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Back The Imposter Save as PDF
Chapters (55)
  1. Cover
  2. ANNA WHARTON
  3. Dedication page
  4. ONE
  5. TWO
  6. THREE
  7. FOUR
  8. FIVE
  9. SIX
  10. SEVEN
  11. EIGHT
  12. NINE
  13. TEN
  14. ELEVEN
  15. TWELVE
  16. THIRTEEN
  17. FOURTEEN
  18. FIFTEEN
  19. SIXTEEN
  20. SEVENTEEN
  21. EIGHTEEN
  22. NINETEEN
  23. TWENTY
  24. TWENTY-ONE
  25. TWENTY-TWO
  26. TWENTY-THREE
  27. TWENTY-FOUR
  28. TWENTY-FIVE
  29. TWENTY-SIX
  30. TWENTY-SEVEN
  31. TWENTY-EIGHT
  32. TWENTY-NINE
  33. THIRTY
  34. THIRTY-ONE
  35. THIRTY-TWO
  36. THIRTY-THREE
  37. THIRTY-FOUR
  38. THIRTY-FIVE
  39. THIRTY-SIX
  40. THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. THIRTY-EIGHT
  42. THIRTY-NINE
  43. FORTY
  44. FORTY-ONE
  45. FORTY-TWO
  46. FORTY-THREE
  47. FORTY-FOUR
  48. FORTY-FIVE
  49. FORTY-SIX
  50. FORTY-SEVEN
  51. FORTY-EIGHT
  52. FORTY-NINE
  53. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  54. Praise
  55. THE IMPOSTER

The reporter has turned back to her screen.

‘See you tomorrow then,’ the reporter calls without turning round.

Chloe hauls her bag back onto her shoulder, the weight of it replacing a sudden emptiness. She heads towards the door, the brightness of the hallway beyond like a beacon to safety. She’s out the doors, down the stairs, out into the street.

It’s only then that she allows her breath to return to normal.

She’s done it. She’s got the file.

Her hands are still shaking when she gets back to Nan’s house. She rummages through Nan’s bureau for some Blu-Tack then runs upstairs to her room. She shakes the photocopies onto her bed, and they land on the eiderdown with a satisfying thud. Then she gets to work.

She starts by removing a couple of pictures from the wall, then the pins that had held them there. They leave faint smoky outlines of themselves, but she’ll soon cover them. She flicks through for the earliest cutting from the pile, dragging a stool from Nan’s dressing table so she can reach up to the top left-hand corner of the room. She works from left to right, up and down on the chair until her thighs burn, but she won’t stop. She tacks each copy up with four tiny bits of pale-blue putty, and once she’s done the top two rows it’s easier, faster, not having to mount the stool. She works without stopping, a need to see what she’s had in her mind all day.

An hour and a half later she stands back and there it is, the whole story of the Kyles covering three walls of her bedroom – just a few leftover cuttings creep around the next corner. It irritates her that they don’t all fit, but she would never have left them. No, here she has everything.

She shrugs her shoulders a few times, massages the knots that have appeared in them. She’s tired and it’s nearly 3 a.m. She gets into bed, lying on her right side, an arm stretched under her pillow, so she can study this new newsprint wallpaper. She squints ever so slightly and the words blur to grey and, just for a second, it’s as if the photographs of Maureen and Patrick have been chosen from her own family album. Just like that, she has her very own archive. And under its gaze, she sleeps.

FIFTEEN

The phone ringing on the floor by her bed wakes her up. Chloe answers it still half asleep.

‘Oh, sorry, I didn’t wake you, did I?’ Hollie says.