by Byrne, Tanya
I tipped my head back and laughed, so loud that the birds fled from the branches over my head. I looked up as they wheeled past, then turned to look at the tree. ‘I haven’t been here since I was eight. Not since my gramps died. My nan wouldn’t come back without him,’ I told them, pressing a hand to its dark trunk. ‘It isn’t how I remember.’
I remember how my heart sagged when I got there that day. The tree wasn’t as tall as I remembered and I was sure it was closer to the sea. I could see it – on the horizon – and I could smell it, the tang of salt in the air, but it was too far away.
‘Rose, come on,’ Juliet said carefully. Despite the sunshine, it must have been cold because when I turned to look at her, her curls were whipping back and forth, but I couldn’t feel a thing. ‘There’s a café at the bottom of the hill. Let’s go get a cup of tea and talk.’
I knew that café. Dad used to take me there for ice cream whenever we came here. When I was tiny, he would walk me up and down the hill on his shoulders. ‘Are you holding on, little one?’ he’d ask, then he’d bounce me up and down and I would laugh and laugh.
‘Rose, please,’ Sid said, stepping forward. ‘You’re scaring me.’
I turned to face the tree again. ‘When I was eight, I climbed this tree. It was the bravest thing I’ve ever done. I thought I was on top of the world.’
I turned to Sid as he lifted his eyelashes to look up at the sky, and I knew he was thinking about that afternoon at the park.
‘But after a few minutes I realised that I was all alone,’ I breathed and he looked at me again, his forehead creased. ‘I’d never been alone. There was always someone downstairs or watching me scramble across the monkey bars at the park. But here, up this tree, I was alone. I knew if something happened to me no one would know. No one would find me because, for the first time, I hadn’t told anyone where I was going, I just went.’
Sid nodded. ‘There was this awful moment when I thought I’d never see anyone again, my dad, my uncle, my nan, Gramps. I thought that was it.’ My heart tensed at the memory. ‘It’s horrible, to be eight and to know it’s just you, that your parents won’t always be there. I wanted to climb this tree so bad, as soon as I saw it, but then I wished I hadn’t.’
The wind blew my hair into my face and when it stuck to my cheeks, I realised I was crying. ‘Curiosity will break your heart,’ I told him with a shiver.
He stepped forward and I think he was going to say something, but I’ll never know what it was because Juliet interrupted. ‘If this is about yesterday, about our argument, don’t worry. It’ll be okay,’ she said, coming to stand next to me. ‘I promise.’
I stared at her, suddenly livid. ‘You broke my heart, too.’
‘What?’
‘You ruined my life.’
She looked stunned. ‘What? How?’
‘You stabbed my father.’
I said it so smoothly. After months of swallowing down the words every time she smiled at me or Sid kissed her, they finally flew out of my mouth. BANGBANGBANG.
I heard her breath catch in her throat, then she took a step back. ‘Who are you?’
‘Who am I? Who are you? That’s the question.’
Sid looked between us. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Tell him, Juliet.’ I said her name with a smile. Sang it like a fucking aria.
She took another step back. ‘Who are you?’
‘Well, you’re Juliet Shaw and you stabbed my father so that would make me . . .’ I tilted my head and pretended to think about it.
‘Emily Koll,’ she breathed and I looked at her with a wide smile.
No one had ever been scared of me before then, like really, truly scared. I can’t say I enjoyed it, even though it was what I wanted. And it’s funny that, how you can want something for so long, then when you get it, it doesn’t feel like you expected it to feel.
Sid stood between us. ‘What’s going on? What are you talking about?’
‘Sid, be careful. Stay away from her.’ She took another step back and then it was so quiet that all I could hear was my heart in my ears as I took the knife out of my pocket and held it up. It looked beautiful in the sunlight, like it was made of gold.
As soon as Sid saw it, the colour fled from his cheeks. ‘Rose, what are you doing?’
‘Don’t call me that.’
‘Call you what?’
‘Sid, don’t. Get away from her,’ Juliet said, reaching for the sleeve of his jacket and tugging him back. ‘You can’t reason with her. She’s dangerous.’
But still he tried. ‘Rose, stop it. What are you doing? Give me the knife.’
‘An eye for an eye,’ I told him. ‘A heart for a heart.’
I smiled and drew a heart in the air with the knife.
‘Rose, you’re scaring me.’
‘Stop calling me that!’ I hissed.
‘Sid, please,’ Juliet sobbed, grabbing at his sleeve again. ‘Get away from her.’
I pointed the knife at her. ‘I lost everything because of you!’
‘I lost everything because of your father!’ she roared back.
‘But you got it all back, didn’t you? Mike and Eve, Sid.’
‘It’s not the same!’ She was crying then and it was beautiful. So beautiful.
‘Better than being Emily Koll, the gangster’s daughter. I didn’t do anything wrong!’
‘How is it my fault that your father is a criminal?’
I shook my head. ‘He wasn’t. Not until you stabbed him.’ I looked at Sid then. I wanted to grab him and shake him. ‘I didn’t know. About any of it. Before she stabbed him, he was just my dad. You know?’ Sid nodded. ‘I didn’t know.’
I looked back at Juliet. ‘Then you stabbed him and everything fell apart and I had nothing. Nothing. Everything I knew was a lie. How does it feel?’ I stepped towards her. She looked down at the knife. ‘Everything about you is a lie. Sid doesn’t love you, he loves Nancy Wells. Your aunt and uncle aren’t your aunt and uncle, they’re just some random couple you were sent to live with. You weren’t even born in February, your birthday is in October. It’s all a lie. Everything. I’ve said it out loud now so it’s all gone. POOF. Gone. How does it feel?’ I laughed and pointed the knife at her. ‘How does it feel, Juliet?’
Sid stood in front of me before I could take another step forward. ‘Ro, don’t do this.’
‘I love you so much, Sid.’ I looked up at him and I could hear my voice shaking. Shaking and shaking. ‘You know that, right? I’m out of my mind in love with you.’
‘I know. Rose, please. Please don’t do this.’
‘But I hate her more.’
‘Don’t, Rose.’
‘Please don’t call me that,’ I told him with sob.
Then I stabbed him.
I have ten minutes before the guard gets here to take me to the Old Bailey, so I’m writing this as quickly as I can. Sorry if you can’t read it.
This morning has been strange. Quiet. I’m wearing a suit. I haven’t worn this suit since that Open Day at St Jude’s when I played the prelude from Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 and everyone in the auditorium clapped so hard I couldn’t hear my heart in my ears any more.
I kind of look like Emily. I can’t remember the last time I looked like Emily. Naomi helped me get ready; she brushed my hair and filed my nails with an emery board she borrowed from one of the nurses. She didn’t say a word while she did it; she didn’t ask how I was feeling or tell me that everything was going to be okay, and I was glad. I know what people think of girls like us, of girls who end up in a place like this, but despite our misdemeanours and the colourful array of pills we live on, we don’t lie to each other.
Doctor Gilyard just called me into her office. I thought she was going to sit me down, ask me again if I’m sorry, but she just nodded at the phone on her desk.
‘I’ve arranged for you to speak to someone, Emily.’
I looked at her, then at the phone. ‘No.’ I shook my head. ‘I
’m not talking to her.’
‘Please, Emily.’
I stepped back from the desk. ‘I have nothing to say to her. I’ll say it all in court.’
She picked up the receiver and held it out to me like she did with the bow that afternoon in the TV Room. It made me think of Val, of her feet not quite touching the floor.
My legs shook as I took the phone from her and sat down. ‘Hello?’
‘Emily,’ a voice said, and my heart started to throb.
I think it knew before I did.
‘Dad?’
‘Hello, little one.’
Everything in me relaxed all at once. I felt my bones soften like warm wax.
‘Daddy.’
‘You alright, little one?’
I had to wait a second or two before I could speak, but even when I’d caught my breath, it still came out as a whisper. ‘Yeah.’
The line was quiet after that. I heard the scrape of a chair leg on lino, then he sighed. ‘I’m sorry, Em. I wanted to be there today, but it turns out it’s a bit late to try to be a dad.’
‘That’s okay.’
‘No.’ He sounded tense. I imagined him shaking his head, perhaps running a hand across his forehead. ‘No, it isn’t. You shouldn’t have to do this on your own.’
‘I’m not on my own.’
‘Who’s with you? That doctor?’
‘Yeah.’ I lifted my eyelashes to look at her. She was in her chair. ‘Doctor Gilyard.’
‘She sorted it so I could speak to you.’
I wanted to tell him that was nice of her, that it was so good to hear his voice again, but I could feel the tears gathering at the corners of my eyes and I couldn’t let them out. I wanted to be brave. I wanted him to see how strong I was.
But he knew.
‘You alright, little one?’
I tried to blink the tears away, but I couldn’t, so I squeezed my eyes shut. ‘Yeah.’
‘You giving them hell?’
That made me chuckle. It felt all warm and soft in my chest. ‘Yeah.’
I opened my eyes again and looked over at Doctor Gilyard. She was flicking through her notebook and bouncing the rubber end of her pencil against her bottom lip.
‘Good girl. You ready for today?’
I tugged on the hem of my jacket. ‘I’m wearing a suit.’
‘The black one?’
‘Yeah, it smells weird. Like home.’
‘Yeah?’
I sniffed the lapel. ‘It smells of that perfume you bought me in Paris for my sixteenth birthday. Do you remember?’
‘’Course I remember. What was that place we went to afterwards?’
‘Ladurée.’
‘Yeah, Ladurée. Twenty-five euro for a cup of tea and a bit of cake and you didn’t even eat it!’
‘I did!’ I chuckled again and as I did, I felt something in me stir, something under my skin, like when you cut yourself and a couple of days later, the ache becomes an itch.
Dad chuckled, too. ‘You didn’t! You just took photos of it on your phone.’
‘But it was so pretty.’
‘And what was that mad bookshop called?’
‘Shakespeare and Company.’
‘I don’t know how you found so many books in there. It was a mess.’
‘At least they spoke English.’
‘True. We would never have found that crêpe place otherwise.’
There was a long moment when we just laughed and for that moment I forgot – where he was, where I am. It was like I was ringing him from St Jude’s. I wanted to ask about Duck, to curse Arsène Wenger and whinge about homework. But then I heard a door – the cold click of a key in a lock at his end or mine, I’m still not sure – and my shoulders fell.
‘I’m so sorry, Daddy,’ I said with a defeated sob as the tears finally found a way out.
He listened to me cry for a moment or two – not just cry, wild ugly sobs – but when my breathing settled, he didn’t hush me like he did when I was little, he didn’t tell me not to be silly, that everything was going to be okay, he just told me to stop.
‘Don’t, Emily,’ he said, and I could just see the look on his face, the look he gives me whenever I tell him that I can’t do something. I knew he was pointing at the phone. ‘Don’t you dare apologise to me. You’re my baby girl; I should have been looking out for you.’
‘Yeah, but—’ I started to say with another broken sob, but he stopped me.
‘No, Emily. This is my fault. Look what I made you do.’
I shook my head. ‘You didn’t make me do anything.’
‘Of course I did! This isn’t you, all this anger, this bravado. What’ve I done to you?’
There was a tremor in his voice when he said it and nothing in my life – not Juliet, not this place, not whatever will happen to me today – has scared me more than that tremor, than that moment of helplessness.
He’d never sounded so human.
‘Daddy—’
‘Emily, don’t.’
‘Don’t what?’
‘Just stop it.’
‘Stop what, Daddy?’
‘Stop trying to be me.’
My hands were shaking. I wondered if his were, too.
‘You’re better than that, Em. Better than this.’
I looked out of the window, at the rolls of razor wire and the grey, grey sky and it was like waking up from a Sunday afternoon nap; I suddenly didn’t know where I was.
‘I thought I was doing the right thing,’ he said, almost to himself. ‘I thought I was protecting you, sending you to boarding school, not telling you about your mum.’
He stopped. I think he was waiting for me to catch my breath, waiting for me to ask.
‘What happened to her?’ I said it so quietly I thought I’d have to say it again, like that time I broke the Chinese vase in the dining room.
‘I don’t know, Em. She just left.’
I smiled at that. A strange reaction, I know, but it made something in me realign.
He hadn’t lied to me.
‘Em?’ he said when the silence lingered a moment too long.
I didn’t think I could breathe, but I managed to ask, ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said with a long sigh. ‘It was selfish. It just hurt so much to talk about, you know?’ I nodded, even though he couldn’t see me. ‘I couldn’t make her happy so all I wanted to do was make you happy. I wanted you to be so happy, Em.’ I heard his chair scrape through the phone again. ‘I love you so much, you know that, don’t you?’
I wiped my cheek with the heel of my palm. ‘Of course I do, Daddy.’
‘Then you need to get better,’ he told me, and he sounded like him again, like Superman. ‘You need to do everything that doctor tells you to do so that you get out of there and not go to Cambridge like I want you to, but run off to Paris or start a band or marry a broke writer or any of those other things you’d swore you’d do whenever you were mad at me.’
I tried to laugh, but it came out more like a hiccup. ‘I will.’
‘No, you have to ’cos you’re the only thing I’ve ever done right, kid. The only thing.’
‘Yes, Daddy,’ I breathed, my cheeks burning as the shame finally flooded through me. I looked away from the window down at the blotter on Doctor Gilyard’s desk. My scribbles were gone, the sheet clean, but as I ran my fingers over it, I could still feel the deep grooves in the paper, as though it remembered me.
‘Promise me, Emily.’
‘I promise.’
The line was quiet for a second or two. I heard another door open then shut. A key in a lock.
‘You’re gonna be alright, you know.’
‘Am I?’
‘’Course you will, Emily. You’re a Koll, ain’t you?’ he said, and even through the phone I knew he was smiling. And I smiled, too, because he’s right, I am.
I guess I forgot that isn’t always a bad thing.
The following loose pa
ges were tucked into the back of the notebook.
Acknowledgements
This book may have been written, but it certainly wouldn’t have left the confines of my hard drive were it not for the support and guidance of the following people. First, Cristin Moor, not only for encouraging me to write, but for making me fall in love with books again. Liz de Jager and her Red Boots of Awesome for feeding me tea and holding my hand through this whole process. Dawn Klehr and Kathryne Del Sesto for reading the various drafts of this story and making sure that I wrote the best book that I could. Kelly Bignall, Sarah Genever, Jade Bell, Fiona Hodge, Martha Close and Ros Lawler for telling me I could do it, then crying when I did. Jo Burton, Sarah Platt and Debbie Kilbride for cheering me on when I left a perfectly decent job at the BBC to write a book. Sue Hyams and all my friends at the SCBWI. John and Kerry at La Muse for giving me the time and space to write this book. Camille Gooderham Campbell at Every Day Fiction for taking a chance on me and publishing my first short story. Tracy Marchini for telling me that the first draft needed more tension. Without her, Emily’s story would never have been told. My wonderful and ceaselessly patient agent, Claire Wilson at Rogers, Coleridge & White, for never dropping olives on slate floors. Jane Morpeth, Hannah Sheppard, Sam Eades, Vicky Cowell, Lucy Foley and the rest of the team at Headline who are brilliant and seem to love this book as much as I do. My mother, who loves me in a boundless and incorruptible way, whatever I do or want to be. And finally, my brother Martin, who knew I could do this before I did. Okay. You can read it now, bro.
Author Q&A with Tanya Byrne
Have you always wanted to be a writer?
Oh dear. My first author interview and I’m already contemplating lying. This does not bode well.
The truth is, I haven’t always wanted to be a writer. I’ve always been creative. I loved Art at school and seemed to permanently have paint under my fingernails or be peeling PVA glue off my fingers, but I didn’t read much as a child. I grew up in a house without books and don’t remember ever being read a bedtime story or being encouraged to read for fun at school. In fairness, I think the teachers struggled to get us to read the books we had to read and if they did suggest anything else, I was more concerned with split ends and the fine art of applying eyeliner to listen.
