"Mummy?"

Leah jerked awake Friday evening to find herself curled up on the sofa, legs bent at an odd angle. Hissing in protest at her stiff limbs, she hauled herself upright, blinking blearily in the dim light.

A lengthy squint at the clock on the wall told her it was just gone six; had she really fallen asleep so early? Then again, given the week she'd had, Leah shouldn't have been surprised. With the head teacher having requested that Molly stay off the remainder of the week, Leah had been forced to take the week off too, and she couldn't remember many worse weeks in her entire life. Apart from meals, Molly had hardly emerged from her bedroom, barely speaking two words to Leah – until now.

"Come and sit down, Molly," said Leah wearily.

Molly hesitated a moment, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, before sidling into the living room and taking a seat on the sofa opposite Leah, who felt a pang in her chest at the vast space between them. Her brief sleep had swept away any lingering anger at life in general, making her want nothing more than to cross the room and envelop her daughter in her arms – and if she wasn't so adamant that wasn't the right way of fixing this, Leah would have been over there in an instant.

Instead, she forced herself to wait patiently for Molly to speak.

"I wanted to talk, Mummy," mumbled Molly eventually, refusing to meet Leah's gaze as she toyed with the tasselled edge of the worn cushion cover. "I've been thinking about some stuff."

Again, Leah elected to remain silent – Molly was never usually one to voice her thoughts, and Leah wasn't about to interrupt her daughter now that she'd finally begun to talk.

"I..."

Molly coughed awkwardly, clearly having difficulty with whatever she wanted to say.

"I realised that when I got – when I got angry the other day, I wasn't actually angry with Bella. At least, not really."

Leah's mouth felt extremely dry as she attempted to form the right words. So Molly hadn't been angry with the child she had kicked. This was more a worrying revelation than anything – did it mean Molly's motive had been something other than blind rage? Had she, in fact, intended to injure the girl?

"I am really sorry about hurting Bella – I never meant to hurt her. I just got annoyed at her, but I didn't realise that I was actually angry about something else."

Leah suppressed a sigh of relief. While still completely unacceptable, Molly lashing out because of losing her temper was far more bearable than if she had intended to cause pain unprovoked.

But the question which still remained to be answered was what, or who, had made her so angry since the last time Leah had seen her on Friday...

Leah's heart stopped as, in one horrible, sickening moment, the penny dropped.

"What was it that made you angry, sweetheart?" asked Leah, fighting to keep her voice level as she anxiously hoped her guess was wrong.

Leah watched every tense movement of Molly's hands as they toyed with that tassel while she struggled with her answer. Desperately she willed her suspicions not to be true, even as she realised she had known it, deep down, since the moment she'd dropped Molly off at school last Friday. Leah had known, in all honesty, that she was probably letting her daughter in for a whole world of hurt – yet she'd been powerless to prevent it. Neil was her father, after all – he'd been well within his rights to request to see her.

And now, once again, Leah was the one tasked with picking up the pieces of her daughter's shattered heart.

"I was angry with Dad," murmured Molly eventually.

Leah was surprised to hear herself exhale in a big whoosh; she hadn't been aware that she was holding her breath the whole time Molly was thinking of her answer. Now it was her turn to consider how best to respond – how best to disguise her violent rage towards Neil for hurting their daughter – and so she remained silent for several seconds, gnawing at her lip as she mulled it over.

"What made you angry with Dad?" she settled on eventually.

Molly's answer came surprisingly quickly this time; now she had finally begun to voice what was on her mind, it seemed there was an eager rush to spill forth all she'd been keeping bottled up.

"He already has a new girlfriend - Sarah," she blurted, voicing the name with distaste. "She stayed for the weekend too, and I don't like her. She smells like a perfume shop and her eyelashes look like spiders – and she kept kissing Dad all the time. It was gross!"

Leah fought back the urge to burst out laughing. Molly could always be counted upon to lighten the atmosphere with her blunt comments – Leah had really expected to feel a lot worse when she inevitably heard that Neil was kissing someone else. Perhaps it was because she'd already been through all that before she'd found out about the affair – after all, Sarah was not such a 'new' girlfriend as Molly thought.

Whatever the reason, it was a breath of fresh air for Leah to realise it didn't bother her that Neil was with Sarah. She was welcome to him; Leah simply didn't feel attracted to him anymore, and hadn't really for quite a while. Of course, that might have had something to do with the fact that she was now attracted to someone else...

No, she would not go there right now. Tristan had no business creeping into her thoughts unannounced; especially not when she was in the middle of something very important with Molly. This perfectly demonstrated why nothing could ever have happened between them – the last thing Leah needed right now was to be distracted, and Tristan seemed to consistently pose the biggest distraction Leah had ever faced.

"The thing is, Molly," sighed Leah, "Dad cares about Sarah, because she's his girlfriend, so unfortunately you will have to try and get along..."

"No," cut in Molly firmly. "No, I won't. I'm never going to stay with Dad again."

Leah's eyes widened in shock at the finality in Molly's voice.

"I know you don't like her now," she soothed her daughter, attempting to remain calm despite the alarm bells pealing inside her head. "But you just need to give it time."

"No!" cried Molly, the sudden increase in decibels causing Leah to jump slightly. Her panic only increased at this angry outburst of the sort Leah hadn't witnessed in months from Molly; clearly something drastic had changed for her daughter during the weekend.

"Molly," said Leah gently, fighting to keep her shaking voice level. "I want you to be completely honest with me: did something happen with Sarah over the weekend?"

Molly's silence told Leah everything she needed to know.

"You can tell me, Molly," coaxed Leah gently. "You know you can always tell me anything that's upsetting or worrying you."

For a moment, it seemed as if Molly had closed in on herself again and would not speak. Leah waited with bated breath as the silence stretched on unbearably; it couldn't end now, not after getting so close to finding out what had been going on!

Just as Leah was about to give up hope, a sudden movement across the room caught her attention. Apparently without thinking, Molly had leapt to her feet, before wordlessly staggering towards Leah's sofa with a choked sob and burying herself in her mother's arms.

Leah had no idea how long they remained in silence; all she knew was in that moment, her entire world had righted itself again. Gently rocking her daughter as her tears seeped into Leah's jumper, the vast hole occupying her chest the past few months slowly began to knit itself back together. Molly was still hurting, yes – but she had come home. She had finally let herself experience the emotions she had suppressed throughout the divorce, which was the first step towards properly healing – and for the first time in many months, Leah dared to hope that things might get better.

The sobs eventually subsided, and when Molly turned her tearstained face up to Leah she found a tissue ready for her, magically produced from Leah's pocket in that special motherly way. Molly took it with a grateful smile – and with that one, small display of tenderness from her daughter, suddenly all the torture and turmoil of the past few months seemed more than worth it for Leah. She would willingly endure it all again, she realised, just to be able to see her daughter smile again.

"I'm really sorry, Mum," sniffled Molly now.

"You have nothing to apologise for, Molly!" cried Leah. "There's nothing wrong with having a good cry; sometimes it's what we need to help us feel better."

"No, I mean – I'm sorry for being so horrible when Dad left."

Leah simply enveloped her daughter in her arms once more, not trusting herself to speak.

"You don't have to apologise for that, either," murmured Leah eventually through the sizeable lump in her throat.

Molly made to wriggle out of Leah's arms once again, but by gently stroking her hair she soothed her daughter into serenity.

"I do, though," mumbled Molly. "I was angry with you, because I thought it was your fault that Dad left – but now I'm glad he's gone, because he's a rubbish dad. He made me eat a pizza with mushrooms on it for tea – why doesn't he know I hate them? – and then he wouldn't let me watch Doctor Who because Sarah wanted to watch a stupid kissy film. And then – when I went to bed, I heard – I heard Sarah call me a little brat to Dad. And Dad – he didn't say anything.

"Am I a little brat, Mummy?"

Once, twice, three times Leah swallowed – but this time she simply couldn't prevent the tears from falling. Giving in, she succumbed at last to the wave of gasping, choking, snorty sobs of the most unattractive kind, which had been threatening to escape for a very long time.

"What's wrong, Mummy?" asked Molly fearfully.

Leah needed to pull herself together; it wouldn't do for her daughter to see her completely fall apart. With a few deep breaths, Leah brought the tirade under control, before gazing intently at her daughter and cupping her beautiful young face in her hand.

"I could never think that of you, Molly," she told her daughter sincerely. "You're a bright, loving, determined young girl, and you shouldn't ever let anyone tell you otherwise. If only you knew just how special you are to me, my darling – I love you more than anything else in the world, and always will, because you, Molly, are an incredible person."

With a heartfelt sigh, Molly disappeared into Leah's embrace once again; both mother and daughter overcome with emotion in a single moment of tender beauty between them. Perfectly content, they may have remained nestled together the entire night – if the doorbell had not rung that instant.

It must be Neil, thought Leah, leaping to her feet instantly as she found herself spoiling for a fight. Not pausing to think of her current dishevelled state, she hurried into the hall and wrenched open the front door, ready to give that lowlife a piece of her mind.

But her fighting spirit evaporated rather quickly, upon coming nose-to-nose with a sheepish-looking Tristan, along with two small figures clutching a large Tupperware box.

"Hey, Leah," he greeted her, as if this were the most normal occurrence in the world. "Can we come in?"