‘And butterfly wings,’ Wilbur will add. ‘Where is the bag of butterfly wings?’
‘Oh, well; those, we ate.’
And you will both laugh quietly, sleepily, and you will have the strangest feeling that he is resting his forehead against yours as he speaks, that you are resting your forehead against his, and there will be a long pause, and you will lie back on your pillow, the phone still at your ear, and fall asleep into the gold coins, the stars, the dragon eggs, the butterfly wings, fall asleep into the absence of fear, into truth and hope, friendship and love, all of it there in that pause.
You can also take a guess that one night, while you are standing beside Wilbur at his place, staring through his windows into the night, something will glint, catching your eye. ‘Do you see that?’ you will say.
Wilbur will wrench the window open and lean out. A faint sound will drift into the apartment, like a hushed breeze that sighs and exhales, as if the air were breathing. You will open the next window along and lean out too, and you will turn to look at each other, disbelieving. Now a fragrance will brush against you, something with pieces of eucalyptus in it, faint notes of vanilla. And in every direction, as far as you can see, tracings will surge and fall, drifting in sets, crossing each other, almost transparent but silver-lined. A little like water crossed with mist. You will both reach out, touch a wave as it passes, and it will glide by your hands, soft as cloth but with an unexpected firmness.
Again, you will glance at each other. Because you are not blockheads, you will not leap out of the window.
You will run down three flights of stairs, out into the dark street, the parked cars, the streetlights, and they will still be there, the air alive, bustling, almost laughing with flight waves. A low wave will pass by your hip and you will touch it and, without deciding, will find yourself riding it, your body slung across it, and it will carry you steadily along the street until you panic and slide back to the road, running a few steps, exhilarated.
You will both fly. You will practise on the low waves, then learn how to cross, higher and higher, until you are up among the trees, the icy freshness of the air up there. At first you will hold yourself awkwardly and your lower back will twinge, and then you will remember the positions you rehearsed in Practical Flight. You will relax your shoulders, hold your arms steady.
At times, you will panic at the fact that you are high in the sky, but images will return to you from Flight Immersion, and you will accept that the sky is for you.
You will call advice to each other. You will shout, ‘Is this real?’ Wilbur will fly close to you, and you will reach for each other’s hands.
You will fly through the dampness of clouds, swing over electrical wires. You will soar over city lights, across grids of suburban roads.
You will knock on doors and collect your flight class—Frangipani will fly neatly and gracefully, a ballerina; Pete Aldridge will surprise you by shouting and whooping. Antony will weep, Nicole will frown, anxious and swearing until her face brightens and then she’ll tear higher and higher, swimming through the air, reaching for stars.
You will circle a children’s playground, gazing down at the moonlit slides, the dandelions, the ridged mud, broken gate. And there, on the path running alongside this playground, a man will be walking, hands in his pockets, head bowed in thought. He will look up and see you flying above him. To your surprise, it will be Robert. Back again, never stepped onto the ice, but sailed to the North Pole, was cured by the northern lights, and now he’s back to cure the world of all its cruellest illnesses. You will know him at once; he will still have his hair, finer than it was, a darker blond, and he is well and tall and his face is broader, more rectangular, but he’s looking up, laughing at all of you swooping about, especially happy to see you, his sister; hands in his pockets, waiting while you skim the waves down to him—waiting to tell you his story—
Like I said, you can take a guess.
Most of these things will happen.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To my publishers, Claire Craig (in Australia) and Emily Griffin (in the US), for extraordinary insight and wisdom in the editing of this novel; to everyone else at Pan Macmillan (especially Danielle Walker, who has been so patient and good-humoured, Ali Lavau for copy editing, Rebecca Hamilton for proofreading, lovely publicist Clare Keighery, and Anna Morrison for the beautiful cover); to everyone at Scholastic in the US; and to my superb agents, Tara Wynne (in Australia) and Jill Grinberg (in the US).
To the Australian Arts Council, whose generous grant took a great weight from my shoulders at just the right time and made it possible for me to complete this novel.
To the café owners and managers who answered my questions and chatted with me about café life, especially at Maisy’s and at Café ZoZo in Neutral Bay, and at Oski in Kirribilli.
To Kalle Manner, a rikosylikonstaapeli (detective sergeant) at Itä-Uudenmaan poliisilaitos (the Eastern Uusimaa Police Department) in Finland, who was enormously generous with his expertise, and even emailed me location photographs, and to his sister, Anu Pietilainen, who provided very helpful Finnish expertise of her own.
To the two kind doctors who reviewed the medical sections of this book, and to all the extraordinary people who work in the public and private health systems, especially in paediatrics.
To Nigel Wood, who is endlessly patient with my crises of confidence, and with my questions about life with anosmia, and who tells (quite seriously) fascinating stories about termites.
To all my friends, including but not limited to Natalie, Libby, Rachel, Suzy, Sandra, Jane, Jayne, Jo, Cathy, Sophie, Gaynor, Anna, Hannah, Elizabeth, Melita, Stephen and with particular thanks to Laura, for exquisite emails and encouragement; Kathryn, for the mentoring, wit and sagacity; Michael, for late-night texts containing wit and sagacity; Maria, Deborah and Rebecca for making Coco Chocolate a dreamland; Limor, who shared with me her powerful poetry; Corrie, who sends gifts that basically write books for me; and Lesley, whose mother once pulled over her car to comfort a stranger weeping on the side of the road.
To my sisters: Liane (who lit up when I said I wanted to write a book about flight, which is why I wrote it, and who generously applauded every draft, which is why I didn’t give up on it), Kati (whose many talents include proofreading all our novels), Fiona (who lets me crash her family beach holidays) and Nicola (for her beautiful enthusiasm and GIFs).
To my mum, who makes me laugh, believes in magic, and never quits; and to my dad, who, as a boy, dreamed of flying planes, made his dream come true, and still talks about flight with a gleam in his eye. (Dad has always told mesmerising stories about the sky, and was hugely helpful with technical questions, although, to be clear, he would never ‘step out of a perfectly good aeroplane’.)
To my son, Charlie, who is hilarious and a master of sideways-crooked thinking.
Finally, special mention to Loren O’Keeffe, who was generous enough to read this novel, and to respond to it with kindness. Loren’s brother Dan went missing in July 2011, and she established the Missing Persons Advocacy Network (MPAN) in 2013. MPAN does important work creating awareness around missing people, and providing practical support to their families. It operates without funding and tax-deductible donations are welcome at www.mpan.com.au.
This book is dedicated to my family and friends, but I’d also like to dedicate it to those who have missing family members or friends. The strength required to live with ambiguous loss, with the absence of the one truth that matters the most, is breathtaking.
About Jaclyn Moriarty
Jaclyn Moriarty is the prize-winning and bestselling author of novels for adults, children and young adults, including the ‘Ashbury-Brookfield’ books and The Colours of Madeleine trilogy. Jaclyn grew up in Sydney, lived in the US, England and Canada, and now lives in Sydney again.
Also by Jaclyn Moriarty
Adult
I Have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes
Young Adult
F
eeling Sorry for Celia
Finding Cassie Crazy
The Betrayal of Bindy Mackenzie
The Spell Book of Listen Taylor
Dreaming of Amelia
A Corner of White
The Cracks in the Kingdom
A Tangle of Gold
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
First published 2019 in Macmillan by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd
1 Market Street, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 2000
Copyright © Jaclyn Moriarty 2019
The moral right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.
All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.
This ebook may not include illustrations and/or photographs that may have been in the print edition.
Cataloguing-in-Publication entry is available
from the National Library of Australia
http://catalogue.nla.gov.au
EPUB format: 9781760785840
Cover design: Anna Morrison
Cover image: Getty Images
Typeset by Midland Typesetters
This is a work of fiction. Characters, institutions and organisations mentioned in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously without any intent to describe actual conduct.
The author and the publisher have made every effort to contact copyright holders for material used in this book. Any person or organisation that may have been overlooked should contact the publisher.
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