by Holly Smale
I laugh. “Is that why you disappeared?”
“Not really. Oh, Harriet, I feel so embarrassed. I gave you such a hard time about Nick. I don’t think I quite realised until I met François that it’s not really like that. You can’t protect yourself from it. Nothing exists but them.”
“François?” I laugh. “He’s French and his name is François?”
“Some French people are called François, Harriet,” Nat says crossly. “It’s a thing. It happens.”
I smile and we start heading outside the airport. “You were wrong about Nick, by the way. I’ll tell you all about it in the taxi.”
“You know what?” Nat sighs. “Maybe I don’t know anywhere near as much about boys as I thought I did. They’re quite complicated, aren’t they? I think this might be the start of a lifetime of confusion.”
She links her arm in mine. “So, did you have a good time? Did it live up to the epic Flow Chart? You know we’ve still got loads of time left to do that stuff together.”
I think back to the bright lights, and the booming televisions, and the beautiful shrines, and the madness of Harajuku. I think about Mount Fuji, and the Shinkansen, and Tsukiji and the video arcade and the sumo hall; about my lit-up dress and Charlie and Kylie Minogue and the cockroach. I think about Yuka and Bunty and Toby and Haru and Naho and Shion; about Rin, who waved us off at the airport wearing a pink tutu and gave me the friendship bracelet I’m wearing now.
I think about Nick, who kissed me again before I got on the plane and had to literally push me into check-in because I decided last minute I wasn’t going anywhere.
Then I think about how different I feel to the way I did when I went there. As if I’m still me, but stronger. As if I’ve found my wings, and I finally know what to do with them.
“Yes,” I say with a grin as Bunty opens a taxi door and we climb in. “As far as adventures go, I’d say Tokyo was pretty coolioko.”
don’t like hospitals.
Let’s be honest: nobody actually does. Ostensibly they’re about making people better, but they’re not. They’re about reminding us that at some stage we all get sick, and we all hurt, and we all get lonely, and sometimes there’s nothing anybody can do about any of it.
The only thing on my mind as we walk through the big metal doors into the waiting room is that the last time I was in this exact hospital, I had a mum. And when I left three days later, I didn’t.
I suddenly feel horribly sick – right through to the middle – and it hits me just how much my feelings towards this baby are about the fact that it might take Annabel away from me. Because that’s what babies do, isn’t it? Babies change everything.
As we walk across the big green floors, I try to focus on the rhythm of my breathing and the beating of my heart and the tap of my trainers. Then I feel Nat gently grab my hand. “It’s going to be OK, Harriet. Look.”
I glance up and there’s Dad doing some kind of Riverdance in the hospital corridors. Every time a nurse or doctor walks past, he grabs them and spins them in a little triumphant circle.
This must happen more often than you’d think, because they just wait patiently until he lets them go and then continue with a slight smile down the corridor.
Nat kisses my cheek. “I’ll go and get a cup of tea. See you in a few minutes?”
“Offspring Number One!” Dad shouts across the hospital as my non-kissing soulmate disappears through the doors. He immediately wrestles me into a bear hug and tries to whirl me in another circle. “You’re back! That’s your name henceforth, by the way. Or maybe ‘Good’ and I shall call your sibling ‘Bad’ and we’ll have an entire set of Manners.”
He lets go and I steady myself. “Is …” I swallow. “Does that mean Annabel’s OK?”
Dad looks at my face and then wraps me up even tighter. “Of course she’s OK, sweetheart. She was always going to be OK.”
I can feel my chin starting to do the crumpled-up paper-ball wobble. Dad kisses the top of my head and pulls away. I finally notice his T-shirt. In big letters in red marker pen it says MY DAUGHTER’S A SUPERMODEL, and underneath, in little letters, it says: THE OTHER’S JUST SUPER.
“It’s a girl? I have a baby sister?”
“You certainly do,” Dad says with a grin that almost cracks his face in half. He ruffles my hair, and for the first time in my entire life I don’t scowl and try to smooth it back again. “I think it’s time you met her.”
he room is totally quiet.
Sunshine is streaming through a window, and there’s a small, comforting beeping sound. Annabel’s sitting calmly in bed in a clean white nightgown. Her blonde hair is smoothed into its normal impeccable bun, her face is peaceful and her cheeks are rosy. If it wasn’t for the fact that she isn’t wearing a suit and there’s a small, snuffling bundle of material in her arms, you wouldn’t know anything had changed at all.
Except it has.
I lurk nervously in the doorway while Dad bounds straight into the room like an excited Labrador. “WIFE-FACE!” he says loudly, and then claps his hand over his mouth. “Sorry,” he says in a fake whisper. “I meant wife-face, lower caps.” He leans over the bed and peers at the lump in Annabel’s arms. “When do her eyes open?”
“I didn’t give birth to a kitten, Richard. Her eyes have already opened. She’s asleep.”
“Don’t be so sure, Annabel,” Dad says firmly. “They’re smarter than they look. Harriet used to have this trick of pretending to be asleep when actually she was listening and storing it all up and getting ready to spout it all back out again just when you least expect it. We need to be prepared. This one looks wily too.”
“Good,” Annabel says, affectionately rearranging a few of the blankets. “The wilier the better.” Then she looks up to the doorway. “Mum? Can I have a word?”
Bunty nods and jingles into the hospital room. She’s surprisingly quiet.
“I’m sorry, Mum,” Annabel continues. “I’ve been far too harsh. You’ve done an amazing job taking care of Harriet. We couldn’t have done it without you.”
There’s a pause and I see Annabel searching for the right words, which is something I have literally never seen before.
“I’ve changed my mind about your kind offer. We’d love to have you stay with us for the first month or two.” There’s a pause. “I would love you to stay.”
Bunty kisses Annabel on the forehead.
“Thank you, darling. I know I haven’t been around in the past as much as I should, but I’d really like to change that.”
She can be such hard work sometimes, you know.
I don’t think I can handle any more.
It’s my first baby, and you know I love her to pieces but …
I just think it’s best for everyone if she’s not here.
They weren’t talking about me.
They were talking about Bunty.
A tiny squeak escapes from my throat, and Annabel looks up. She stares at me for a split second and then twists towards Dad.
“Take Tabitha, please,” she says, gently thrusting the bundle at him.
“Tabitha?” Dad says. It’s only when he takes the baby and fits her swiftly into the crook of his arm that I remember he’s actually done this before. “Tabitha Manners? As in Tabitha from Bewitched?”
Annabel laughs. “It’s also Aramaic for gazelle and the cat in Beatrix Potter so it should keep us all happy. I’m sure if we do enough research we can find a few record-breaking owls and koalas too.” Then she turns back to me. “Come here, Harriet.”
I walk towards her and sit gently on the bed. With a slight wince, Annabel bends down and gets a piece of paper out of her handbag. She hands it to me.
On it, written in perfectly neat handwriting, double underlined, it says:
The Manners Family
Harriet
Tabitha
Richard
Annabel
Bunty
“You see that?” she says quietly, pointing to it. “Y
ou’re still at the top of my list, Harriet.”
She nudges me with her shoulder, and my world suddenly falls straight back together as if it never exploded in the first place.
“Oh, what?” Dad moans, leaning over us. “Are you kidding me? I’m third? It’s my surname in the first place: I gave it to you little name-stealers.” He looks at the bundle and gently prods it with a finger. “I’ve got your card marked, Missy, and I know where you live.”
“Can I see her?” I ask nervously. “My sister?”
Dad grins and carefully hands me the bundle, and I stare down at Tabitha.
I don’t believe it. I actually do not believe it.
Not only is my new sister a maverick with no respect at all for timetables and plans, apparently she has no interest in statistics either. Less than two per cent of the world has red hair and it’s a recessive gene.
She’s even more ginger than I am.
“Another top model in the making,” Dad says proudly, looking at both of us. “Annabel, you are so incredibly lucky I’m genetically such a hotty.”
At that precise moment, Tabitha opens huge blue eyes and looks at Dad with a calm, unimpressed expression that says: Seriously? Billions of fathers in the world and I got landed with this plonker?
And I am suddenly absolutely certain that I’m going to love her more than I’ve ever loved anything, ever. Even maths. Even English. Even history.
Even more than physics.
My phone beeps. I quickly give my tiny, adorable sister a gentle kiss on the head and then hand her back to Dad.
Coming back to England tomorrow. ;)
Nick. xxxx
I grin happily and then look over at Bunty, who’s vaguely sniffing some flowers next to the bed. Then at Tabitha, yawning and wrinkling her little red nose. Then at Dad, humming under his breath and trying to get Tabitha to high-five him with her tiny palm. Then I look at Annabel, still gazing calmly at me.
She wrinkles her nose and I wrinkle mine back, and I suddenly realise that it doesn’t matter how far I go, or how lost I am, or how lonely I feel. I fit in here. I always will.
That’s how I know I’m home.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to my wonderful editor, Lizzie Clifford, for helping me discover ‘the statue in the stone’, and to my agent Kate Shaw, whose patience and kindness gave me the time to find it. Thanks to the whole team at HarperCollins, who have supported both Harriet and myself with passion and tireless creativity from the start, and to Pippa Le Quesne, whose guidance is always illuminating.
Thanks to my family: to my amazing Mum and Dad, always proud of me whether I deserve it or not, and my grandparents, for the world’s best cuddles, advice and jam tarts. Thanks to Flossy, for trying so hard to kill my keyboard, and to my little sister, Tara: my best friend, and the only person I’d give up my giant teddy-bear with the blue bow for.
Enormous thanks to Julian and Naho for their incredible generosity, and for re-translating my terrible Japanese without mocking me too heartily. Thanks also to Kristin, Laura and Sarah, for years of support and friendship. You have made many dramas so much smaller.
Finally, to everyone who has read and loved Harriet: you have brought her alive, and I couldn’t have done it without you.
Thank you. x
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About the Author
Photograph © Georgina Bolton King
Holly Smale is the author of Geek Girl and Model Misfit. Clumsy, a bit geeky and somewhat shy, she spent the majority of her teenage years hiding in the changing-room toilets. She was unexpectedly spotted by a top London modelling agency at the age of fifteen and spent the following two years falling over on catwalks, going bright red and breaking things she couldn’t afford to replace. By the time Holly had graduated from Bristol University with a BA in English Literature and an MA in Shakespeare she had given up modelling and set herself on the path to becoming a writer. Between then and now she also spent two years living in Japan. Holly is currently writing the third book in the Geek Girl series.
Copyright
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2013
HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers
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Copyright © Holly Smale 2013
Cover photographs © shutterstock.com; Cover typography © Mary Kate Mcdeveritt; Cover design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
Holly Smale asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780007489466
Ebook Edition © September 2013 ISBN: 9780007489473
Version: 2013-09-04
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