Phoebe
SUGAR RUSH, HOXTON, 10:32 P.M.
• • •
“I have to pee,” said Phoebe, as they came up for air. It was like being a teenager, snogging for ages in public. And kissing Caspar was a revelation. She’d always disentangled herself from George’s open mouth and darting tongue within minutes, telling herself it was normal for long-term couples not to kiss. She sidled off Caspar’s lap and out of their booth, trying not to stumble, knowing he’d be watching her back view weave to the loos. Once inside, she Instagrammed a photo of their cocktails with the caption There may be trouble ahead . . . Hopefully George, and everyone else, would realize she was on a date—since Caspar’s hand was in the shot. She scrolled idly through her Twitter feed as she sat on the loo. For a second, her brain, fuddled by alcohol and Caspar, couldn’t compute the hashtag #SeanCoughlan that kept appearing. “Really sad to hear about the Irish doctor”; “Such a shame about Sean Coughlan, the world needs more people like him,” she read. Wasn’t Sean better now? she thought, before she saw an unmistakable “RIP Sean Coughlan, such a waste.” She sat, paralyzed, tights round her knees. No wonder her parents had left all those voicemails. She ought to go home, she knew. But the date was going so well. How could she explain to Caspar without ruining everything? Would Olivia even want her around? She never knew the right thing to say, even to the people she should be closest to. Then again, if she didn’t go home, she’d be “Phoebe who’s oblivious to the news,” like always. Her phone pinged. It was a text from Caspar.
Have you escaped out the window? X
Shit. She had to choose.
Andrew
THE KITCHEN, 34 GLOUCESTER TERRACE, CAMDEN, 11:04 P.M.
• • •
Sitting opposite Jesse, Andrew thought how game his son was—joining in with their quiz on such a somber evening. It still staggered him, how life could switch. Just hours ago he’d been buoyant with relief at handing over Leila’s letter, prancing around, foolishly pleased about the talk he’d had with Jesse. Coming after his chat with Olivia in the car, it felt as if he’d mastered a new language. Even the awkwardness over Jesse’s eccentric medical ideas had been smoothed, with Emma promising Jesse she’d try green juice alongside the conventional treatment Olivia advised.
Earlier, he had chilled a bottle of 1984 Dom Perignon, planning to toast Olivia’s birth at midnight, possibly even to say a few words. That wouldn’t happen now, he supposed. Thinking of her upstairs, it was impossible to feel celebratory. Where was Phoebe anyway? It was a new sensation to feel angry with his youngest. He was just skipping a question about Haag, when they heard the judder of a taxi outside. A key turned in the front door above them, followed by heels clacking down stairs. Phoebe tottered in. She looked sensational, as always—if drunk. “I just heard,” she said, bending to try to undo her shoes, nearly toppling over, and then seeming to give up. “Where is she?”
“Upstairs,” said Emma.
“What, on her own?”
“That’s what she wants, darling. She didn’t feel up to coming down, and she doesn’t want anyone with her.”
“I’ll go,” said Phoebe, without waiting for any of them to stop her.
They heard her clattering upstairs, and Andrew remembered the Skype call in November, when Phoebe and Olivia had had nothing to say to one another. Perhaps every family should be quarantined together, he thought.
Olivia
THE SPARE ROOM, 34 GLOUCESTER TERRACE, CAMDEN, 11:16 P.M.
• • •
Three floors above, Olivia lay looking at the ceiling. From below, she heard someone hurrying up the stairs. The steps were too elastic for her parents, or Jesse, but wasn’t Phoebe out on her date? Olivia wouldn’t have expected her to know about Sean anyway. Or to cut her date short. It wasn’t like Phoebe—or the Phoebe she thought she knew.
It was Phoebe, though. She shut the door behind her and kicked off her shoes, moving with an unsteady conviction. She didn’t say anything, but lay down beside Olivia, head to toe. They used to lie like that when they were little, in their room in Norfolk, when one of them had a nightmare. Her feet still only reached Olivia’s shoulders. And even though Olivia could feel her not knowing what to say, it was sort of comforting. Finally Phoebe said, “He’s still here, Wiv. Inside you. I mean, your baby is half Sean. So he’s still here, and he always will be.” They lay on the bed in silence, sides touching now.
“You go down. I might come in a bit,” said Olivia after a while. It surprised her that she was able to form a sentence.
Phoebe sat up. “Yes! Please come down, they’re doing that stupid quiz,” she said, and then looked panicked that she shouldn’t have said something normal, or revealed that their parents weren’t weeping. Olivia wanted to tell her it was OK, but she knew that would embarrass Phoebe more. Sometimes, she thought, she understood her sister better than she realized.
She listened to Phoebe padding downstairs and thought about what she had said about Sean. It flipped around her fear that she was never going to move forward—that the baby would moor her in grief forever. Because Phoebe was right; there was another way of looking at it. Half of Sean was now going to live on in her care. Perhaps that was why this baby was being born. And the thought shifted something, so that the tide of pain ebbed back, just a tiny bit.
Emma
THE KITCHEN, 34 GLOUCESTER TERRACE, CAMDEN, 11:35 P.M.
• • •
Across the table from Andrew, Emma couldn’t concentrate on anything—especially the quiz she had suggested. She hadn’t even been able to eat, which never happened. All she could think of was Olivia. She hoped Phoebe hadn’t rushed upstairs and put her foot in it. It was right that Phoebe had come home, but she seemed rather tipsy and might well say the wrong thing. Emma had already begged Olivia to come down twice now to no avail. After everything that had happened over Christmas, she’d hoped Olivia would want them in her hour of need—but it seemed not.
Emma still couldn’t believe what had happened. It was always that way, when a young person died. Sean looked so strong, so alive, in his photograph. She wished she’d known everything when she’d met him at the airport. She kept imagining what she would have said, and now never would. Not that her regrets mattered. But it was unbearable to see Olivia in such pain. Andrew was asking yet another question that Emma didn’t have the foggiest about, when Phoebe appeared, in stockinged feet. She seemed less giddy as she put the kettle on.
“Think she’ll be down in a bit,” she said.
Phoebe
THE KITCHEN, 34 GLOUCESTER TERRACE, CAMDEN, 11:45 P.M.
• • •
Phoebe knew that stuffing herself with Jesse’s worthy but not unpleasant brownies wasn’t really appropriate. Nobody else was eating, but she had to—she was starving after cocktails on an empty stomach. Seeing her parents’ ashen faces, she was glad she’d come home. She wished she could erase Olivia’s pain as easily as Caspar had hers. It had been horrible to see Wiv, who was usually so composed, crying like that. She didn’t even seem to realize she was crying, the tears were just pouring like a tap left on. Everything was going to be so different now, with her mother and sister needing to be looked after. She and her dad would have to be the grown-ups.
Her phone buzzed, on silent. Thinking it might be Caspar, she checked it surreptitiously under the table. But it was a text from George: Happy New Year, Phoebles. Miss you. An in-breath of cacao powder nearly choked her. Fuck you, she typed immediately, then stopped and deleted. She didn’t feel angry like that—it was all too distant. One day, she knew, she and George would have to meet for a stilted drink on neutral ground. But it wouldn’t make any difference—that whole chapter already felt like memory. Just as she was switching her phone to silent, Olivia came in. And without even thinking about it, Phoebe jumped up and hugged her—not one of their stiff, A-shaped hugs, but a real, boob-meshing hug.
&
nbsp; Olivia
THE KITCHEN, 34 GLOUCESTER TERRACE, CAMDEN, 11:54 P.M.
• • •
Olivia sat back from the table, holding the token inch of champagne Andrew had poured her. Her whole body still hurt, like she’d been smashed into. But Phoebe had been right to urge her to come down. She’d always thought it was better to cry in private, but now she wondered if she was wrong. Seeing how nervous they all looked, she told them to see in the New Year as usual with the bongs on the radio. She actually wanted some normalness around her—anything to cushion the feeling of freefall.
With a spark and splintering sound, the room went black. The voice on the radio stopped. “Power cut!” said Phoebe.
Her father flicked on the torch in his Swiss army knife, opened the fuse box in the corner, and fiddled with the switches. Nothing happened. “Must be the whole street,” he said, looking out the window. He took matches and candlesticks from the side, lit a candle, and put it in front of Olivia. He held up the match to watch the flame dwindle. “Still reminds me of Afghanistan,” he said, and then looked at her as if he shouldn’t have said anything. She took a tiny sip of champagne.
“How come? You never tell us the whole story,” she said. It was the first time she’d spoken since coming down. The candle flared, and she saw Emma, Phoebe, and Jesse looking at her in surprise, and then at Andrew. And as he began to tell the story, she thought, It’s going to be hard. But I won’t be alone.
Epilogue
Seamus Andrew Coughlan Birch,
born August 17, 2017, 1:03 a.m.
Acknowledgments
A huge thank-you to my agent, Olivia Guest at Jonathan Clowes, for encouraging me to write something longer than an article and for believing in this idea. Without you, I would have put fiction off for years. Thank you also to Cara Lee Simpson for being so brilliant during Olivia’s leave, and to Ann Clowes for your time, advice, and expertise.
Second, thank you to everyone at Little, Brown for making me feel so welcome—above all, Emma Beswetherick. You are the most enthusiastic, astute, and understanding editor anyone could ask for—a fairy godmother of editors—and it has been such a pleasure to work together. I’m also enormously indebted to Andy Hine, Kate Hibbert, Helena Doree, Sarah Birdsey, and Joe Dowley at Little, Brown Rights for your tireless work. I’m thrilled to be published in so many other countries. Special thank-yous, too, to Dominic Wakeford and Ella Bowman for your advice and excitement about the book, and to Ursula Mackenzie, Charlie King, and Tim Whiting.
Third, thank you to everyone at Berkley in New York—I’m delighted to be part of the Penguin US family. A particular thank-you to Claire Zion, Jeanne-Marie Hudson, Craig Burke, Diana Franco, Lauren Burnstein, Danielle Dill, Jennifer Monroe, and most of all my editor, Amanda Bergeron. Your positivity, suggestions, and eye for rogue Britishisms were invaluable.
Next, I must thank my mother, Laura, my husband, Luke, and my dear friend Laura Cox-Watson. I’m so very lucky to have such clever plot consultants and early readers close by. I also owe a great deal to my parents and parents-in-law for all the hours you looked after Finlay and Max, which allowed me to keep writing up until my due date, and soon afterward. I’m deeply grateful to you all.
Finally, thank you to my oldest friends Felicity FitzGerald and Charity Garnett, both for sparking this story through your heroic work in Sierra Leone, and for your help with getting it down accurately. Your courage, kindness, and knowledge are awe-inspiring.
And another thank-you to Luke, for everything.
Readers Guide
Discussion Questions
• • •
Is there one character you relate to more than any other in this story? If so, why?
How well do you think Francesca Hornak captures the family dynamic of a week in quarantine over the holidays?
Do you think it was better/right for Andrew to conceal his one-off infidelity with Jesse’s mother? Or should he have spoken up and told Emma at the time?
Why did Olivia stay away from her family for so long? Have you ever experienced the feeling of not being able to be yourself with your family?
Discuss the sibling rivalry between Olivia and Phoebe. Why do you think we, as adults, fall into old roles when home with family? Have you experienced this?
What do you think kept Phoebe and George together for six years?
Did you empathize with the way each character reacted to Jesse’s surprise arrival? Did you empathize with Jesse?
Is there a moral lesson that each character takes away with them at the end of the story? If so, what is that lesson?
What are the main themes in the story?
Do you like the way the story is told from multiple points of view?
The end is tinged with tragedy and hope. How did the ending affect you?
What do you imagine or hope would happen next for each of the members of the Birch family after the closing pages of the book?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Francesca Hornak is a journalist and writer whose work has appeared in newspapers and magazines, including The Sunday Times, The Guardian, Elle, Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, and Red. She is the author of two nonfiction books, History of the World in 100 Modern Objects: Middle-Class Stuff (and Nonsense) and Worry with Mother: 101 Neuroses for the Modern Mama. Visit her online at twitter.com/FrancescaHornak.
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Seven Days of Us Page 29