen, packing left over sandwiches into a wicker basket.

"Calm down, will you?" Michael said, taking the basket from her, before she could swing it from the bench.

Polly scowled for a moment. "Sorry, I'm just excited," she said, pausing again, releasing a smile. "Don't you remember when you first saw the house? Good god, you had to order the maid around for me, I didn't like to do it. Not in the proper way at least."

"You had a maid?" Anna exclaimed in surprise.

"Yes. Not anymore though. I hated the way she lingered. Liked to listen to every word we said, I swear," Polly laughed. "Come on, let me get my coat and we'll be off."

The car ride to Sutton was long, and once she'd gotten over the initial fear of the bumps that Michael would run over every few seconds, Anna couldn't bring herself to mind. It'd been a long while since she'd travelled in such away. In fact, she remembered the exact day: the day in which she was being driven to the docks, anticipating the extensive journey that was surely ahead.

And though she still felt that pit of worry deep, deep down, Anna knew that this very car ride would replace the memory, even if she could feel the tension between her brother and their mum. She would find out the meaning of it and sort it, then she'd be as happy as she'd always imagined.

The house in Sutton was beautiful. Polly hurried along the pathway, cutting through the peaceful silence of the street as she pointed to the flowers in the thin beds by the windows. Pale blue hydrangeas, a brilliant bush of them, lining the walkway.

"I planted them myself, when I first moved in. Hydrangeas. Just like the flowers on the blanket your aunt sewed for you."

The scent of flowers cascaded around them as the stood by the tall door, waiting for Michael to dig the key from his pocket. Daffodils crowded the opposite edging, a sure sign of the middle of spring- the season she loved. It was almost July. How the days had gone by so quickly! Both a blessing and a curse.

Inside, the house was large enough to grant the feeling of emptiness, and yet as Polly lead them through the hallway to the sitting room, the warmth that radiated from the decorated walls swelled up to Anna's chest. The same feeling of home as she'd felt at Small Heath. But she supposed, wherever her heart was, wherever she wanted to be would be home.

Polly disappeared into the kitchen excitedly, leaving Anna to peer around the room, standing by the unlit fireplace and glancing at the photographs that lined the mantle- they were all turned down.

Anna picked up the one in the middle, turning it over and laying the frame in her palm. It was no bigger than a postcard, it's frame old and frail and the photo inside seemed as old as the matching clock it sat next to. The image was grainy, as all the photos she'd seen, showing five men and two women.

She could name only Michael and Polly, who stood together on the far left, proud, gleaming smiles on their faces. They both looked different. They were younger, but it was more than that. Polly seemed unburdened, or at least more self confident with the way she stood. Independent. While Micheal, arm draped over the seat of another, looked carefree, his shoulders released from the weight that suppressed him now.

The people around them were family, she noted. They looked so similar yet so different. Anna felt Michael's eyes watching her warily. He noticed the picture in her nimble hands, eyeing the image with thinned lips.

"What'd you say our family does?" She asked, moving to stand beside him, letting him take the frame into his grasp. "This is them, isn't it? Our cousins?"

Michael nodded, his solemn glance never lifting.

"Tommy-" he began, but Polly cut him off, moving to pry the photo from his hands and place it face down on the mantle.

"Michael," she warned.

He sighed, watching as she headed to the front door, bringing Anna's suitcase and the picnic basket into the room.

"Later."

Anna nodded. "Okay."

Though she loved what her mother was doing for them, with the picnics and the blanket in the garden- of which was filled with even more daffodils and hydrangeas- Anna still could think of nothing other than the image of her cousins and the fact that as they laughed and talk, it lay face down, shunned from existence. For years she'd thought of nothing but her family, and while her mother had been the prime image, family meant everyone. She wanted to know them too.

Anna eyed the suitcase that lay ruggedly against the kitchen wall. "Oh! I almost forgot."

She hurried to it, flicking the clasps open and ruffling through her clothes until her hands wrapped around tissue paper, the striped wrapping ripping slightly as she pulled it into the sunlight.

"In Australia, I bought something to give you if I ever made it back. And since I did..." Anna smiled. Saying it aloud didn't seem real. She handed it over. "Here."

Polly unwrapped the gift, feeling the cool touch of the ornament in her hands as she held it up to see. Her eyes lifted, trailing a hand over the delicate face of the young girl. The country's name resting below her.

"Oh, Sally Anna," she whispered, arms pulling her into a hug. "I love it."

Anna breathed out, feeling the warmth spread through. She'd never get used to the feeling. She'd never get sick of it either.

"Mum." Polly pulled away, as if sensing her question. "What happened? Before I came."

Polly looked away, hand still circling the ornament.

"Why don't you speak about my cousins? Michael said you all use to be close," she said. "As close as any family could be."

Her mother's eyes closed, her face tightening. It was then that Anna realised that it perhaps wasn't thanh she didn't want to talk about them, but that she couldn't. It looked as if the words wouldn't be able to pass her thinned lips. Anna frowned. The thought of having pushed her mother made her want to cry.

"You're right, Anna," Polly said suddenly. "You have a right to know."

Polly breathed out, glancing to Michael who sat tense against a tree.

"It's been a few months since I last saw them. A few months since we... we got out." Her voice was timid and frail, as if every word caused more pain that even the event in question. "Your cousins, we were all good people, doing bad things. I promise you that. But Thomas."

She paused, glancing to him, asking him silently to finish.

Michael sighed. "Tommy made a deal."

The phase alone made Polly take over again. Shaking her head at what she only saw as bias.

"We were sent to prison. On a death sentence to hang. All of us. John, Arthur, Michael and me. While he walked free. The trial wasn't meant to be until a few weeks after that day. But one morning, the wardens came in, and pulled us to our feet and started walking us.

"My neck was in the noose. The wardens hand was on the lever. And I swear I saw angels, calling down to me, their soft voices in my ear. And then I saw you, Anna, my darling, standing above me, calling me that it will be alright and that I'd see you again." Polly was crying now, soft tears of a woman who'd learned to be silent as she sobbed many years ago. "And then another voice scared you away. A man yelling to stop. Saying that we were free. A motion had been passed for our release.

"You might think I should be grateful for Tommy for getting us out of it. For removing the rope necklace from miles away. But to that I say, you can't know what it feels like to be at deaths door and then be yanked away from it, all within five minutes. He hadn't stepped foot in a single prison for the whole sixth months we were rotting." She laughed out bitterly. "John was so scared he shit himself."

"That's why I don't talk to them. That's why I never will. We're different people now. Or at least I am." She glanced meaningfully to Michael. "I won't be mixed up in his shit."

Anna choked out an apology, wrapping her arms around her mother's shaking shoulders.

"He won't ever hurt this family again."

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