‘Hey Diana.’
‘Shepherd, my dear boy. Have you found your mummy?’
She sounds distressed.
‘No, Diana. My mum is dead, remember?’
‘Oh . . . yes . . . such a pity. Such a pretty young thing. Very talented too. The singing voice of an angel. And she could never be found without her yo-yo. I think it was the only gift her mummy gave her. Oh, she was so very talented with her yo-yo.’
I feel bile rise in the back of my throat and I try to maintain my stance despite my quickening blood loss.
‘You remember what colour it was?’
‘Of course. It was bright yellow,’ Diana says. ‘I remember it so well because she used to say it was her only bit of sunshine in her world.’
I burn cold.
I’ve seen a bright yellow yo-yo in Greystone.
In the woods.
In Bishop Clark’s caravan.
My gut twists, squeezes tighter and tighter, until it feels like a knife punctures my lungs. I can’t fucking breathe.
‘Shepherd? Shepherd, dear? Are you alright?’
Diana’s voice manages to calm the sense of dread racking through my body.
‘Yeah, Diana . . . Just need to help my mum rest in peace.’
Outside Swan Lake, I feel a storm coming. But it doesn’t stop me. I drive to the woods, as lightning lights up the dark sky, and park my car by the treeline. The wind stills and the storm passes when I get closer to Angel’s Stone.
It’s time to go home.
53
ME
When I get to Violet’s cottage, the sky is clear.
The eye of the storm.
The cottage is small. The woods suffocate it. The sun lights the wet stone path as I walk up.
The roof has caved in. An ash tree grows through the middle of the house. The front door is opened, held open by a clump of weeds.
The sunlight follows me inside and illuminates the mould, damp and moss that cover the walls. The burnt leg of a chair is propped in the fireplace. The mantelpiece is choked with ivy. The fireplace is decayed with matted feathers. I could walk from one end of my mum’s house — my house — to the other in ten steps.
To the left of me, there’s a windowless room. It smells like a cave. The roof is still intact and a sturdy lock is rusted on the door. At the other end, there’s a smaller room, with a rotted stuffed pink unicorn on the bed. This must’ve been my mum’s room. I go inside.
There’s a hole in the wall, the breeze from a window messing the leaves around the floor. I spot a little yellow suitcase underneath her bed, swagged in dirt and years of dust.
Inside this case are the worldly possessions of my mother, I just know it. There’s a frayed yellow ribbon tied around the handle. The lock has rusted. I need to know what’s inside.
I sink to the hard floor and open it. One of the hinges breaks. It’s held on for too long a time.
Some things are too much.
Inside there are baby clothes. Little vests, a knitted cardigan with ducks on the buttons, and a pile of nappies. There’s a pair of shoes, black patent and worn down. I cradle one in my hand and look inside. The shape of her toes is still pressed into them.
There’s a dress made of shiny fabric, a few blouses, and a coat with ripped lining. At the bottom of the case I find a purse with money in it, hand-written song lyrics, and a tarnished silver bracelet with a . . . seahorse charm.
Huh . . . maybe US is destiny.
This tiny suitcase is proof that my mother, Violet Adams, and her baby, Dean Adams, existed. We had a place in the world. Until we were thrown out like roadkill.
I’m all curses and tempest, black fire and fury, and without thinking I hurl the case across the room. All my mum’s possessions scatter.
It’s then when I hear her.
It’s then when I feel her warm hand on my bitter, cold arm.
In the dim light of the sun, I look up.
Amy.
Even in my darkness, she’s the little bright.
When I see her standing there, looking at me, tears in her eyes, my grieving heart thumps harder.
‘How’d you know I’d be here?’ I say.
I’m afraid you’ll rip my heart in shreds.
‘I just got back from Elizabeth’s and saw you leave Swan Lake. I followed you.’
I go to say something, but she sits down next to me and says, ‘Before you say anything, there’s something I need to tell you. Something I should have told you a long time ago.’
I breathe her in.
Her sunshine hair is all undone, the little white brain of her bun gone. Her eyes all swollen and red. She sniffs and shrugs.
‘After my sister got hurt, I think I must’ve had a mental breakdown. I didn’t deserve to be alive, not if Elizabeth wasn’t. They told me that when she first woke up, she was like a zombie. The fault in her head — I caused that. Why couldn’t I have just kept silent?’
She closes her eyes for a moment, takes a steadying breath. ‘The hate infected every piece of me and to punish myself I stopped living. I felt like a broken doll forced to perform by invisible strings when all I wanted was to stop. The checking was my only way to keep still.’
Amy looks at me with such emotion, my dead heart restarts.
‘But then you appeared like magic, like a white rabbit from a hat. And I fell in love with you all over again. I wanted to fix my broken strings. I wanted to look up at the night sky and see hope in the stars again, just like I
