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Chapters (86)
  1. Title Page
  2. CONTENTS
  3. Love
  4. Before
  5. One
  6. ONE
  7. Two
  8. TWO
  9. Three
  10. THREE
  11. Four
  12. FOUR
  13. Five
  14. FIVE
  15. Six
  16. SIX
  17. Seven
  18. SEVEN
  19. Eight
  20. EIGHT
  21. Nine
  22. NINE
  23. Ten
  24. TEN
  25. Eleven
  26. ELEVEN
  27. After
  28. One
  29. ONE
  30. Two
  31. TWO
  32. Three
  33. THREE
  34. Four
  35. FOUR
  36. Five
  37. FIVE
  38. Six
  39. SIX
  40. Seven
  41. SEVEN
  42. Eight
  43. EIGHT
  44. Nine
  45. NINE
  46. Ten
  47. TEN
  48. Eleven
  49. ELEVEN
  50. Twelve
  51. TWELVE
  52. Thirteen
  53. THIRTEEN
  54. Fourteen
  55. FOURTEEN
  56. Fifteen
  57. FIFTEEN
  58. Sixteen
  59. SIXTEEN
  60. Seventeen
  61. SEVENTEEN
  62. Eighteen
  63. EIGHTEEN
  64. Nineteen
  65. NINETEEN
  66. Twenty
  67. TWENTY
  68. Twenty-One
  69. TWENTY-ONE
  70. Twenty-Two
  71. TWENTY-TWO
  72. Twenty-Three
  73. TWENTY-THREE
  74. Twenty-Four
  75. TWENTY-FOUR
  76. Twenty-Five
  77. TWENTY-FIVE
  78. Twenty-Six
  79. TWENTY-SIX
  80. Twenty-Seven
  81. TWENTY-SEVEN
  82. Twenty-Eight
  83. TWENTY-EIGHT
  84. Eleven Months Later
  85. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  86. Copyright

I can feel it, can still feel the rise and fall of my chest and the air in my nose as I take in a deep breath and let it out, as if to prove the point. But there’s no relief when I do it. There’s nothing there.

‘We don’t need to breathe to function, but we need to breathe so we can talk.’

‘OK.’ I consider it for a moment. ‘But how come with the tea, when I picked up the mug, I could feel that it was hot against my knuckles and when I drank it, it burned, but it didn’t hurt?’

‘Because pain is a physical response and touch is a sensory one. We still need to be able to feel stuff.’ She stops and I can tell that she’s trying to think of the best analogy. ‘Like, say I’m doing a reap and it’s in a house that’s on fire so it’s too smoky to see where they are. I need to be able to feel them so I can find them.’

I get it, I think.

‘Anyway, that’s enough rest,’ she says, jumping to her feet. ‘There’s something I want you to see.’

I hold my hands up. ‘I’m not doing a reap. I’m not ready.’

‘Oh no. It’s nothing like that.’ She shakes her head. ‘Come on.’

Seven

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SEVEN

Dev takes me to a party on the beach, which I wasn’t expecting. I don’t know what it’s in aid of – the first day of the year? Is that a thing? – but it’s too loud to ask. It’s a mess, people everywhere – almost as many as last night, when I was with Poppy – a bonfire in the centre of them, its hot yellow flames curling up to a peak like the petals of a tulip. Except this party is at the other end of the beach, at Duke’s Mound, the Pier a finger of coloured light in the distance.

I tug the sleeve of Dev’s coat to get her attention. ‘What is this?’

She shakes her head and cups her hand to her ear.

‘What is this?’ I have to shout over the music and when I do, I realise it’s that song by Honeyblood that I was obsessed with last year. It’s called ‘Babes Never Die’, ironically, and I listened to it on repeat for, like, a month and drove Rosh insane. The memory of it should make me feel better, but it doesn’t. After lying in a dark room at the bookshop for the best part of a day, the assault of, well, everything – people, sound, colour – leaves me dizzy.