Prologue
PROLOGUE
Grace Kelly was feeling aggrieved that hot summer’s afternoon as she made her way home from school. Her school bag was digging into her shoulders, and she scuffed the toes of her sandals on the pavement in a sort of protest as she trudged along.
Aggrieved. She rolled it around in her head, deciding it was the sort of word Ava would use to describe feeling thoroughly fed up. Although her twin sister would never have found herself being kept behind after class and thus missing out on heading down to Emerald Bay for a swim with her friends in the first place. So it was that instead of cooling off in the sea, twelve-year-old Grace had to sit sweltering at her desk until four thirty when Mrs Duggan made a show of shuffling and stacking the papers in front of her before saying she could go. It was too late to join them all down at the bay now.
The sky above her was blindingly blue, and squinting up at it, Grace couldn’t find one single cloud. Heat shimmered in the distance over the tar-sealed road like a mirage, and she could smell the sweet, freshly mowed grass as she neared the park. If summer had a smell, this was it, she thought, and all things considered, she should be in good form. Especially as it was only another week until school would become a distant memory.
The summer holidays were nearly upon them, and the thought of not having to listen to Mrs Duggan droning on about mind-numbing fractions and the like for six whole weeks was bliss. Instead, there would be lazy days down at the bay, picnicking and giggling with her friends. Grace was convinced that when the sun shone down on Emerald Bay, there was no better place in the world to be.
Normally on the way home from school she’d jam her earphones in and play her favourite song, Craig David’s ‘Walking Away’, only she couldn’t even do that today, thanks to Mrs Duggan confiscating her minidisc player this afternoon. Her crime, sharing an earphone with her friend Clara so they could both listen to Craig, whose voice was a thousand times preferable to Mrs Duggan’s. At twelve, she and Clara had pledged to marry Craig one day. They’d work the logistics of it out when the time came, and hopefully yer man Craig had a brother for Ava, because it would never work between her and her favourite singer if Ava wasn’t nearby.
Her thoughts switched from Craig to the iPod she coveted. She’d struck out on hers and Ava’s birthday, but she was planning on putting it on her Christmas list, because it would take her forever to save up for one the rate she was going.
Her step faltered as she spotted something on the roadside up ahead. What was it? Grace shielded her eyes with her hands to block the glare, but it still took her a few steps more to register the upturned bicycle and the person sitting in the gutter alongside its spinning wheel. She looked around. There was no one else about, so, picking up her pace, she called out, ‘Are you OK?’
A head turned at the sound of her voice, and she recognised Christopher Dorrance, Clara’s neighbour. He was the same age as her and Clara. Clara got on well with him, but Grace thought him a bit of an oddball, what with being in the choir and playing the piano. Besides, there was no love lost between her dad and Christopher’s. The two men couldn’t stand one another for reasons Grace didn’t understand other than that it fell into the murky waters of grown-ups’ business. Her dad wouldn’t be pleased if he saw her talking to a Dorrance.
She forgot all about that, though, as she dumped her bag on the ground and crouched down alongside Christopher. Her eyes slid from the crumpled bike frame to the hole in his knee, and the gushing blood sent a wave of dizziness through her. She swallowed hard and finally looked at his face. His skin was bone white.
Later, Grace would like to say she’d kept a cool head, but she hadn’t – the sight of all that blood pooling on the tarmac made her mind go blank.
‘I think you should make a tourniquet to stop the bleeding,’ Christopher suggested, his voice thin and reedy.
‘Yes, a tourniquet.’ Grace nodded, emphatic. She knew this – it was only last year she’d sat her Girl Guides First Aid badge. Never mind she’d not passed, because by that time, she’d decided guiding was naff. What could she use, though?
Her eyes raked over Christopher, but he was in school uniform like she was. There was nothing she could use in her school bag either. Then it came to her, and Christopher’s eyes widened as Grace put her hands up her school blouse and deftly unhooked her bra. She freed one arm then the other, sliding it out the armhole of her blouse. It was only a T-shirt bra anyway, so as she didn’t feel left out. Without any further messing, she wrapped it around Christopher’s skinny, pale leg and tied it tightly.
‘There – you won’t die on my watch.’ Grace sat back on her haunches to survey her handiwork with satisfaction. ‘We should get you round the corner to Dr Fairlie’s surgery. Do you think you can walk if you lean on me?’ Otherwise she’d have to leave him on his own while she ran round to the practice to get help.
Red spots of colour had popped forth on Christopher’s cheeks as he stared at the bra wrapped around his leg and then at Grace. ‘I think so. Thanks.’
Grace shrugged off his thanks as she got to her feet. She was only doing what anyone would do. ‘Here, put your arm around my shoulder,’ she bossed, leaning down. She’d come back for their school bags later. Right now, she needed to get Christopher to the doctor’s.
He did as she’d told him to do, and Grace staggered under his weight. It took her a moment to straighten, then they set forth. It was a slow shuffle hop along, and Grace could tell Christopher was in pain from his jagged intakes of breath. She did what she was good at – or at least what Mrs Duggan said she was good at – and distracted him by chattering on about the great injustice their teacher had inflicted on her that afternoon.
They didn’t see anyone on the short journey, and when Grace pushed open the door to the doctor’s practice and called out for some help, she couldn’t help but think Emerald Bay could be a funny old place. The minute you wanted to do something away from prying eyes, you could put money on Mrs Tattersall or the like springing up and marching you home to tell your mammy and daddy what you’d been up to. But when you genuinely wanted to bump into someone, there wasn’t a soul to be seen.
Go figure , she thought.