‘Hi,’ I say softly. I’m not even sure my voice is loud enough to carry over the desk but Danielle smiles. ‘How can I help you?’
It’s like trying to speak while running and not having the breath for it. I think of West and I find my voice. ‘Can I see Natalie?’ Each word followed by a long pause.
‘Natalie Matthews or Natalie Aloi?’
I bite my lip, trying to remember if she mentioned her full name in her emails.
Danielle raises her eyebrow. ‘What’s it regarding?’
‘The tree emails,’ I say, not quite sure what to call it. The pauses are shorter. It’s like I’m only powerwalking now.
‘That’s Natalie Matthews. I’ll call her down. What’s your name?’
‘Piper Rhodes.’
I stand there as Danielle dials an extension number.
‘Hi, Nat,’ she says after a moment. ‘I’ve got a girl called Piper here to see you. Okay, great.’ Danielle hangs up. ‘She’ll be down in a minute.’
‘Thanks.’
I move away from the counter to wait. I feel like high-fiving someone or thrusting my arm in the air. Maybe this is what mountain climbers feel like when they reach the summit. Maybe even they have doubts about the next mountain.
A door opens and Natalie emerges. She instantly reminds me of a modern Barbie doll, the ones that are meant to portray realistic beauty standards but are still gorgeous.
‘Piper, it’s so nice to meet you.’
I smile.
‘How did you go finding the trees?’
My eyes glance around as always, assessing the situation. No one else is in earshot. The problem is, Natalie knows me as the girl with Selective Mutism, or at least she would have some idea from my emails. It’s a whole different mountain. I take out my notepad.
Natalie reads my note and her face drops. ‘Really? I’m so sorry. Let me duck back to my desk and I’ll run his number through the database again. Do you mind waiting a few minutes?’
I shake my head.
‘Great, I won’t be long.’
She hurries off and I’m about to put my notepad back in my bag when I decide that I’ve relied on it for too long. I walk over to the bin nearby and throw it in.
Natalie returns a few minutes later. ‘You were right,’ she says. ‘That wasn’t West’s tree. I must’ve made a mistake typing in the ID number for his tree. I’m sorry to have sent you all the way out there for nothing. The good news is that West’s tree is not far. I’m on my lunchbreak now, so I’ll walk you there.’
I want to ask Natalie for the address so I can find it myself, but instead I follow her out of the building and down the busy street. ‘You’re lucky it’s a nice day,’ says Natalie. ‘Every other day this week it has been raining.’
I nod. Dad checked the weather before we left. I was expecting rain. I even brought an umbrella.
‘Have you come to Melbourne just to find these trees?’
I nod.
‘Some people think the tree email program is crazy and a waste of money, but what they don’t realise is how many people have emailed the trees. When the program first started, we were getting thousands of emails a week. Now we only get a couple a week. Everyone picks different trees too. Some people do it for a joke but a lot of people pour their hearts into the emails. It’s beautiful, really.’
We come to a familiar-looking intersection and it’s then I realise that we’re at the State Library. We cross the road and I expect Natalie to keep walking down the street, but she veers up the grassy hill in front of the library. I follow a few steps behind. ‘Here we are,’ she says, turning around.
I shake my head. My voice surprises me. ‘That’s my tree.’
‘I know. Your tree is the one closest to us. West’s is the one behind it.’
I look from Natalie to the trees and back to Natalie. ‘Are you serious?’
She smiles. ‘I wouldn’t lie to you, Piper.’
I nod.
‘I’ll leave you to it then,’ says Natalie.
‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘Not just for helping me find the trees but for being there when I needed someone to talk to.’ The words leave my mouth fluidly.
Natalie puts a hand on my arm and squeezes. ‘It’s been a pleasure. Say hi to West for me.’
I watch her walk off and then turn back to our trees. West’s tree is slightly taller and fuller than mine. They are so close together that their top branches cross over. It’s difficult to tell where one tree stops and the other tree starts. Of the 77,000 trees in Melbourne, our trees are beside each other. It’s impossible, unbelievable.
Just like West and me.
The more I think about it, it’s not that unbelievable. Mr Lyons probably just picked a whole cluster of trees in the same area when he was assigning them, so it’s not that unlikely.
Either way, they are our trees and whatever happens, there will always have been Piper and West.
Exactly four weeks after the accident West is awoken from the coma. I find out on Facebook, of course. Almost immediately the Get Well West page where his parents announced the good news – along with the ward, bed number and visiting hours – is flooded with messages of celebration. I’ve never felt such relief in my life. It’s like I’ve been holding my breath for the last month and I’ve finally released it. Despite this, I don’t post anything on the page. Everything I have to say, I want to say to West in person.
I imagined that the moment West woke, I would rush straight to the hospital. But I don’t. I stay in my room almost all day. Everyone from school will be at the hospital. But it’s not just that. I’m afraid of seeing West. What am I going to say? Will I be able to speak at all? Can I talk to West or just coma-West? I’ve made a lot of progress recently, spoken to people in a whole variety of circumstances, but it’s always been different with West.
By the evening it’s too late to go anyway, visiting hours are over. I’m angry and disappointed with myself for wasting the whole day. I’m in my darkroom printing another roll of photos that I took in Melbourne when Mum knocks on the door. ‘There’s a friend from school here to see you. She said her name is Indiana.’
‘I’ll be there in a minute,’ I say and I quickly finish off the photo I’m working on. Indiana is sitting on the steps when I get to the front door. She stands when she sees me.
‘Hi, Piper.’
‘Hey,’ I say confidently.
She blinks several times. ‘Hey . . . I hope you don’t mind me dropping by. I wanted to give this to you. It’s straight from the printer,’ she holds out the yearbook. ‘I thought I might see you at the hospital today . . . anyway, the cover looks amazing. It just made it in time. Lucky too, because the back-up cover I did was terrible.’
I turn the yearbook over, seeing with new eyes the cover I created. The colours of the Post-it notes pop out but it’s the messages that stand out. Each photo is set within a stock image of a polaroid frame and arranged so they look like they’ve been dropped on the cover. I run my hand over it. It does look great. ‘Thanks. How’s West?’
‘He was quiet but he seems okay. I think he is coming to terms with all that has happened. The doctors say he should make a full recovery but he has a lot of rehab ahead. Are you going to see him tomorrow?’
‘I’m not sure.’
‘You should. Take the yearbook with you. West hasn’t seen it yet.’
I nod vaguely.
Indiana leans in close. ‘Did you know West has a really cute twenty-year-old cousin? I met him at the hospital. He studies engineering at UTS. We’re going to see a movie on Friday night.’
‘That’s great,’ I say and give her a hug.
Once she has left, I take the yearbook and show Mum. She asks how West is and I tell her what Indiana said. Then she asks the same question as Indiana.
‘Of course I want to see him, but it’s not that simple. There’s so much pressure, so many feelings. What if I can’t speak to him?’
‘Piper Rhodes, I d
on’t think that matters,’ says Mum. ‘He fell in love with you before you ever spoke a word to him.’
‘But he might not feel the same way about me any more. We were broken up before he had the accident. I thought trees and truffles could change that, but what if it can’t?’
‘You won’t know until you see him,’ says Mum.
What I don’t say is sometimes it’s better not knowing.
I wake up in the middle of the night from a dream that started with a young girl walking through a forest. I didn’t see her face, only her blonde hair. It was like I was following her. She stopped in a clearing, bent down onto her knees, dug a small hole and planted a seed. Then she disappeared into the forest. Not long after, a young boy came along. I couldn’t see his face either. He had dark brown hair. He also planted a seed. Then, in the dream, it started raining and I woke up.
The dream felt so real and I can’t fall back asleep, so I listen to the rain hitting my window and think of West. Is he asleep or listening to the rain too?
In the morning, I borrow Mum’s car and drive to the hospital. The car park is full but that’s not unusual, so I park on the street and walk. Once I reach the hospital entrance, I realise that I left West’s truffle in the car and walk all the way back to get it. Most people bring patients flowers or chocolates; I bring a smelly member of the fungus family, but I know, if nothing else, West will love it.
I see him before he sees me. He has a room to himself and he’s alone, staring ahead. Visiting hours have just started so there’s no one else here to see him yet. There are balloons and flowers all around his bed. I hover outside the door and my heart beats crazily in my chest, as though it’s trying to get out.
I don’t think I can do this. I could ask a nurse to pass on the truffle to West. Just as I’m about to turn away, I feel a nudge on my lower back. I look over my shoulder to see West’s mum. Her eyes look right into mine. They are the same colour as West’s.
‘Go on,’ she says.
Holding my breath, I step into the room. West turns his head. He blinks a few times, as if not quite sure he is seeing me. Then he smiles. ‘Pi,’ he says.
I exhale and I just know. ‘Hi, West.’
I have so many things to say . . .
I’ll start with thanking my mum and dad. The words ‘thank you’ just never seem enough. All the thanks in the world for being there for me in every way while I wrote this book. No matter how old I get, you always take care of me. A special thanks to my mum for editing and proofreading. I’m endlessly grateful that I have such wonderful, clever parents.
The most heartfelt thanks to my husband, Stephen. You were there every step of the way – to listen to me go on about Piper and West, to cook when I couldn’t leave the computer, to give me the time I needed to write while we were planning our wedding, to let me cry when I thought I couldn’t do it and celebrate when I did.
To my dearest editor, Heather Curdie, thank you, thank you, thank you for always believing in Piper and West. Your patience and expertise has made The Things I Didn’t Say better in infinite ways. Also, many thanks to Jane Godwin and Jess Owen for your insight and work on this book.
My next big thank you goes to the brilliant, Felicity Vallence, for the YA Squad, answering my millions of emails and everything else you do. You make writing and publishing a book so much more fun than it already is. And to my publicist, Tina Gumnior, a huge thank you for also answering many emails and all your great work behind the scenes. I’d also like to thank the marketing and sales teams at Penguin Random House Australia and my designer, Bruno Herfst. I appreciate all the hard work you do.
This book wouldn’t be complete without acknowledging teenagers with Selective Mutism and social anxiety. Your stories and videos touched and inspired me. Thank you for bravely sharing them.
Finally, a big thanks to the many readers who have got behind me over the last two years. You don’t know how much your support and excitement means to me. All the blow-kisses in the world to you beautiful people.
About the Author
Kylie Fornasier grew up not far from the Blue Mountains in New South Wales where The Things I Didn’t Say is set. When Kylie is not writing or researching her latest book by searching for lyre birds, trekking to swimming holes and exploring glow-worm caves, she teaches primary school children. Her first young adult novel, Masquerade, is set in Venice, where Kylie spent two weeks researching and eating more than a healthy amount of pasta! She’s busy planning where she might set her next book.
PENGUIN BOOKS
UK | USA | Canada| Ireland | Australia
India | New Zealand | South Africa | China
Penguin Books is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies
whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com.
First published by Penguin Random House Australia Pty Ltd, 2016
Text copyright © Kylie Fornasier 2016
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
Cover and text design by Bruno Herfst © Penguin Random House Australia Pty Ltd
Cover photograph © Aleshyn_Andrei (Shutterstock)
puffin.com.au
ISBN: 978-1-76014-221-6
THE BEGINNING
Let the conversation begin...
Follow the Penguin Twitter
Keep up-to-date with all our stories YouTube
Pin ‘Penguin Books’ to your Pinterest
Like ‘Penguin Books’ on Facebook
Find out more about the author and
discover more stories like this at penguin.com.au
The Things I Didn't Say Page 21