Page 23 of The Next Chapter

It’s closer to midday by the time I’m opening the cottage doors.

Noah is nowhere to be seen and as I’m literally stranded here, I decide to make a start on the first chapter of Lola’s memoirs while it’s all fresh in my head.

Plus, the chance to think about everything she said without an audience holds a lot of appeal.

I send off a quick email to Seb to say that I’ve done the first session and that I’m working on chapter one today. He replies to say that Kitty is putting the feelers out to editors at publishing houses and that she’ll need the first three chapters from us before she makes a deal.

It’s the same process we’ve been through before, but even the thought of someone reading what I’ve just heard makes me feel unsure. Lola has been so private; I don’t understand how she could possibly want this now.

I open the patio doors wide, pleased to find that I can just about stretch my laptop cable outside if I pull the white plastic furniture closer to the doors.

I make a drink and a sandwich from my ever-dwindling food supplies, then get set up thinking that it really is a shame that no one’s around to witness how brilliantly normal I’m being.

It’s very hot. How is it so hot? Skye is meant to be unpredictable weather wise. The Inner Hebrides are not known for wall-to-wall sun. They’re the sort of place true crime documentaries are filmed.

It is an unspoken law of this land that as someone who heralds from the UK, I am meant to maximize time spent in the sun.

But as the glare of my laptop almost blinds me and my legs stick together and to the plastic chair, I think, actually I don’t love it sunny.

For one, there’s all the chafing. So much chafing.

And there’s just so much pressure to be enjoying yourself in the sun.

Probably, admitting this out loud would see me stripped of my citizenship and driven out of the country so I keep my sun aversion to myself.

I plug my headphones in, ready to listen to Lola talk through the early years of her childhood again.

I know what’s coming now, can brace myself for hearing that Lola was the black sheep of the family, according to her own mum.

I mean really, being born in a storm, like a baby can help that.

I was born on a Wednesday, and no one ever held that ‘full of woe’ thing against me.

‘Do all old people talk to themselves? Or are you just extra weird?’

Harper is stood a few feet away, on the edge of the forest, looking like that dead girl from The Ring when she climbs out of the well. She’s watching me from the perimeter of the gardens between cottage and hotel. Scowling.

I pause the recording that has literally just started and pull out an earphone.

‘I was muttering to myself. It’s totally different.

And I’m not old.’ I laugh to cover the fact that maybe it isn’t that different.

Harper scowls some more. Despite the heat, she’s wearing her ripped skinny black jeans and a black long-sleeved hoodie.

Her hair, as usual, is poker straight and covering a fair bit of her face.

‘Is everything okay?’ I ask. Because I notice that she seems angrier than usual, which is really saying something.

Her hands are balled into fists that hang by her side and her lips are pressed into such a tight line, they’re almost invisible.

It’s as if she’s vibrating with rage. Which means she doesn’t answer me.

‘Do you want to come and sit down?’ I gesture to the other chair, closing my laptop to show her that I’m not too busy. ‘I can make you a drink.’ I extend my final peace offering.

She eyes the chair like it’s personally wronged her and doesn’t move. ‘I still don’t trust you,’ she mutters.

‘Okay, but remember, you came to find me today. You’re pretty safe if you want to sit down.’

I hope she knows that I mean not just in the sense that I’d never do anything dodgy.

I once lost a whole night’s sleep after I accidentally forgot to pay for a cabbage in Sainsbury’s.

It hadn’t had a sticker and I’d meant to speak to a cashier about it at the end but forgot.

I’d gone back the next day to pay, but the whole night I’d been convinced that I’d end up with my own spot on Crimewatch. I annoy myself sometimes.

I’m wondering about relaying any of this to her when she snaps, ‘Fine,’ storming over to the other chair without committing.

‘I’ll go and get some lemonade,’ I say, standing up as Harper continues to glare straight ahead.

I move back into the cottage, pouring some of the fancy lemonade I’d brought from home into two glasses.

Heading back outside, I’m pleased to see that Harper has actually decided to sit down.

‘Here you go,’ I tell her, passing her a glass.

She takes it but doesn’t have a drink. I have an urge to feed her, which is odd. She’s just so thin. ‘Do you want this sandwich?’ I ask her. ‘I can make another.’

Her face morphs from anger to outright disgust. She wrinkles her nose and recoils away from my lunch.

‘What even is it?’ she asks.

‘Hummus and rocket, it’s really good for you.’

‘Grim.’ She pretends to puke on the grass. That settles that, then.

We sip lemonade for a minute, neither of us talking. My mind is still reeling from everything Lola said. And now Harper. And Noah. This little patch of Scotland might be secluded, but it certainly brings its fair share of drama.

‘Is everything okay?’ I ask Harper after a few minutes. She’s looking off into the forest that surrounds the cottage on three sides.

She shrugs and I think that’s all I’m going to get until she says, ‘Blake’s gone for a walk with them .’

I remember that Blake is her brother. ‘He’s gone with your foster parents, you mean?’

She nods.

‘Okay, how did that make you feel?’ I ask her, ridiculously out of my depth. I think again about how even Elton doesn’t respect me and reckon that my chances of getting Harper to open up are slim to none. I won’t know what to do if she does.

Another shrug. But this one seems less angry. Even if she’s still facing towards the forest, her shoulders are starting to slump. To curve forwards. ‘You wouldn’t get it,’ she says.

‘Try me.’

Something about the way I say it must ring true, because Harper turns to face me then with some sort of question in her wide eyes. I resist the urge to look away.

‘I just feel so fucking angry,’ she says, finally defeated. I figure that now isn’t the best time to pull her up on her using the odd fuck or ten. Plus, pot, meet kettle.

‘With Blake?’ I ask.

She shakes her head. ‘Nah, with Mum.’

I realize that we aren’t talking about Harper’s foster mum here.

I don’t say anything, hoping that she’ll keep talking.

She does. ‘If she’d just laid off the booze, we could’ve stayed with her. She wasn’t even bad or anything, not like they made out. I could have looked after Blake. It’s not fucking fair.’

Harper takes some deep breaths. God, parents mess their kids up, or at least some of them do. I guess that it’s the only job in the world where there are no prerequisites. Any old Tom, Dick or Harry can have a baby.

But I do know what it’s like to feel all confused, to wonder why the person who is meant to love you most in the world just doesn’t.

‘I think anger’s good,’ I tell her, after we’ve both been quiet for a little while. I’m a complete hypocrite. I don’t do angry myself. I hate angry.

‘You reckon?’ she asks.

‘Absolutely. If you feel angry, you’re angry. Whatever you feel is how you feel.’

‘Blake’s not angry,’ she tells me. ‘He’s younger than me, though. It’s hard to talk about.’ She starts to study the dried grass by her feet. ‘I just want her to be a better mum, you know?’

I nod again.

‘I get it,’ I say. Harper looks at me. ‘I mean, I don’t get it, but I get some of it.’

Generally, I try not to tell anyone what happened with Lola.

Even Colin hadn’t known the whole truth of it.

Because who wants to be like, ‘Date me! Marry me! I’m such a catch my own mother abandoned me!

’ But I do want to tell Harper more and wish I could.

It’s just that everyone here thinks that Seb is my brother, and if I spill that I was adopted as a baby and it gets back to Lola, she’ll definitely be onto me.

And then she might work out that she’s telling me her life story under false pretences. It’s a bit of a dick move. But then she did abandon me, so you know, hopefully we’ll be even after this.

‘Wait, you actually do get it,’ Harper says, and I realize that she’s watching my face really intently. I make a conscious effort to unscrew it.

‘Are your foster parents going to be wondering where you are?’ I ask.

She shakes her head. ‘Told them I was going to sit in the garden. They’ve gone for a walk around that massive lake. It’s not like I can escape from here, it’s like that prison. Alcatraz.’

Teenagers are dramatic.

‘Can I play music through your laptop?’ she asks. There’s a very good chance that we’ve now arrived at the real reason Harper has come to find me, like a teenage moth to a laptop with passable Wi-Fi flame.

‘Sure,’ I tell her, loading up Spotify and abandoning the idea of getting any work done for now. I go and get a bowl of vegetable crisps. ‘Here.’ I prop them on the table in front of her to yet more sounds of retching.

Music starts to play through the laptop. It’s not the sort of grunge screeching that I’d imagined Harper would like to listen to.

‘It’s The Smiths. You won’t have heard of them, but they’re my favourite.’

I have of course heard of The Smiths. I’m basic, but I’m not that basic. But Harper looks pleased with herself, so I let it slide. Plus, it makes sense that Harper would be drawn to Morrissey, kindred spirits and all that. ‘Do you play an instrument?’ I ask her.

Another head shake. ‘Not well. I want to learn guitar, though.’

‘You should speak to Lola, I’m sure she’d teach you. You could do the karaoke on Saturday nights.’