The Girl in Between

by Sarah Carroll

  ‘You came back,’ I say before she reaches me.

  She stops. She’s out of breath but she looks real happy that she made it back just in the nick of time. ‘I’m sorry, love,’ she says. ‘I’m so sorry.’ She kneels down in front of me and she smiles. Her hand stretches out. She’s reaching for me. To hold my hand. To take me with her. ‘Come on, love, we have to go.’

  I kneel down too. But I don’t take her hand.

  ‘Where?’ I ask.

  And I know what she’s going to say cos I’ve heard the words before. Cos this has all happened before.

  ‘Anywhere you want, love. Anywhere. I promise.’

  I feel a hole open up inside me. ‘A castle?’ I say.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Just the two of us?’ I say.

  ‘Yeah.’

  I nod. ‘You came back, Ma.’

  ‘’Course, ye eejit. I’d never leave you.’

  And the hole inside me aches cos I know it’s true. ‘You came back, Ma. I know ye did.’ I pause till I’m sure she’s listening. ‘I saw ye. That night in the alleyway.’

  Ma’s smile melts away. ‘No,’ she whispers.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say.

  Ma’s eyes are going all deep. And I know what it means. But this time I can’t let her drown.

  ‘I left you that night,’ I say. ‘I wasn’t supposed to. But I went to look for food. And you woke up. And I wasn’t there. So you went looking for me. But you couldn’t find me. Then you came back.’

  She nods. ‘I came back.’

  ‘I know. But it was too late, Ma. I was already gone.’

  Two Yellow Jackets come up to the gap in the fence. They’re holding a board. The last board to finish the fence. They see Ma. But they don’t see me. ‘Ah here, come on! It’s time to go,’ one of them shouts. ‘Bloody squatter.’ He shakes his head. But the men drop the board and leave.

  Ma doesn’t even notice them. She’s staring at me like she wants me to make it all better. So I say, ‘You’re not stuck here cos of the Authorities, Ma. The Authorities aren’t even after us. You’re stuck here cos of that night.’

  Ma shakes her head. She covers her mouth with her hand. She’s going to cry.

  ‘But you kept your promise,’ I say. ‘You found us a castle. And it was good, Ma. It was.’

  Ma nods.

  ‘It just got bad cos we got stuck here. That’s all,’ I say. ‘Now it’s time to go.’

  She looks up at the mill and shakes her head. ‘No. I can’t. I won’t leave you.’

  ‘You have to leave, Ma. I’ll leave too.’ I say.

  ‘You’ll come with me?’

  I look at the ground for a bit. I roll some grit under my fingers. ‘You know what, Ma? Every castle has a secret escape route.’

  When I look up, Ma’s face has gone all soft. Like Gran’s mushroom face.

  ‘Yeah?’ she says.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say and I point to the gap. Ma turns and looks at the traffic passing by.

  ‘Not much of a secret, love,’ Ma says.

  ‘Nah, that’s not it. The secret escape route’s not a place. It’s a way.’

  Ma crawls forwards a bit so she’s closer to me.

  ‘What is it? What’s the secret?’

  I smile. And she smiles back. And it’s a real smile.

  ‘Together. That’s the secret way out, Ma. We have to leave together.’

  Ma takes one of those breaths that makes her whole body shake.

  ‘Please, Ma? Will you leave with me?’

  Ma shakes her head.

  ‘You said it was time to move on, Ma. You were right. But we can still leave together, can’t we?’

  She rubs her face with the palms of her hands. She takes a few shuddery breaths. Then she drops her arms.

  ‘Where will you go?’

  I look up at the sky. There’s a break in the clouds. The sun’s rays fan through. It looks like the fingers of a giant searching for souls, to take them out of this world.

  ‘A castle. With halls and secret tunnels and a massive garden. And rooms that have real curtains that hang all the way to the floor, and duvet covers that match. I’ll keep a room for you, Ma. Beside mine and Rose’s.’

  Her eyebrows arch in a big question mark.

  ‘She’s Caretaker’s girl. She likes castles too,’ I say.

  Ma smiles but she doesn’t ask. And I don’t tell. We both just sit there for a while and look at each other till I say, ‘You got to do it, Ma. Not me.’

  She grabs me and hugs me real tight. ‘I miss you,’ she says. ‘I miss you so bloody much. And I love you. I’ll never, ever stop missing you and I’ll never, ever stop loving you.’

  ‘I know,’ I say.

  Her tears are warm on my neck. I push her away and make her look at me.

  ‘One thing, Ma. You have to promise me something first.’

  ‘Anything, love.’

  There’s something different about her. She looks wrecked but her eyes, they’re not drowning.

  I know she’s ready. So am I.

  ‘You have to forgive her.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Gran.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ she says.

  ‘Sometimes you look at me with the same look Gran had the day we left. You have to forgive her.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Don’t you miss her?’

  I’ve never asked her what happened with Gran. I think that’s why she doesn’t know what to say right now. She’s staring at me. But this time I stare right back. I don’t blink and I don’t look away. I don’t ask her neither. Cos it doesn’t matter now.

  Ma looks down the street. In the direction that the school girls walk.

  She nods. It’s only a tiny nod. But it’s a nod.

  ‘Nothing’s unforgivable, Ma.’

  She bites her lip. A tear rolls down her cheek. She wipes it away. But more come.

  ‘Promise me you’ll go back to Gran’s. That you’ll get better. That you won’t drown.’

  Ma closes her eyes. She takes a deep breath. Then another. Then opens them and she nods again.

  ‘Say it, Ma.’

  ‘I promise.’

  ‘Promise you promise?’

  ‘Yeah, love. I do.’

  And we both stay there for a while till I say, ‘Look at the state of ye,’ cos her face is all wet and runny.

  Then she does this real goofy smile and she flicks her hair like she’s pretending she looks gorgeous. I laugh.

  ‘Nothing a few home-cooked meals can’t fix,’ she says. She takes my hand. This time I let her.

  ‘And a hairbrush,’ I say.

  ‘And maybe some make-up,’ she adds.

  Ma stands and pulls me up. We look at the Castle.

  ‘It was a poxy hole, in fairness,’ she says.

  ‘Nah,’ I say. ‘It was deadly.’

  Ma smiles at me. She leans forwards till her forehead is touching mine. She holds it there a long time. Then she whispers, ‘Ready?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘You?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she says.

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘Sure I’m sure.’

  She takes her head away and kisses my forehead. She’s still holding my hand when she turns. She steps through the gap of the fence. Then she looks at me and smiles.

  She squeezes my hand real tight. I squeeze back.

  And then I let go.

  If anyone is watching, they might see a girl step out of the shadow of the mill, just as the Yellow Jackets close in. They’d see her leave behind the broken windows and weeds that grow in between the big stones. They’d see her step away from a Castle that’s about to crumble and tumble into the canal and disappear like the memories of a ghost.

  If anyone is watching, they’d see a girl take a deep breath and a step and then another, out of the gap in the fence and into the light and the noise and the traffic and the people.

  If anyone is watching, they’d see. But no one sees me. I’m
invisible.

  Acknowledgements

  A friend said to me that he imagined writing must be a very lonely occupation. I replied, not at all.

  Of course I sit alone dreaming and writing and editing until I have something worth sharing. But once I do, there are a lot of people I rely on. People who assist, advise and encourage me.

  I would like to acknowledge the Irish Writers Centre, a wonderful resource for Irish writers, and the place where I found direction and focus in the early days. Through the centre I joined the Children’s and YA group, where I learned so much about the difference between good writing and a good novel. I would particularly like to thank Simone, Aoife, Aine and Colleen for their countless hours of editorial comments, advice, encouragement, tea and cakes.

  Audrey, my very first fan, thank you for wading through every draft.

  I can’t possibly thank my agent, Claire Wilson, enough. Nothing in my career will ever be as exciting as the very first email I got from you. But since then, your insight and patience have been simply invaluable.

  I’m not sure if it is unusual, but I love the editorial process. I took this book as far as I could myself, but Rachel and Lucy at Simon & Schuster, and Kathy at Penguin Random House, helped me to mould it into the best book it could be. Thank you so much for all your hard work and wisdom, and for accommodating the arrival of my daughter onto the scene, mid edit!

  Finally, none of this would have been possible without your support and belief in me, Bob. Perhaps there are writers that find this to be a lonely occupation. But I will forever be grateful that while I may sometimes struggle, it’s never alone.

  Sarah Carroll currently splits her time between a houseboat in Ireland and travel abroad. She recently returned from five years in Tanzania, where she founded and ran a hostel while working to support local community projects. She continues to promote ethical overseas volunteering through her blogs and films while planning her next book. The Girl in Between is her debut novel.

  Q&A with the author

  What inspired you to write The Girl in Between?

  Most of the locations we see in the novel exist (or existed). The mill was located across the water from where I live (it has since been mostly torn down). There was a homeless man living in its shadow. I’d see him sleeping there in the mornings, with people hurrying by him on their way to work.

  One day, I looked at the mill and I thought to myself, there’s a young girl trapped in there. Why? Because it’s her refuge from life on the streets. The mill is her home and she shares it not only with her mother, but with the ghosts of the past.

  That evening I wrote the first chapter.

  So, really, the mill and the homeless man that lived beneath it inspired the story.

  The Girl in Between explores the idea of homelessness, which is an issue many people in Ireland are experiencing. Did you want to bring attention to this?

  I didn’t begin the novel with the sole aim of highlighting the homelessness crisis in Dublin. Once I decided to write a story based in the mill, however, I immediately knew I would be dealing with themes of homelessness and grief.

  I wanted to explore the meaning of home to a child that didn’t have one, and to give a voice to someone so vulnerable yet brave. I wanted to know how a child, exposed to the horrors of living on the streets, could still find a way to be a child.

  The ending – with its twist – is particularly shocking. Did you know when you started writing that the girl in the story was a ghost?

  Yes! For me, the mill represents not only a castle, but a limbo land – a facade of a crumbling past about to be replaced by an uncaring digital future. The girl, like the mill, embodies the past. She is stuck in the mill because she is stuck in limbo. And she is being kept there by grief, both her own and Ma’s. I knew that for the story to end and the mill to be torn down, the girl must move on.

  Have you always wanted to be a writer, and do you have more stories planned?

  If you want to be a writer, you have to have more stories planned! I have a few novels in various stages of completion, but the next novel to be published is about a girl who discovers that the attics in her row of Georgian houses are connected. The main themes are bullying and the power of words.

  To answer the first part of the question, no, I didn’t always want to be a writer. I studied geology in university and after I worked in geophysics, then I travelled a lot, then I opened a hostel in Tanzania and ran that for a few years. Then I considered writing.

  There was one night in Tanzania when l lay in bed, melting in the heat. I had just returned from a trip home, where it had been snowing, and as I lay there, I started dreaming of a land where it was always Christmas. The next day when I was jogging, I thought about it again. And the next. Soon, I realized I had a story I needed to write. So I wrote it. That was seven years ago.

  What were your favourite books and authors growing up?

  That’s tough to answer because I read anything I found. But the ones that stuck with me were books that helped me to learn about the world outside of my own life. I remember devouring novels about social issues, like Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, and Under the Hawthorn Tree and The Twelfth of July. I always loved good comedy too. Basically anything ever written my Roald Dahl I adore, and (though I read it later in my teens) The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is in my top three books of all time.

  Lastly, is it true you live on a houseboat? What’s that like?

  Ha! Yes, I do, some of the time anyway. It’s great, I love it. But it’s small. And, with the arrival of our daughter, my family just got bigger. So we may not be on the boat much longer . . .

  First published in Great Britain in 2017 by Simon & Schuster UK Ltd

  A CBS COMPANY

  Copyright © 2017 Sarah Carroll

  This book is copyright under the Berne Convention.

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  PB ISBN 978-1-4711-6062-2

  eBook ISBN 978-1-4711-6063-9

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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