Mrs Clanks gave us the envelope with our Memory Book in and Zac held it on his lap for the whole journey. Anita said he could put it down if he wanted but he wouldn’t let go. He just held on to it really tight all the way to Martha’s.
Zac and I spent the rest of our childhood at Appleton House and twenty-five years on we still think of it as home. It was as though there were two child-shaped holes waiting to be filled and we fitted them perfectly. Martha got another dog, a black and white spaniel this time, and we called her Zip. She was just as lively as Dash and soon she was running along beside Zac’s ankles, looking at him adoringly. We also discovered that dogs can count, though possibly not to one hundred.
Silas didn’t go to jail and not long after the march the poll tax was abolished and the posters and sheets came down. We still have our Memory Book and the photo of the dog but neither Zac nor I have looked for our mother since that afternoon in Trafalgar Square. Perhaps one day we will but for now we have all the family we need.
Martha has been my inspiration. I have moved back to London and work as an illustrator but there is nowhere I would rather be than with Martha in her studio. She still paints and though her hands are less steady her colours are just as vibrant.
Zac became a teacher and is married with a daughter, Bonita. He has promised to take her to Spain one day. He is the sweetest dad you could imagine, and the kind of teacher who spots the sad, sullen kid at the back of the class and tries to help.
Skilly House has been sold by the council and is due to be demolished so flats can be built. Last week we gathered for a final goodbye. Silas and Hortense were there as warm and energetic as ever, packing and organising and piling the table with food. The only difference is a few years ago they married. Zac and I were so surprised. We had been so wrapped up in our own lives it never occurred to us that adults had feelings too.
Mrs Clanks was also there with her husband, Albert. She is much older now but her back is still straight and she still wears a ribbon in her hair. At a quiet moment she took me aside and pulled two envelopes out of her bag.
“I thought you might like these,” she said.
And there were the letters we had written so many years ago, the pink and the white envelopes as fresh as if they had been written yesterday. I didn’t need to read them, I know them off by heart, but I carried them with me all afternoon.
There were many past Skilly kids at the gathering, some I knew and most I didn’t, but we were all there for the same reason – because Skilly was part of our lives. Amazingly Jimmy was there, tall and thin and urgent with life. He told me the night he left Skilly he’d slept under Waterloo Bridge. He’d felt too old to live in a children’s home but he’d had nowhere else to go. On the second night he stole a blanket and got into a fight; on his third night he was moved to a hostel. His life has been tumultuous but throughout it all he has stayed close to Silas and Hortense. He now works with young people and he finally feels he is keeping his head above water.
Wonderfully, Pip was there too. I have often worried about the small, sad girl stuck behind her wall but there she was, smiling and happy with two small daughters of her own and no possibility of a wall because her girls are completely enchanting. If ever there was a small miracle it was for me the sight of Bonita playing with the two little girls while Zac stood proudly by.
The garden at Skilly was overgrown and bursting with flowers, and clematis and ivy almost covered the walls. The tree had been sliced into pieces and piled high, the names we carved into the bark buried in the heap.
Later Silas lit a fire and we gathered round, a circle of ghosts watching the flickering flames, and I thought of all the lost children who had gazed out on that garden and wondered what the future would bring, or even if there would be a future.
I walked over to Mrs Clanks and held out the letters. She nodded. There was no need to speak. We took a letter each, crumpled them into balls and tossed them into the flames. They twisted and tumbled a little and then they caught light, scattering their embers into the fire.
I would like to thank my agent Gillie Russell for her support and encouragement and for making so much possible. Many thanks also to the wonderful team at Nosy Crow for believing in this book from the start and picking it up and running with it with such enthusiasm. I could not have asked for more. Huge thanks also to Katie Harnett for her beautiful illustrations.
I would also like to thank my friends and family for their support, in particular Paul, Hilary and Kate for their patient encouragement, Phoebe for her excellent advice and Tess for being a breath of fresh air.
Finally, thank you to Rosie and Oliver for being a constant source of inspiration – and distraction – and for putting up with my moods (sorry about the spinach incident). Many thanks also to Duncan for believing in me and my stories, even when things showed no sign of working out.
Copyright
For Duncan, Rosie and Oliver
LITTLE BITS OF SKY
First published in the UK in 2016 by Nosy Crow Ltd
The Crow’s Nest, 10a Lant Street
London, SE1 1QR, UK
This ebook edition first published 2016
Nosy Crow and associated logos are trademarks and / or registered trademarks of Nosy Crow Ltd
Text © S. E. Durrant, 2016
Cover and inside illustrations © Katie Harnett, 2016
The rights of S. E. Durrant and Katie Harnett to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, incidents and dialogues are products of the author's imagination or are used fictiously. Any resemblence to actual people, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
ISBN: 978 0 85763 400 9
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