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  Copyright

  Harper

  An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

  The News Building

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain by Harper 2017

  Copyright © Debbie Johnson 2017

  Cover design by Holly Macdonald © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017

  Cover images © iStock.com (stairs and street light); Shutterstock.com (all other images)

  Debbie Johnson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  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, downloaded, 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.

  Source ISBN: 9780008150198

  Ebook Edition © May 2017 ISBN: 9780008150204

  Version: 2017-03-08

  Dedication

  For my mother – five years gone, and part of me still expects it to be her when the phone rings late at night.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Part One: The Stage Is Set

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Part Two: The Curtain Opens: The A–Z Begins

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Part Three: The Final Curtain

  Chapter 72

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Also by Debbie Johnson

  About the Publisher

  PART ONE

  The Stage Is Set

  Prologue

  Andrea

  Forty years have passed since my own mother died, and yet I can still remember it like it was yesterday. I can still recall the sounds and the smells and the way her tiny hand felt in mine as she finally gave up the fight, as the light faded from her eyes.

  I can remember the hollow feeling inside me as I made my way home to my own children, crying on the bus and ignoring the kindness of strangers as the double-decker trundled across London.

  Walking through the door to our flat, overwhelmed with the need to bundle them up and keep them safe and love them so much that no harm would ever come to them. Protect them from the cruel torments of the world.

  Four whole decades later, it is still so vivid. When it comes to the people you love, and the people you lose, the passage of time is irrelevant – some things simply stay with you forever.

  I’m thinking about this so much more now, because this morning I was told that I am dying. Not in the slow and certain way that we are all dying – but in a two-months-if-you’re-lucky way.

  The look of practised sympathy on the consultant’s face as he explained was enough to kick-start my stiff upper lip, and I silenced him with a smile. I’ve been an actress for the whole of my life, and I’ve done many a death scene.

  Now, I’ve got to decide how to play my own – and what good can come out of it.

  My last diary entry was a reminder to tell my friend Lewis that his ancient dog, Betty, needed a flea treatment, pronto. The one before that seemed to revolve entirely around buying a new hat for our trip to the races.

  Funny how quickly things can change.

  Now, I have a few weeks left – and I have to make them count. I have to scheme and work and plan like I’ve never schemed and worked and planned before. In those few weeks, God willing, I will be directing my own play – and performing a minor miracle.

  Because, of course, I couldn’t actually bundle up my own children for the rest of their lives – no mother can. I couldn’t keep those two girls safe, and I couldn’t protect them from the cruellest torment of all – the way we can hurt the ones we love.

  If it’s the very last thing I manage, I am determined that I will make the impossible happen. I will bang my daughters’ heads together, and make them whole. I will do as much as I can to heal them, and their future, as I have time to do.

  Because they’re going to need each other, so very much. One day, very soon, they are going to wake up to a world without their mother – and, like I say, I still remember how that feels.

  Her tiny hand, holding mine.

  Chapter 1

  1984 – Farewell to Templeton Peck

  Dead goldfish are pretty revolting items, thinks Andrea, as she lovingly wraps up the body of the late, great pet known as Faceman. Once a delightful creature dashing through his fake coral reef and pirate castle, he’s now slippy and cold and far too reminiscent of three-day-old Chinese food that’s starting to disintegrate.

  Once he’s enveloped in tissue paper, he is placed in a shoebox, which the girls have decorated in the style of the little Corvette that The A-Team character drives around in. It’s a masterwork of red felt-tip pen and blobby white paint that is barely dry, so some of it has smudged pink.

  Patch, their cross-eyed Jack Russell terrier, is yipping and snapping at her ankles, desperate to get at the box. It’s just food to him, and Andrea shoos him away. He disappears to the side of the garden, and starts digging a hole in the flowerbeds.

  Poppy is sobbing uncontrollably, her wild dark hair plastered to the tears running down the sides of her cheeks. Seven years old and
already a drama queen. Rose is hugging her, making soothing noises to try and calm her down. They’re both barefoot, still in their nighties, and look impossibly small and forlorn as they traipse through the dew-soaked grass of the cottage garden.

  It’s easier for Rose to be calm, of course. Her fish, B. A. Baracus, is still happily swimming around in the bowl, calling people ‘fool’ and looking tough. Poor Faceman has lasted less than three months. This is their first encounter with death, and emotions are running high, in the way that they do when little girls are involved.

  There is a small hole, which Andrea dug earlier that morning, and a cassette player next to it, running on batteries. Andrea hands the shoebox to Poppy, who drags herself out of her hysteria long enough to accept it with tiny, shaking hands. Andrea reaches out and strokes her face clear of tears. Her skin is clammy and pale and moist, and although at least some of the performance is for effect, Andrea knows her baby girl is genuinely devastated.

  Next time, she thinks, I’ll get them a pet with a longer shelf life. Like one of those tortoises that live for a hundred years.

  ‘Go on, Popcorn,’ she says gently, gesturing to the hole. ‘We need to say goodbye to Faceman now. Would you like to say a little prayer for him?’

  ‘I c-c-c-an’t!’ she stutters, trembling so much the box starts to shake as well. Andrea has visions of the goldfish making a bid for freedom, flying through the sky and landing on the head of one of their garden gnomes. This, for some reason, amuses her, and she fights to keep her face straight. She can’t laugh. Not now. This is a big, serious thing. The way she plays this will affect their outlook on the Grim Reaper for the rest of their lives. She has to at least try and get it right.

  ‘I’ll do it,’ says Rose, who is two years older and already displaying the kind of alarming maternal instincts that make Andrea think she might end up as a grandma by the time she’s 40. She’ll have to lock her in the broom cupboard before long, or make her take a bite from an enchanted apple.

  Poppy nods, and leans down to place the box in the ground. It tilts as she does it, but luckily no goldfish corpses slosh out and scare them all. Patch is watching them from the hole he’s now sitting in, and Andrea silently says her own prayer: please do not let that stinky little dog gallop over here and run off with the dead fish’s body.

  They stand back respectfully, and place their hands together in the prayer position they’ve been taught at school. Andrea’s not at all sure she believes in God, or the afterlife, but it’s certainly useful where small children are concerned. Much more comforting than the alternative.

  ‘Dear Jesus,’ says Rose, bowing her head so her brown curls swing around her chubby face, ‘please take this wonderful fish, Faceman, into heaven. He was a good fish and we all loved him. Please give him a nice bowl to swim in, and lots of other fish to play with, and let him know that we will never forget him. Amen.’

  It is a lovely prayer, simple and heartfelt and innocent, and Andrea feels tears filling her eyes. They are so precious, these two beauties. These two grubby angels who have enriched her life beyond belief. In moments like these, she can forget all her worries: the bills, her lacklustre acting career, the sheer exhaustion of being a single mum in a world built for couples. She can ignore it all, and focus on what matters – her Rosehip and her Popcorn. Best girls in the world.

  Poppy looks up at her big sister, and offers a small, tremulous smile.

  ‘It’ll be all right, Pop,’ says Rose, reaching out and holding her hand. ‘Heaven is a beautiful and perfect place, and Faceman will be happy there.’

  Poppy frowns, and Andrea recognises her Thinking Face. It’s the look that usually goes before a very tricky question – like Where Do Babies Come From? (said very loudly in the park after seeing a lady with a pram), or Why Is That Man Bald? (said very loudly on the bus behind the town’s answer to Kojak), or her particular favourite, Why Don’t I Have A Dad? (said very loudly at Parents’ Evening).

  ‘Mummy,’ she says, with a voice far firmer than her tearful expression, ‘how does Faceman get to heaven? If he’s buried in a box in a garden? And is there a different part of heaven for everything – you know, like a Sheep Heaven and a People Heaven and a Goldfish Heaven, all in separate bits? Because sheep would need grass, and fish would need water, and people would need the pub …’

  Again, Andrea bites down on her lip to stop herself from laughing. The pub? That’s what she thinks people heaven would be like? She’s clearly been on one too many trips to the Farmer’s Arms …

  ‘Well it’s all a bit of a mystery, my love,’ Andrea replies. ‘Nobody has ever come back from heaven to tell us about it – because they’re just too happy there. Personally I think that angels will come down and fly Faceman up with them tonight, while we’re asleep.’

  As she says this, she sees Rose’s face also screw up into a thoughtful frown. Oh no, she thinks. They’re too old for such an outrageous fib. They don’t believe me, and now they’ll want to dig up the bloody box again tomorrow and check if he’s gone. That’s my night sorted – a glass of red wine and an impromptu goldfish exhumation.

  ‘But do they always fly to heaven?’ asks Rose, her gaze flicking back to the house. ‘Because B. A. Baracus hates to fly, you know that, don’t you?’

  It’s actually an easier question than she’d anticipated, which is a relief. This whole thing is a minefield.

  ‘Well, when B. A.’s time has come, we’ll … flush him down the toilet? And then he can swim to heaven.’

  ‘Goldfish heaven?’ asks Poppy again, obviously not letting go of her idea of a compartmentalised afterlife.

  ‘Exactly. Now,’ says Andrea decisively, keen to avoid any more of the Junior Tag Team Spanish Inquisition. ‘Shall we play the music?’

  Both girls nod, and their mum presses the button on the cassette player. The A-Team theme music blares out, echoing around the garden and drowning out the birdsong and the sound of a lawnmower in the distance and the faint rumble of traffic heading into the village. They all stand to attention, singing along and doing the ‘duh-duh-duh-duh’ noises at the right places. It’s their favourite TV show, and is a fittingly rousing end to Faceman’s short, soggy life.

  With the final ritual completed, Andrea reaches out for both their hands, hoping that they’ll be happy and not too confused by all of this mortality nonsense. The three of them walk together towards the cottage, winding their way through the maze of potted lavender and garden gnomes and buzzing bees.

  Just as they’re about to go back inside and hopefully settle down for their usual Saturday morning cartoons, Poppy pulls on Andrea’s hand, and comes to a halt.

  ‘Mum,’ she says, in a tone that means business. ‘What will happen to us when you go to heaven?’

  Andrea kneels down on the cracked crazy paving, and takes both girls into her arms. She feels small hands and skinny limbs wrap around her, and squeezes them as hard as she possibly can without popping their ribs. Like she never, ever wants to let them go.

  ‘Oh, darling – don’t worry about that. There’s a very long time before your mummy goes to heaven.’

  She pulls back, still on her knees so she is at eye level with the children, keeping one hand on each of their shoulders. She looks from face to face, and sees the way that Poppy’s hand has already crept into Rose’s; sees their strength and their wonder and their potential. How did she ever create two such perfect creatures?

  ‘And even when I do,’ she adds, giving them both a reassuring smile, ‘you’ll always have each other.’

  Chapter 2

  The Present Day

  ‘I know you’re aiming for Scarlett-O’Hara-on-her-deathbed, darling, but with those earrings, you’re landing closer to Pat Butcher leaving the Queen Vic in a black cab.’

  Lewis is perched on the end of the bed, trying to ignore the machines and the wires and the dreaded drip stand. He’s feeling a little queasy because of the smell. That unmistakable hospital smell: that hideous combinatio
n of death and disinfectant.

  He can hear the nurses outside, chatting away about their night out at the weekend, and has a deeply uncivilised urge to run through the door and clang their heads together. He realises it’s unfair – God knows, if anybody is entitled to a life-affirming booze-up, it’s people who care for the dying. But still. A little decorum wouldn’t go amiss.

  Andrea manages to kick him, though it barely registers – she is very weak, and his behind is very well padded. It’s like a gnat biting a T. Rex. He pats her foot beneath the green blanket, and gives her a smile.

  ‘I hate you,’ she says, ‘with an absolute passion.’

  ‘Careful, my sweet,’ he replies, noticing that she is removing the gaudy drop earrings with shaking hands. ‘You could pop your clogs at any moment. Would you really want those to be your last words?’

  ‘No,’ she answers, throwing the jewellery down, ignoring the fact that the fake ruby drops skitter across the floor, one disappearing beneath the bed and another taking up residence under the cabinet.

  ‘If they’re going to be my last words, I’d make it “an absolute fucking passion”. Now, are you ready? How’s the lighting? Honestly, you’d think they’d spare more thought, wouldn’t you? A few gentle spots instead of all this … fluorescence?’

  ‘Spare more thought to lighting? In hospital? I suppose they’re concentrating on more important things.’

  ‘Ha! I’ve reached the stage where there is no more important thing. Lighting makes all the difference, you know. There was this time, on set, with John Nettles …’

  ‘Oh lord!’ Lewis exclaims, standing to his size-12 feet and throwing his arms in the air in a gesture that is half pleading, half surrender, ‘if you tell me another story about bloody Bergerac, I swear to God you won’t get the chance to die naturally – I will take that pillow and smother you with it!’

  She manages a smile, but it is a sad thing. Like her skin doesn’t have enough life left in it to give it any conviction. She’s always been slim, as long as he’s known her, but now there is barely anything left.

  Within the space of six weeks, the disease and the drugs have ravaged her like a Viking horde, leaving this grey, skinny streak of a human being behind. He’d do anything to pass on some of his solid bulk, but apparently the boffins haven’t yet come up with a way to transplant the health and vitality of a 68-year-old man to his dying friend.