Forget Me Not (The Ceruleans: Book 2) (17 page)

I went to the zoo a girl of substance – standing tall,
fighting, living. I came home a shadow.

In the week that followed, the black crept in from the
beyond, into me. Gone was that part of me with the energy to create moments, to
see a world in a grain of sand. She had ceased to exist on that cold, wet path.
In her place was a girl who said no to an invitation out, who joined in
laughter just a beat too late, who made excuses not to surf, who jumped at loud
noises, who awoke screaming at night when the tiger’s claws reached through the
fence and slashed her open.

As usual, I did my best to hide it all from Cara and Luke.
When my head pounded, I discreetly popped tablets. When the edges of the world
blurred, I held tight to the nearest object and chatted on. When my heart ached,
when my tear ducts burned, when the grief threatened to drown me, I smiled,
smiled, smiled. I saw in their eyes, though, that they weren’t entirely fooled,
and that my silence, my act, hurt them.

There was only one person I could turn to. Those last words
I’d uttered at the zoo had proved to be prophetic: I needed Jude. He came to
the cottage often, in the early afternoon, usually, when Cara was at school and
Luke at work, and we talked. Well, mainly he talked and I listened silently,
because I didn’t know how to respond to his truths –
‘You have to stop
lying; you’re hurting people’
– and the impossible choices he laid down – ‘
Either
tell Luke that you’re dying now and share with him your last days, or leave the
cove and let him get on with his life’
. He was compassionate, he was a good
friend, but as the days wore on Jude grew increasingly frustrated by my
inertia, and I, in turn, grew increasingly more incapable of pulling myself out
of the quagmire into which I’d sunk. Until, a week to the day after my
collapse, a little old lady, a beast and a talking clock threw me a rope.

I was visiting Grannie Cavendish – alone; something I’d
taken to doing. I liked the simplicity and beauty of her fantasy world. I liked
the escapism to be found within the four walls of her room. And I liked that
with her I could be myself. I could be quiet, I could be sombre, I could cry,
even, and there was no judgement there. In turn, she seemed to enjoy my visits,
and though she regularly forgot my name, she readily recognised me as the Blue
Fairy – a character, I now realised, from the original Pinocchio book.

This afternoon, we were watching Disney’s
Beauty and the
Beast
, side by side, in matching wingbacked chairs. Grannie (she insisted I
call her that) was having a particularly good day. She’d done a stirring
rendition of ‘Be Our Guest’ and the movie’s theme song, and now we were at the
part where the Beast lets Belle go so that she can save her dying father.
Grannie gave an almighty sniff, and I turned to see tears on her cheeks.

‘The talking clock doesn’t understand,’ she said, engrossed
in the action. ‘Cogsworth says everything is just peachy. But it’s not.’

I opened my mouth to utter reassurances –
but she’ll be
back; the ending will be happy
– then found myself agreeing: ‘No, it’s
not.’

‘Belle has gone.’

‘Yes.’

‘The Beast has to let her go, you see. Because he loves her
– really-
true-love
-loves her. And you know what they say, dear.’

‘What?’

‘That if you really-
true-love
-love someone, then you
have to set them free. Because holding on is just selfish. It’s not right. Like
hogging all the gravy at dinner. Harold down the corridor, he does that.’

The words were delivered so lightly, with the same gravitas
as when she offered me a biscuit. But she may as well have shouted them at me
for the impact they had.

‘Oh dear, is your teacup faulty?’

‘Sorry?’

‘Your teacup. It’s gone all wobbly.’

I set my cup on its saucer with a clatter. On the screen a
mournful candelabra was declaring that it may have been better if the Beast had
never met Belle at all, so tragic was their parting.

‘Silly Lumiere,’ scolded Grannie. ‘Of
course
it’s
better that they met. Better to have lost and loved... and... oh dear, how does
it go?’

‘Better to have loved and lost than never loved at all.’

‘That’s it.’

‘Do you believe that, Grannie? I mean, the loss bit is
hard.’

‘Only if you cling on.’

An echo in my mind – Grandad, in the garden of the cottage:

‘I don’t want to lose him.’

‘You can only lose what you cling to.’

‘What do you mean, Grannie?’

She turned back to the television. ‘I don’t know, dear.
Cogsworth might, though. He’s pretty smart. For a clock.’

We sat quietly and watched the end of the film. By the final
scene, where the Beast lay dead, tears were pouring down my cheeks.

‘She’ll save him,’ said Grannie, patting my hand in comfort.
‘Just you watch. She’ll kiss him, and he’ll come back to life. And he’ll be a
prince again. And everything will be just peachy.’

‘But what if he’d let her go and she’d never come back?’

She tilted her head and thought about it. ‘Well,’ she said,
‘then he’d always know he did what was right. He did the right thing. That’s
important, you know.’

I nodded. ‘I know.’

‘Mind you...’

‘Yes?’

Grannie Cavendish looked about the room and then whispered
conspiratorially, ‘I think, if Belle had never come back, the end of the story
might’ve been quite different. Have you seen the way the Beast looks at Mrs
Potts the teapot?’

*

I made the decision that afternoon, sitting in the living
room, over three consecutive cups of coffee. I made the decision to leave
Twycombe. I didn’t want to leave; I wanted to be here, home, at the end. But
leaving was the right thing to do for Luke and for Cara, who’d already lost so
much, been so hurt by death.

Thanks to Jude, thanks to Grannie, I saw now what I had been
doing. These past weeks I’d put myself first:
my
wishes,
my
needs. I’d been unutterably selfish, like a child at a playground – just one
more go on the slide, just one more swing to the skies. Already Luke had paid a
price. No more.

I set a deadline: one week. One week to fill with good
memories to wash away the bad. One week to say goodbye.

I would take him somewhere beautiful, I decided, to tell
him. Land’s End – the very tip of the country, where the land and the sky
collided. I would say it casually, that I was going to visit my mother for a
few days. He’d be happy to hear I’d mended that fence, would wish me well for
the trip.

Next Sunday, I would kiss him goodnight, and then I would
drive to Hollythwaite to spend some time with my mother. Until… until it was
time to call Jude, and he would take me someplace quiet, someplace peaceful,
just him and me.

Luke and Cara and Mother, they’d wonder where I was.
Travelling – I would tell them I’d gone travelling; some time to myself, to
find my way. I’d email them until the end. Beyond, even – you could schedule
messages for future delivery, couldn’t you? Over time, I’d distance myself more
and more. Until, one day, the messages would just stop.

I knew how my distance and eventual disappearance would hurt
them. I’d been through it with Sienna, and I’d hated her for doing that. I
hadn’t understood then that she wasn’t doing it
to
me, to hurt me, but
for
me, to protect me. At least with my plan there was no grieving, no knowledge of
the death. Mother would wonder at some point perhaps, but Luke and Cara would
move on, I told myself.
Luke
. It tore me apart to think it, but I knew
in time I’d be little more than a memory for him. He’d meet someone new, and
then he’d stop waiting for the green-eyed girl he’d loved once.

By the fourth coffee, I had it all planned out. I’d even developed
an elaborate subterfuge that had me sneaking back to the cove right at the end
and covertly healing Cara in the dead of night. Jude would take some convincing
on that part of the plan. But he’d be pleased, I thought, about the rest, glad
I’d finally made a decision. The right one. I’d explain it all to him when he
came over later.

My head was pounding, my stomach was churning and I was
tired, so tired, but I felt calmer than I had in weeks. Even a painful decision
sits more peacefully than no decision at all. I leaned back in the chair and
gave in to the heaviness pressing down on me. Sleep, I needed to sleep.

But apparently a nap was off the agenda, because just
moments after closing my eyes, or so it felt, a hand was shaking me roughly.

‘Scarlett! Wake up!’

‘Jude,’ I groaned grumpily and prised open an eyelid. He
wasn’t beside me; he was at the fire, fiddling with the dial, and then striding
to the window and throwing it open.

‘Get up!’ he shouted. ‘Now!’

Groggily, I sat up. ‘What?’

He came to me and hauled me up none-too-gently. ‘Come on –
out of here.’

Before I could form a response he was propelling me out of
the room, through the kitchen and into the frigid air of the garden.

‘What are you doing!’ I spluttered as he pushed me down onto
a patio chair.

‘Stopping you making the biggest mistake of your life!’

‘What?’

He hunched down and inspected my face. ‘How do you feel?’

‘My head hurts.’

‘Good. Serves you right. What were you thinking?’ I cringed
and he backed away, but carried right on yelling. ‘I know you’ve been down,
lost. But
this
, Scarlett, this? And behind my back – no, in my face. You
knew
I would find you. You were shoving your broken promise right in my
face.’

I gaped at him as he paced up and down, throwing words at me
that made no sense at all.

‘What about your
sister
–
WHAT ABOUT SIENNA?
What
on earth did you think you were doing, Scarlett?’

‘Napping!’

He froze mid-stride. ‘Napping?’

‘Yes. It’s a bloody tiring business dying, you know.’

‘The gas – you didn’t turn it on?’

I stared blankly at him.

‘The room – it reeked of gas. The fire was on, but not
ignited. It was gassing you.
Killing
you.’

‘But I didn’t turn it on at all. Jude, I don’t remember
doing that!’

And then I was shaking, and it wasn’t from the pain in my
head or the cold air all around. Quickly, Jude quit standing over me and
crouched in front of me, his hands on my shoulders.

‘It’s okay now,’ he said. ‘It’s okay.’

‘It’s not,’ I told him. ‘I’m a disaster zone. This kind of
stuff keeps happening. It’s Death, I’m telling you – coming for me.’

‘What do you mean, this keeps happening?’

‘First the brick from the church tower and the cliff dive
before Newquay. And then, since I’ve been back, all sorts of scares.’

‘Like?’

‘Like when the toaster exploded. And when the kettle gave me
a shock. And when Chester left a ball at the top of the stairs and I nearly
slipped on it. And when I fell asleep in the bath and woke up underwater. And
when that bees nest exploded in the roof of the shed. And the other day, when I
forgot to put the handbrake on in the Mini and it nearly ran me down –
flattened a wall in the garden instead…’

I let myself trail off – though there were plenty more
examples I could have shared – because he looked so alarmed.

‘Why didn’t I know about any of this?’ he demanded.

‘Because I thought I could look after myself.’

‘Evidently not. You might have died in there today.
Alone
,
Scarlett – do you realise what that means? I wouldn’t have been there to Claim
you. You’d have gone into the white light, and your death would have been
meaningless!’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said miserably. ‘It was just an accident.’

‘A very dangerous one. Your head, Scarlett – you’re a danger
to yourself. You can’t carry on like this. It’s not right.’

‘I know.’

I opened my mouth to tell him my master plan, but the pain
was stalking through my mind, now, obliterating memories, thoughts, reason, and
all that came out was, ‘Luke.’

‘Is it him?’ said Jude. ‘Is he the only thing holding you
back?’

I sank forwards until my forehead was resting on my knees.
It didn’t help the pain at all, but at least there was less distance to fall.

But I didn’t fall. I floated. Across the garden, into the
cottage, up the stairs and into my room. Jude put me down on the bed and coaxed
tablets into me, several of them. Then he pulled back the bedclothes and helped
me to lie down. The last thing I heard before I sank into sleep was his voice,
murmuring an apology.

Orange and black and white where all should be green. The
tiger. In the cottage garden.

A voice behind me, high and desperate: ‘Run, Scarlett,
run!’

But the tiger isn’t moving. It lies in the grass,
watching me with eyes that aren’t hungry, but inviting.

I take a step. The grass is wet. I look down. My feet are
bare. My legs are bare. I’m naked. I wait for the rush of shame, but it doesn’t
come.

The tiger is waiting. I take another step...

‘Scarlett, no!’

... and another, and another, until the fur of his
stomach is tickling my toes.

Ignoring my sister’s cries, I sink down on my knees in
the grass, reach out a hand, stroke it along the velvety fur of his great
belly. The tiger lets out a low, satisfied growl. I stare into his eyes. They
are the yellow of the sun.

I turn from him, away, and lie down in the grass. It’s
cold and smells of autumn. The tiger curls in behind me, his stomach to my
back. He’s warm.

At an upstairs window of the cottage stands my sister.
She is waving furiously and shouting my name. I don’t listen to her. I am safe
here.