I booked a first-class ticket. I could say it’s because I was honouring Will by travelling in style. Toasting his memory with my free champagne.
But that would be a lie. I did it because I could.
In spite of my luxurious seat, Michelin chef-designed food and all the alcohol I can drink (which I take advantage of fully) the journey is hellish. We are diverted because of the snow, the likes of which they haven’t seen since, ironically, the winter Will died. We eventually land at an airport miles away from the one we were headed to, and it seems that paying thousands of pounds for a posh seat doesn’t get you on a coach any faster. Nor does it help when the roads become so blocked that you have to sleep in a school sports hall with dozens of other people, being served hot soup by kindly French ladies from the Croix Rouge.
I feel sorry for the couples and families around me – grumbling about losing time out of their precious holidays, griping about the conditions in the hall and about the lack of information while young exhausted-looking reps in colourful jackets force smiles and say again and again platitudes along the lines of: ‘I’m sorry, sir, the roads are blocked and there’s nothing more we can do. As soon as we have any more information, we’ll let you know.’ I feel a wave of nausea as I see that some of the reps are from Powder Puff, the company we travelled with on my last ski trip, the one I took with Will.
So while these families are desperate to get to their planned destinations, I’d rather be going anywhere else except the mountains. If travel wasn’t already so tricky, I’d be tempted to turn straight round and go back to the airport, back to my beach. Pretend I couldn’t get through. Say I tried, but it simply wasn’t to be.
Why am I even here? There seems very little doubt that the body they’ve found is Will. Coming here isn’t going to bring him back.
Perhaps it will help me.
Then again, perhaps it won’t.
38
January 2020, La Madière, France
Hugo
‘God, this is so BORING,’ Ria whines, yet again. We’ve already played Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, poker and blackjack today. The snow has knocked out the internet and satellite TV. We had sex at least, so that’s something, but Ria is now pacing about like a caged animal.
‘I’ve had enough of being here,’ she snaps. ‘When do you think we can leave? I really want to go home.’
‘Darling, you know what Millie said. The roads are closed today. Even if they weren’t, there have been loads of flight cancellations and so it’s very unlikely we’d be able to get ourselves onto a plane. The weather’s due to get better in a couple of days, so we should be able to get our flight as planned and until then—’
‘A couple of days!’ Ria shrieks. ‘There must be something you can do, Hugo.’
I pull a face. ‘Um, no. I’m flattered that you think I’m so powerful, but I can’t compete with the worst snowstorm they’ve seen in twenty-odd years.’
I try to take her hand. ‘There are worse places to be stuck, my love,’ I say. ‘It’s very comfortable here, everyone is safe and warm, and we have Millie cooking us some great food.’
‘And the wine’s good,’ Simon adds, lifting his glass in a ‘cheers’ motion. It’s only about four o’clock and he’s already a good way through a bottle.
Ria pulls away from me and leans her head against the huge window. I can hear Inigo crying upstairs again. ‘It’s so claustrophobic though,’ Ria complains. ‘I just want to go home.’
39
BEFORE
When I woke up, Mama was gone. Again. I went to school because I had had enough of dealing with her stuff and now that I was old enough to look after myself I didn’t feel I needed to call Anna straight away every time. Mama would probably be back by the time I got home and there would have been a whole lot of fuss and disruption for nothing – as usual.
But later that day when I was in maths there was a message that I was to go and see the head teacher.
Instantly I felt sick. Oh God. What had Mama done now? Had she been sectioned again? The worst time was when they found her in Tesco in her nightie pulling stuff off the shelves and some of the kids from school saw her and knew who she was. I hoped it was nothing like that.
I wasn’t surprised to see Anna in the head teacher’s office as she always came along when this kind of thing happened but the two police officers – a man and a woman – took me by surprise. I guessed their presence must mean that she’d been arrested.
‘Ah, there you are. Thank you for coming. Would you sit down, please?’
I’d never heard Mrs Hardcastle, the head teacher, speak so softly. ‘I’m afraid we have some bad news for you.’
‘Is it Mama?’ I asked, pointlessly, because of course it was. What else could it have been?
‘Yes, I’m afraid it is,’ Anna answered. Her voice sounded strained, almost as if she was trying to stop herself from crying. This was far from the first time Anna had come to school to give me bad news about Mama, but she was never usually emotional about it.
‘What is it?’ I asked. My voice cracked. ‘What’s happened this time?’
Anna came over to me and took my hand. ‘There’s no easy way to tell you this, but I’m afraid your mother was found dead earlier today.’
I looked at Anna and saw that her eyes were filled with tears. But I must have misheard. ‘I’m sorry? You said she’s dead? But I saw her last night … Dead?’ I shook my head. ‘You must have got it wrong. I saw her. She was at home. With me.’
Anna looked at the policewoman and then back at me. ‘There will be an investigation, of course, but I’m afraid it looks like she may have killed herself deliberately.’ She paused. ‘She fell from the top of a car park in town. She would have died instantly and wouldn’t have suffered.’
I snatched my hand away from Anna and put both hands over my ears. ‘No, no, no!’ I shouted. ‘Don’t say that! You’re wrong!’
I felt tears rolling down my cheeks. I hadn’t noticed I was crying.
Anna pulled my hands gently away from my ears and took me in her arms as I sobbed. ‘I’m so sorry,’ Anna said softly. ‘I’ve arranged temporary foster care for you for the time being and we’ll talk about all the other … arrangements later. Would you like to go now?’
I looked up at her and wiped my eyes but the tears wouldn’t stop coming. ‘To Rhonda’s?’ I asked.
‘I’m afraid Rhonda can’t take you this time. It’s another family, but you’ll be very well looked after.’
And so began the worst few years of my life. It turned out Rhonda had breast cancer and that taking on foster children had become too much for her along with the chemo. And while living with Mama had been unstable and unpredictable, underneath it all, I felt like somewhere deep inside, she loved me. And I loved her. Home was home and she was my mama. With her gone, and without Rhonda, I felt like I had nothing.
My new foster parents were kind enough but they preferred to take in older children, like me. And many older children in the care system have been through some grim things in their lives and are, like me, fairly damaged. Sandra and Terry seemed like good people and did their best to create the family atmosphere I’d grown to love at Rhonda’s but when there was so much violence, hatred, and noise from some of my transient foster brothers and sisters, it was often quite frightening to be at home. It was only when one of the boys sexually assaulted me that I managed to get moved to a different foster home. Rhonda was still too ill to take me, though we kept in touch. I moved often, from place to place. Some of my placements were better than others, but I felt permanently dislocated and longed for a home of my own.