“I know that. At least, I do now. And that’s what makes it worse. It actually made it a lot easier that your friend came with us and was such a div to me. But you weren’t.”
Ginny unwillingly released his hand. It fell to his side. He was looking at her now.
“So now you know,” he said. “Are you satisfied?”
“Not yet,” she said.
She reached out and took his hand and squeezed it. At first, it shook harder; then it slowed. She mattered to him. He was afraid.
She let go of her bag, stepped up on her toes, and kissed him. Hard. Egregiously and in public and right in front of the people trying to get out of the Costa Coffee. She wrapped her arms around him.
Kissing . . . real, proper kissing . . . makes you lose all sense of place and time. She was vaguely aware that they were blocking the people trying to move around them, that a group of little kids were making comments, that Oliver had scooped her up and was more or less supporting her so that she didn’t have to strain to meet his height. This was one of the real ones that actually do make you feel like your body is going completely gelatinous, and you like it.
A peevish second announcement snapped her back to reality. It reiterated that the train was coming. It would be pulling in any moment. Snide, interrupting announcement. There wasn’t time to say good-bye. Ginny reached around, trying to find the handle of her bag as Oliver released her and they slowly pulled their lips apart. She was dizzy, so it was hard to get her ticket into the little opening. In fact, she forgot that once she put the ticket through, Oliver couldn’t come with her, so they were immediately separated by a metal bar. When she turned, he was doing something she had never seen him do before.
He was smiling.
Ginny took her place on the train, her head still spinning. It was crowded, full of people commuting into London for work, or maybe to enjoy the last day of the holiday. She sat across from a group of moms with their daughters, maybe ten or eleven years old, on a big day out. They were talking about going to a movie and discussing where they wanted to have dinner that evening. She wasn’t entirely sure what had just happened or what it meant, she only knew she wasn’t ready to go. She wasn’t ready to leave everyone behind—Keith, Richard, Mari, Oliver. Even these little girls on the train. She didn’t want to leave them either. They were all a part of one large picture, a picture Ginny loved.
But the train sped on efficiently through the bright and sunny morning, past woodlands and towns and fields with horses. It was taking her into the heart of London, and from there, another train would take her to the airport, and a plane would take her home.
Home. It was a nice thought. She had missed her parents, her friends . . . but the word didn’t have quite the same meaning anymore. England was home too. So much of her was here.
The Question floated back into her mind. It had been lingering in the background, waiting for the right moment to make its presence felt. Like Oliver, she could also memorize things that were important (though this was only two sentences, which was a little bit easier). Describe a life experience that changed you. What was it, and what did you learn? (1,000 words)
Maybe now she had her answer, and it was one word: England. Sure, that didn’t convey a lot of information, but these people had no right to pry into her personal life. They were college admissions officers, not therapists. It’s not like they cared what her answer was. They just wanted to see if she was a functional student who could write three pages that made some kind of sense. She wasn’t going to tell them the truth, that she wanted someone to block her path. She wanted this train to break down, for her flight to be canceled, for immigration to tell her that she wasn’t allowed to go. She wanted London itself to rise up and refuse to let her pass out of its boundaries.
And then, just as the snack cart came by and accidentally whacked her on the elbow, she realized exactly what it was she had to do.
Over the course of fifteen minutes, somewhere between Clapham Junction and Waterloo Station, she figured out her future. Not the details . . . there was no point in thinking about details. Just the basics. She mentally paged through the calendar and did some math. The deadlines would probably be tight. There would be a lot of research and work to be done very quickly, but she had done harder things.
Richard was waiting for her at one of the coffee shops that lined the Victoria Station, doing a crossword puzzle. Ginny rushed toward him, and he looked up with a smile and a wave.
“You seem ready to go,” he said.
“Well,” Ginny replied, sliding into the seat opposite. “About that . . . what do you know about applying to universities here? And, like, having me around. For a few years. Not in your house, but, you know . . .”
It took Richard a moment to take in what Ginny was saying. He looked at his coffee thoughtfully and turned the cup a few times.
“I think,” he said, “that if that was what you planned to do, then we could get that information. And that you’d always have a place to stay, even in my house, for as long as you wanted.”
Now it all made sense. It wasn’t like everything was fixed now, or every plan made, every answer in hand . . . but now there was a shape to things. And as they walked to the airport train and Ginny took a last look around the station, she knew it would be easier to say good-bye this time. It’s always easier to say good-bye when you know it’s just a prelude to hello.
Acknowledgments
First, I want to thank everyone who’s written to me or otherwise contacted me since the publication of 13 Little Blue Envelopes, asking me to write a second book. It’s because of you that this story exists.
I have the good fortune to know many wonderful people. The following is just a partial list of people who are owed thanks:
Thanks as always to my agent, Kate Schafer Testerman. Without Kate, I would certainly have met some unlikely fate by now, like being accidentally shot off into space. To my editor, Zareen Jaffery, who guided this book with a clear and steady hand. Holly Black, Cassie Clare, Libba Bray, and Robin Wasserman, for all their help developing the story and generally listening to me chatter away. Sarah Rees Brennan, who hosted me for several days in Ireland and broke into that swimming pool with me. (“We didn’t realize it was closed. It was just dark, and, you know, when we forced the door, it opened, and then we just took the cover off. Of course these are bathing suits. . . .”) Justine Larbalestier, Chelsea Hunt, and resident English guy Andy “Weasley Is Our King” Friel, all of whom read the book and gave me extremely helpful notes. To John and Hank Green, who introduced all of Nerdfighteria to Ginny and the crew.
More thanks to . . .
Scott Westerfeld, for the fob. Jason Keeley and Paula Gross, who feed me regularly. Rebecca “Lone Star” Leach, my de facto assistant, who does my strange bidding. Tobias “I love John Barrowman” Huisman, my pointman in The Netherlands. Donal Finnerty, Ireland’s leading expert on fridges. The Accio Books crew: Maria Alexandra Flores, Luz Maria Flores, Alida Gene Sara Priest, Kerstyn Smith, Sophia Arnold, Hannah Gann, Jennifer McCall, Carissa Crossett, Marcus Walton, Megan Sprimont, Rachel Belanger, Jessie Johnson, Lois Carlyle, and Marlee Grace Abbott.
And to Hamish Young, who was born in the forest and knows all about badgers.
About the Author
MAUREEN JOHNSON is a New York Times bestselling author whose novels include SUITE SCARLETT, SCARLETT FEVER, GIRL AT SEA, 13 LITTLE BLUE ENVELOPES, and THE KEY TO THE GOLDEN FIREBIRD. She lives in New York City, but travels to the UK regularly to soak up the drizzle and watch English TV. She is constantly online at www.maureenjohnsonbooks.com, or on Twitter @maureenjohnson.
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ALSO BY MAUREEN JOHNSON
13 Little Blue Envelopes
The Key to the Golden Firebird
Girl at Sea
The Bermudez Triangle
Devilish
Suite Scarlett
Scarlett
Fever
Let It Snow (with John Green and Lauren Myracle)
Copyright
The Last Little Blue Envelope
Copyright © 2011 by Maureen Johnson
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 e-books.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Johnson, Maureen, 1973-
The last little blue envelope / Maureen Johnson. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
Sequel to: 13 little blue envelopes.
Summary: Seventeen-year-old Ginny Blackstone precipitously travels from her home in New Jersey to London when she receives a message from an unknown man telling her he has the letters that were stolen just before she completed a series of mysterious tasks assigned by her now dead aunt, an artist.
ISBN 978-0-06-197679-7
[1. Voyages and travels—Fiction. 2. Swindlers and swindling—Fiction. 3. Letters—Fiction.
4. Artists—Fiction. 5. Aunts—Fiction. 6. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 7. Europe—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.J634145Las 2011
[Fic]—dc22
2010033580
CIP
AC
* * *
EPub Edition © 2011 ISBN: 9780062077134
11 12 13 14 15 LP/RRDB 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
First Edition
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