Chapter 64 Birdy
BIRDY
Six months earlier
Feelings are like visitors, they come and they go, and sometimes they stay when uninvited.
I sit in my little flat above the bookshop with Sunday at my feet and a blanket on my lap like I’m already fucking dead.
Then I have a word with myself. It’s been three days since I visited Thanatos.
Two days since I opened the letter telling me my date of death.
And one day since I fell apart. I can’t eat, can’t sleep, but I know I need to snap out of it.
Ever since I discovered I had so little time left, there has been one person I knew I needed to see.
I’ve thought about her so often over the years.
Every day for always. And now I need to visit her before it is too late.
To say sorry.
To say goodbye.
Even though it has been years since I said hello.
Now I know exactly how little time I have left, I need to use it wisely, not sit around drowning in self-pity.
The first thing I did, the same day I found out, was quit my job.
I have spent most of my life working for the police.
I think I’d like to spend whatever time I have left just being me. Whoever that is.
Now that I’m dying I wish I’d done a better job of living.
I think I might leave London. Maybe I’ll sell the flat above the bookshop, and take Sunday somewhere I’ve never been before.
I certainly have no intention of going back to Hope Falls; that’s the last place I’d want to spend my final days.
I plan to sell my grandmother’s house and put the money to good use.
I might take a trip to Scotland; I hear it’s very beautiful there.
No more police work, no more stress, no more anything.
Just me and my dog far away from it all for as long as life lets me.
But I have to see her first and I’m so scared.
It’s the last thing I need to do before I leave it all behind.
Sadly, it’s also the hardest thing.
Because how can you face a person knowing you destroyed their life?
The Manor looks like a luxury hotel surrounded by miles of nothing, but it’s really an expensive and exclusive institution for rich young people who, for various reasons, cannot care for themselves.
I could never afford something like this, but I guess the girl’s father can.
His job must pay pretty well. I’ll never forgive myself for what happened to Gabriella.
I have relived it over and over since, and spent the rest of my life trying to do the right thing to make up for the worst thing I ever did.
I still remember everything about that day as though it were yesterday, because it changed my life, and hers, forever.
I had just been promoted and was on my way to becoming the UK’s youngest DCI.
I was on top of the world and then, because of the accident, I hit rock bottom.
What I did ruined her life, so I ruined my own in a feeble attempt at justice.
I didn’t want to ease my guilt, I wanted to live inside it.
I abstained from joy. Deprived myself of hope.
And denied myself love. All because of what happened to Gabriella.
She’s eighteen now. Her father can’t stop me from seeing her.
I just want the chance to say sorry. For all of it.
I have to show my ID, along with the relevant paperwork to prove who I am, to be allowed into The Manor.
I instantly hate the place. It reminds me of a prison.
I am shown to Gabriella’s room by a woman wearing a white uniform.
Her name badge says MARY. She has very long blond hair, and she seems kind.
She says that Gabriella hasn’t been here long, and to try to not be upset when I see her, which makes me feel even more anxious.
I don’t know what to expect. I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing.
I don’t know how to feel about any of this.
Lately I think I just don’t know how to feel.
Maybe feeling things is something people can learn to forget.
“You know that Gabriella can’t speak?” Mary says and I nod.
“She was in an induced coma for six months after the accident—by all accounts nobody thought she would survive—but here she is. The most important thing in cases like this is not giving up hope. Broken wings can still fly if given time to heal. She’s a tough little girl, resilient, and she’s in there somewhere, trapped inside herself.
The doctors say her brain function is normal but she still hasn’t spoken a word since the accident ten years ago.
Not even a whisper. She’s painting—just childlike pictures—but at least it’s a way for her to express her feelings.
When she’s sad she paints a wolf. When she’s scared she paints a fox.
And when she’s happy she paints a bird. We’re all secretly confident that she might speak again one day, sometimes it just takes a trigger.
There can be a person or an incident that unlocks what got locked. ”
Gabriella has been trapped inside herself for ten years.
Because of me.
My heart breaks a little bit more when Mary says that.
The guilt I feel is all-consuming. When we reach the door I have an almost overwhelming urge to run in the opposite direction, but Mary opens it before I can escape.
I’m frozen to the spot and speechless myself when I see someone painting a picture by the window.
The person I came to see isn’t here. The eight-year-old girl I remember has transformed into an eighteen-year-old young woman.
I barely recognize her.
But it’s clear when I walk into the room that she does recognize me, even after all these years of not speaking and no contact.
She looks in my direction and the paintbrush falls to the floor.
I feel devastated all over again. Dismantled.
Destroyed. My face is wet with tears. I shouldn’t have come here.
But then, despite everything I’ve been told about her not speaking for ten years, Gabriella opens her mouth and whispers one word.
It’s so quiet I barely hear, but I didn’t imagine it.
Mary hears it too and gasps. It’s a word I haven’t heard for a very long time.
Gabriella stares at me and whispers the word again: “Mummy.”
I run to my daughter and hold her, wishing with all my broken heart that I had never let her go.