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Back Love and Other Lies Save as PDF
Chapters (61)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Imagine a girl
  4. Prologue
  5. The Foreigner
  6. One
  7. Two
  8. Three
  9. Four
  10. Five
  11. The Skeptic
  12. Six
  13. Seven
  14. Eight
  15. Nine
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Twelve
  19. Thirteen
  20. Fourteen
  21. Fifteen
  22. Sixteen
  23. Seventeen
  24. Eighteen
  25. Nineteen
  26. Twenty
  27. Twenty-One
  28. Twenty-Two
  29. Twenty-Three
  30. The Spectator
  31. Twenty-Four
  32. Twenty-Five
  33. Twenty-Six
  34. Twenty-Seven
  35. Twenty-Eight
  36. Twenty-Nine
  37. The Assassin
  38. Thirty
  39. Thirty-One
  40. Thirty-Two
  41. Thirty-Three
  42. Thirty-Four
  43. Thirty-Five
  44. Thirty-Six
  45. Thirty-Seven
  46. Thirty-Eight
  47. Thirty-Nine
  48. Forty
  49. Forty-One
  50. The Hunter
  51. Forty-Two
  52. Forty-Three
  53. Forty-Four
  54. Forty-Five
  55. Forty-Six
  56. Forty-Seven
  57. Imagine a girl
  58. Acknowledgments
  59. About the Author
  60. Also by Ben McPherson
  61. About the Publisher

“Do we need to worry that we can’t reach Licia?” I said.

“Licia will be fine,” said Elsa. “She’s safe on her island.”

I took the path toward the station.

At a few minutes after eight that morning Elsa and I had followed Licia down this same path, until Licia turned, and laughed, and asked us please to stop. We had stood there, Elsa and I, smiling at our daughter as she smiled back at us. Her kingfisher dress shimmered brilliant in the sunlight: every imaginable green and blue.

“What?” she said, almost shyly.

World at your feet, I thought.

Elsa held out her hand. “Here.”

Licia stepped forward. Around her wrist Elsa placed a heavy silver bangle with a large embossed dragonfly. Licia held up her wrist, turning the bangle before her eyes.

“The first piece of jewelry your dad gave me.”

“I know,” said Licia, looking from Elsa to me. “Mum, I can’t.”

“Love,” I said, “we want you to have it.”

“Thanks, Dad. Thanks, Mum.”

Still strange after all these years to hear her say Mum—never Mom, always Mum—the only trace of Britain she and Vee carried with them when they spoke.

“Go and have fun, love.”

Something very adult about the look Licia gave me as she tightened the straps on her backpack and turned away. We watched her all the way to the station, holding hands, our hearts full of pride. As she reached the steps down to the platforms I saw her wave to another girl, who approached her and hugged her. I saw Licia hold out her wrist, and I saw how the bracelet glinted and the kingfisher dress shone.

Our daughter, all shrouded in sunlight.

The train I took into town was half-empty. By the doors sat a woman in a headscarf, talking animatedly into a telephone in a language I did not understand. When she ended the call I made a point of smiling at her. The woman smiled cautiously back.

Footsteps echoed around me at the National Theater station. A crowd flowing into town, toward the center of whatever it was that had happened. All heading toward their loved ones. Faces of every kind, all set in the same expression: stoical, impassive, determined.

At the side of the royal park a man stood shouting. His face was bloodied, his clothes torn. At his side a woman stood, a phone by her ear, trying to summon help, listening for an answer on the line that did not come.

Three

Light blazed through the stained glass on the stairwell. After the clamor of the streets the stillness of the building felt wrong. There was a grandeur here, a wastefulness both beautiful and intimidating. Painted angels looked down on me from the plasterwork.