Story: A long wait

Elizabeth was so excited that she wanted to shout out loud. She looked at the letter in her hand. 'Your application to allow your two daughters, Grace and Elena, to enter Britain has been successful.' She hadn't read any further, that was all she needed to read. At last, after nearly two years of letters, phone calls and meetings, she had done it – she would see her children again.

Two years previously, after her husband was killed, Elizabeth had been forced to leave her home town in Africa and come to England, because her life was in danger. She had to leave quickly, and Grace and Elena had been left behind with their grandmother. Elizabeth had missed them dreadfully. But now, they were coming! Now they were going to live with her; she was so excited!

'This is a miracle,' she said to herself. 'I thank God for it.'

So Elizabeth began to get everything ready for her daughters' coming. She cleaned and polished, she cooked celebration food, and she spent ages at the hairdresser so that she looked her best when they arrived. 'I have to let them see how special they are,' she said.

The big day arrived. Elizabeth went to the airport to meet Grace and Elena. She wasn't sure that she would recognise them, as she hadn't seen them for two years, but she had a recent photo of them so she hoped they hadn't changed too much.

And suddenly, there they were. They were much taller than she remembered, and they looked very grown-up, but it was definitely them. It was difficult at first, and the girls felt awkward, but gradually on the way home they began to talk.

'We thought we would never see you again. There were lots of girls in our school whose parents had been forced to leave them, and they never saw them again. When our grandmother told us that we were going to England to live with you, we just laughed. That was impossible, we thought. That just couldn't happen.'

'But it has,' said Elizabeth, 'and now you are here. We're going to have a big party to show you how glad everyone is that you have come.'

And Elizabeth, Grace and Elena celebrated with all their friends, thanking God for the miracle that had happened.