About Last Night

by Adele Parks

  ‘So you’re happy then?’ asked Pip tentatively.

  Steph stretched her legs out in front of her and eased herself back, propped up on her elbows. ‘Never happier,’ she replied honestly and confidently.

  ‘Even after everything? I mean it can’t be easy.’

  ‘No, it’s not. Not always. But I think we’re a bit like a vase that’s been knocked over and smashed into lots of pieces but a vase that’s loved so much that instead of being chucked, we’ve been carefully glued back together. So now while we’re no longer pristine and shiny, we are aware that we are loved and we’ve endured and that seems somehow more important than being pristine and shiny. So yes, I’m very happy. How about you?’

  ‘Not that Robbie and I are like a new vase yet, never mind a broken and fixed one,’ said Pip. ‘Robbie, Chloe and I are more like a brand new jigsaw just being fitted together, we’re enjoying the relief and comfort of the pieces slipping into place.’

  Steph turned to Pip and saw at once that she was misty-eyed. ‘Pip! Are you crying because you are meant to be the creative one and your analogy is so much weaker than mine?’

  Pip laughed and swallowed her tears. ‘I know, I know. I’m just so happy. And you’re happy and it’s all really great.’

  ‘Yes, it is, isn’t it.’ The women beamed at one another cloaked in the sort of love that had thickened and solidified over the years. ‘Pip?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You’re not pregnant, are you?’

  ‘What makes you ask that?’

  ‘You prepared a picnic, that’s basically nesting, now you’re crying, and the fact that we’ve been sitting on this beach for more than half an hour and you haven’t reached for the corkscrew yet.’

  Pip grinned and said, ‘Do you know what, I’m starving. Should I go and get the children and men so we can start in on this picnic properly?’ Within a flash Pip was up and scampering to the shoreline.

  Steph laughed and called after her, ‘You haven’t answered my question. That’s not a proper answer! Do you mean you’re starving because you’re pregnant? Are you or aren’t you?’

  But Steph couldn’t catch Pip’s answer, it was caught on the roar of the waves coming and going. Persistent. Consistent. Endlessly hopeful.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thank you, Jane Morpeth, the most wonderful editor anyone could ask for and I say that as a girl with very high standards indeed! It is a joy to work with you and your amazing team. At the risk of sounding like I’m accepting an Oscar I’d like to thank Georgina Moore and Rosie Gailer for their persistence and creative brilliance. Aslan Byrne and the magnificent sales force – at home, abroad, key account and regional – you are all so talented, tremendous and tenacious. A special thank you to Kate Byrne and Harriet Bourton for wisdom and support. Thank you to the marketing and design team who are the most sparkly, scintillating and smiley crew imaginable, particularly Vicky Cowell and Sam Habib who understand the importance of soft focus.

  Thank you, Jonny Geller, again!

  A massive thank you is due to Police Officer Liz Chatfield and Youth Offending Link Officer Nellie Williams as well as nurses Carol Wordley, Katie Rawson, Tracey Corbett and Pamela Rourke. Thank you all for taking time out of your incredibly busy and vital schedules to answer my questions about police procedure and nursing coma victims. You are terrific women and briefly alluding to your heroic work in this novel has been a humbling experience for me. I ought to add any inaccuracies in procedure or practice are my poetic licence!

  Thank you to the wonderful retailers and librarians that work so hard to engage readers and, erm, well, frankly, sell books.

  Thank you to all my readers, without you there’s no point in writing a word!

  I’d like to warmly acknowledge Rob and Becky Booker, once again, for their wonderfully generous support of Sparks, the children’s medical research charity. The remit of Sparks is to fund research across the entire spectrum of paediatric medicine. Their goal is for all babies to be born healthy and stay healthy. To learn more about Sparks visit www.sparks.org.uk.

  Finally, I’d also like to warmly acknowledge Valerie Satterfield and her daughter, Mary Jean Brown, for their wonderfully generous support of Room to Read, a charity that seeks to transform the lives of millions of children in developing countries by focusing on literacy and gender equality in education. To learn more about Room to Read visit www.roomtoread.org.