The Secret Life of Beatrice Alright

Prologue

PROLOGUE

It’s a midsummer’s day when I read a life-affirming article about New Year’s resolutions in a dog-eared magazine! I flick through the pages between the wash and blow-dry stages at my local hairdressers. I chose the most recently dated magazine to peruse – one that still has a cover; front and back. Jennifer Lopez smiles brightly on the front cover. Her teeth are as white as the snowy backdrop behind her. She wears a matching bobble hat and scarf and offers her tips for an eight-step beauty regime. My beauty regime stretches as far as two moisturisers. One for day and one for night, and I still manage to mix them up sometimes. I make an instant decision to add try a beauty regime to my list of New Year’s resolutions next year.

The hairdresser is chatting away about beer gardens and barbecues, although it’s hard to hear her above the hum of the hairdryer.

‘The guy on the radio this morning said it’s the hottest day of the year,’ she says, while dragging a brush painfully through my easily tangled hair. ‘Thirty-one degrees. That must be a new record for Dublin, right?’

I have no idea, but I nod and smile. People pass by the window wearing as few clothes as legally possible, all while my mind is transported to snowy scenes and mulled wine. I wonder if it’s ironic that even on a glorious summer’s day, I can’t take my mind off New Year’s resolutions and how important they are to me.

The actual irony comes when I take my phone out of my pocket and text my sister.

Tabs : So, you know the way one of my new year’s resolutions was to spend less time on my phone this year? Well, I was reading a magazine in the hairdressers just now and do you know what it said?

Avery: That you fail? Because your on your phone right now. LMAO

Tabs: It’s you’re. And haha very funny. But I’m only on my phone cos I HAD to tell you. Look at this…

I take a photograph of the magazine article and attach it. I wait for Avery’s reply and read back over the words that feel as if they could be written for me, personally.

Did you know that last year 66.8% of people said they would make at least one New Year’s resolution? Imagine, two-thirds of people want to make their life better in some way. Did you make one? If you did, and you failed, then worry not; you are not alone. More than 96.4% of people fail by the end of January. So, drink the wine, folks. Skip the gym and eat the chocolate. Life is too damn short not to.

Avery: I like the gym. This is BS. YOU’RE still on YOU’RE phone btw.

I laugh out loud. Then blush. As I feel the hairdresser’s eyes on me and the eyes of the woman beside me. Who is also on her phone. Quietly.

‘My sister,’ I say, feeling the heat in my cheeks creep across my nose.

The woman smiles and returns her gaze to her phone screen. I do the same.

Tabs: I love you

Avery: You too. Can’t wait to see the new hair.

Tabs: Nothing new. Just a trim.

Avery: I know

I fumble about under the hairdresser’s cape and shove my phone back into my pocket and I reread the article once more. The final line feels cold and messy like the ice cream sliding down the face of a little boy outside the window. Most people fail . But that means some people succeed. I want so badly to be in that small group of succeeders. I am determined that some year I will be.

Every December I make twelve new resolutions. One resolution to be followed each month for the whole year. A sort of month-by-month, step-by-step plan to a better me. Has it worked? Not exactly. It never really works, to be honest. I’ve been writing New Year’s resolutions for more than a decade and I keep waiting for that year. That year that will change everything. What is everything? I have no idea. But when it changes, I will know. It will finally be my year!

I read somewhere once (probably in another tatty magazine) that humans are, by nature, creatures of habit. One day you’re a teenager placing your first cigarette between your lips and the next you’re a fifty-year-old smoker, puffing away on twenty a day. Or, that couch to 5k that used to burn the legs off you has somehow become two marathons a year and an ambition to better your personal best. You may not remember when or why you started something; you just know that something is an integral part of who you are now.

However, I do remember when and why I began writing New Year’s resolutions. It was a Tuesday morning in October, shortly before my thirteenth birthday. I was one of the youngest in my class. Last to become a teenager. The shift between childhood and adolescence seemed to bring with it a strange and almost forced maturity. All of a sudden, we were supposed to know what we wanted to be when we grew up.

‘I want to be a pop star,’ I giggled, turning my drink bottle upside down to create a makeshift microphone before I burst into out-of-tune song.

‘Be serious, Tabby,’ someone said. ‘A real job.’

They meant a solicitor or a dentist or an architect. The types of jobs their parents had. If it was fun, then it wasn’t a job, clearly. My mother was an artist. A painter. Always with her hair tied up in a messy bun and with a splash of paint on her cheek. I saw the way the other parents looked her up and down at the school gates. Her floral dresses and DrMartens boots stood out like an eyesore next to their tailored suits and kitten heels. But she smiled so much more than they did.

Later that morning, instead of joining my classmates for PE, I convinced my sister, Avery, to ditch school and come to the park with me instead. Our imaginations ran wild as we scaled knobbly bark and swung from high branches like brave explorers on a jungle expedition. The other kids were wrong, I thought. When life is fun, then it is most real.

‘Look at me, look at me,’ I squealed excitedly as I clung to one of the highest branches on one of the tallest trees. ‘I bet I can hold on one-handed.’

‘Bet you can’t,’ Avery shouted back from her position on the ground with her head tilting towards the sky, staring up at me.

‘I can too,’ I said, indignant, dropping my left arm down by my side.

The fingers of my right hand began to slip almost instantly and, before I could reach up to grab on with both hands again, I found myself sprawled flat on my back on the icy ground crying for my mother.

‘Oh no, Tabby. We’re going to get in so much trouble,’ Avery said before she ran as fast as she could to get help.

‘I don’t know what I’m going to do with her,’ Mam told the doctor later as he wrapped my broken leg in a bright purple cast.

Purple had always been Avery’s and my favourite colour. But I didn’t like it so much anymore.

‘I’ve two daughters. Both as wild as goats,’ Mam told the doctor. ‘I worry about them so much.’

‘Well, I’m sure this one has learned her lesson. Haven’t you, Tabitha?’ the doctor said. ‘No more climbing trees. You’ll be the death of your mother.’

My mother was my favourite person in the whole world. On the outside she looked like Avery and me – short with dark, wild hair and round chocolate eyes. But inside she was calm and softly spoken and her hugs melted away all our problems. Mam passed away two days before my cast came off and I knew I would never climb another tree again.

The other kids were right. It was time to grow up. No more days spent drawing or playing games of make-believe. It was time to make a plan and be the good, sensible girl who would make my mother proud. It was time to change but I wasn’t sure how. MrsApplegate – my favourite teacher – had an idea. Or rather, she gave me an idea. She taught us all about the Babylonians and the origins of New Year’s resolutions. MrsApplegate explained that these ancient people believed that if they resolved to live their best life every year, their crops would grow and their king and their gods would be delighted. New Year’s resolutions may have changed slightly over the years – I doubt the Babylonians had to worry about dry January or joining the gym – but a deal was a deal and I liked the idea of living my best life. And just like that I had a plan. So now, ever since I was thirteen years old, I start every year with a fresh set of resolutions. Always with the same aim – to be the very best version of myself that I can be. My mother was full of colour. Like a rainbow. I was so determined to shine too.