by Louise Beech
I drew a picture of him once. We’ve still got it, though it’s all faded and the wrinkles in the paper have made his face age like he’s still alive. It’s hanging over my bed. I talk to him sometimes. Just tell him private stuff.
The waitress comes back and I reckon Bernadette is glad she interrupts. So we get mugs of tea. I put loads of sugar in mine. Then I look at the first Lifebook page, at my birth certificate at the bottom of it and a photo of me when I was a baby wrapped in a sweetcorn-yellow blanket.
Bernadette smiles and says they didn’t have any blue ones that day.
I look at the words at the top of the first page, but don’t read them.
Maybe read it tomorrow, Bernadette says. Enjoy your friends today.
That’s when I tell her that I went to see my dad’s grave earlier, and George’s. I go there a lot, she knows that. Sophie comes. But today Bernadette’s real emotional and her eyes fill up again. I tell her it was just what I felt I should do today. Poor George never got past six. He’ll be a kid forever. Never get to pick his spots or listen to careers people lecturing about doing something useful.
It’s a bigger day for you than most kids, says Bernadette. Not everyone gets their life handed to them in a book. There used to be a TV show when I was little called This Is Your Life. They’d have some celebrity on and invite all kinds of people from their past. Muhammad Ali was on it once. Didn’t stop talking.
I’ll have to watch it sometime, I say.
I remember reading that his bike was stolen when he was twelve and he wanted to beat the thief to a pulp. That was when a police officer told him to learn boxing. It was when I was eleven and after my dad drowned that I started thinking about rescuing people out of the water. I used to get Bernadette to take me down to the rescue boat station all the time. Used to watch them preparing their gear. Saw the boat go out once.
When Bernadette realised why I was going she said the river was cold, and one of the most dangerous in the world for its currents. I reminded her that I’d been in it. I knew. I can still remember it now. How the temperature took my breath away. How quick you get tired and then don’t care and want to sink. So someone’s got to go in and rescue people. If my dad hadn’t gone in for me I’d not be here.
I only wish I could have gone back for him.
Bernadette looks at me quietly for a moment and then says, I’ve got one more thing for you.
She goes in her bag and takes out a small velvet box. She holds it for a minute as though she doesn’t want to give it to me. But she does. I open it. Inside is a gold ring. Bernadette tells me it was my dad’s. His wedding ring. She says they gave her it after he’d died and she put it away, not knowing quite what to do with it. But now she knows.
Thank you, I say.
I’m really happy to have it. I hold it in my hand. Bernadette tells me to try it on, says to put it on my right hand or people will think I’m married. It fits just perfect. Never had owt so valuable. Don’t think I’ll ever take it off.
Like she knows what I’m thinking, Bernadette says that my dad never took it off from the day they got married until the day he…
She won’t say the word died. I don’t want to say it today either. I went to see my dad and George’s graves earlier, but sometimes you just go and see people who have gone so you can then enjoy the people who are still here.
I have to go back to work, says Bernadette. Will you be okay?
I tell her of course I will. It’s my birthday remember.
She kisses my cheek again and squeezes me. I can tell she doesn’t want to go.
Then she says, I think I’m just emotional because you’re not mine anymore. You’re grown up. You’ll go soon. And I’m glad for you and excited about all the stuff you might do. I just have to let you go.
The waitress gets our mugs. Bernadette sniffs and messes my hair and leaves. The wind chime bangs against the wall again.
I decide to sit for a bit cos this is where she met my dad and I like that. Maybe he’s watching, who knows? Maybe he somehow made me choose to come here today. It’s hard sometimes to remember him exactly cos I only met him once. He put his coat around me. I remember that. Bernadette’s told me about him but I get this feeling she leaves stuff out. Like she doesn’t think I’m old enough or something. Or that it’s not good.
But I don’t care about that. I’m not perfect.
When I leave the café it starts raining. Doesn’t bother me. I like getting wet. I love the water. So I walk slowly and let it soak me. But I don’t get far because there’s something in my trainer. Does my head in so I stop under a bus shelter, take it off and shake it. This stone falls out. So small I can’t find it on the ground. Makes me smile though. Just a tiny thing can stop you walking.
Like a whole mountain in my shoe.
I carry on walking in the rain. I’ve got a new ring on my finger and my life written in a book under my arm. I don’t know what the words to my future will be. Eighteen doesn’t mean shit really. It’s just a number. I won’t read my Lifebook and be twice the age afterwards. You have to be okay with the child you are. That’s who I’ll always be inside. I can look back and I can look forward and it’s just the same.
So I open my Lifebook and read the first line – just that one – and then close the pages again to keep it dry.
This book is a gift.
Acknowledgements
First I want to thank Karen Sullivan (Orenda Books) for making my lifelong dream come true when she published my debut novel How to be Brave in 2015. For her passion and support. For having such faith in me that she said she would publish this book even before she had read it. I’ll never forget all you’ve done.
Thanks to my early readers who helped so much. Sister Claire sat with me one August afternoon and we talked out the full plot, from beginning to end. Sister Grace was a passionate and impatient-for-the-next-chapter reader. The wonderful Cassandra Parkin too. And I met friend Lesley Oliver because of this book and how she loved it. Thanks also to my fabulous nephew Tom for making the amazing book trailer.
Thanks Mark Swan of Kid-ethic for designing both covers, and Karen and West Camel for the fantastic, patient edits. Thanks to Martin Doyle at the Irish Times for his support.
Thank you to the bloggers who reviewed How to be Brave, and for your continued support – Anne Cater, Anne Williams, Liz Barnsley, Sophie at Reviewed the Book, Stephanie Rothwell (stephbookblog), Sharon at Shaz’s Book Blog, Louise Wykes, Janet Emson, Karen Cocking, Vicki Goldman, @janeaustenrulesok, Marina @chick-catlibrary, The Book Trail, Live Many Lives, Stephanie Cox, Brian Lavery, Mumbling About Music, Vicki Leigh-Sayer, Jack Croxall, Trip Fiction, Jackie Law, Sarah Hardy (By The Letter Book Reviews), Poppy Peacock, Jacqueline Grima, Louise Hector, Shaz at Jera’s Jamboree, Leah Moyse, Christine at Northern Crime, Melinda at the Discerning Reader, The Last Word Review, Nick Quantrill, Lisa Adamson (Segnalibro), Hilary Farrow (thinkingofyouandme), Melissa Rose, Pam Mcllroy, Joanne at Portobello Book Blog, Ana at This Chick Reads, Lisa Hall (ReadingRoomWithAView), Safie Maken Finlay, Adrian Murphy, Jules Mortimer, and Abbie Headon.
Thanks for the lovely messages I’ve had from readers, some of them great authors – Sue Bond, Jeanette Hewitt, Ian Patrick, Jane Isaac, Vicki Bramble, Gill Paul, Lor Bingham, Richard Littledale, Fiona Cane, Richard Gibney, Yusuf Toropov, Amanda Jennings, David Ross, Paul Hardisty, Rebecca Stonehill, Katie Marsh, Matt Johnson, Nicky Doherty (Black), Rita Brassington, Annie de Bhal, Carol Lovekin, Sarah Jasmon, Tara Guha, and Mari Hannah.
Thank you for the support from Helen Jn Pierre and Dave Mitchell with the cakes, crazy photos and events, Simon Shields, Janet Harrison, Chris Watson and the Willerby/Kirk Ella Reading Group, Shane Rhodes and Humber Mouth/Head in a Book, Sue Wilsea, Ian Judson, Lisa Martin’s Beverley Book Group, Pat Lawrence and the Best Supper Ever Book Group, BBC Radio Humberside, Vicky Foster, Ian Winter, The Women of Words, Hull Libraries, Beverley Folk Fest, and my favourite team, Fiona and Pete Mills at Hull Kingston Radio.
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br /> A big thanks to the Book Connectors group started by Anne Cater for all support. Thanks to the Prime Writers, an amazing group of writers who arrived at this later in life like I did. Also thanks to the vast Facebook TBC (The Book Club), especially Helen Boyce and Tracy Fenton, who are so passionate about books. Thanks to all the many wonderful (too many to mention) members (friends!) there.
Hello to Aston from the ‘girl who writes all the books’.
I wanted to include a quote from my great friend Johnny Ennals, the kind that would never likely make it to the cover but deserves to be included here. He said of my first play – ‘Better than Shakespeare cos I didn’t fall asleep’.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Louise Beech has always been haunted by the sea, and regularly writes travel pieces for the Hull Daily Mail, where she was a columnist for ten years. Her short fiction has won the Glass Woman Prize, the Eric Hoffer Award for Prose, and the Aesthetica Creative Works competition, as well as shortlisting for the Bridport Prize twice and being published in a variety of UK magazines. Louise lives with her husband and children on the outskirts of Hull – the UK’s 2017 City of Culture – and loves her job as a Front of House Usher at Hull Truck Theatre, where her first play was performed in 2012. She is also part of the Mums’ Army on Lizzie and Carl’s BBC Radio Humberside Breakfast Show. Her debut novel, How To Be Brave, was a number-one bestseller on Kindle in the UK and Australia, and a Guardian Readers’ Pick for 2015. Louise is currently writing her third book.
You can follow her on Twitter @LouiseWriter and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/louise.beech, or visit her website: www.louisebeech.co.uk.
Copyright
Orenda Books
16 Carson Road
West Dulwich
London SE21 8HU
www.orendabooks.co.uk
First published in the UK in 2016 by Orenda Books
This ebook edition published in 2016
Copyright © Louise Beech 2016
Louise Beech has asserted her moral right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publishers.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978–1–910633–40–3
Typeset in Garamond by MacGuru Ltd