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Lily Alone: A gripping and emotional drama
Vivien Brown
What sort of mother would leave her all alone… a gripping and heart-wrenching domestic drama that won’t let you go.Lily, who is almost three years old, wakes up alone at home with only her cuddly toy for company. She is afraid of the dark, can’t use the phone, and has been told never to open the door to strangers.But why is Lily alone and why isn’t there anyone who can help her? What about the lonely old woman in the flat below who wonders at the cries from the floor above? Or the grandmother who no longer sees Lily since her parents split up?All the while a young woman lies in a coma in hospital – no one knows her name or who she is, but in her silent dreams, a little girl is crying for her mummy… and for Lily, time is running out.
Copyright (#ulink_22232fdb-88d5-5b35-97df-44af7e4ebc10)
HarperImpulse
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
The News Building
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
First published in Great Britain by HarperImpulse 2017
Copyright © HarperCollinsPublishers 2017
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017
Cover photographs © Shutterstock.com (http://Shutterstock.com) / Cover design by Books Uncovered
Vivien Brown asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780008252113
Ebook Edition © June 2017 ISBN: 9780008252120
Version: 2017-05-18
Dedication (#ulink_2fcc0d0b-9e6d-5584-955f-cd2318943030)
To Penny, who is almost the same age as Lily,
but will never be alone.
Contents
Cover (#u00c425cc-661a-5aeb-8368-a2a10796297c)
Title Page (#ud45443cf-caee-562a-ad15-c1ec5320d5b3)
Copyright (#uc82d08f6-f9bf-59a3-b034-d5e2b382be67)
Dedication (#u88d63dba-d3d7-5ba6-b621-26733f85f141)
Prologue (#u8a8171b9-764c-55e7-9240-bffa55992630)
Part One (#u599f1a4d-1dfa-5a69-a760-497c0001a4e0)
Chapter One (#ua60a5359-193b-5457-b104-86ad075760cc)
Chapter Two (#udaeaf8f0-782c-5332-b8b5-3ee032ff08a3)
Chapter Three (#u5014f319-98a1-570b-8e81-2fa384589382)
Chapter Four (#u71d18988-fe4f-5f08-900a-b671e80c2a59)
Chapter Five (#u8f3e0c6b-574c-5aea-9336-71668f73a6a3)
Chapter Six (#u4aa07657-559d-521a-be79-6f994515492d)
Chapter Seven (#u02d82014-bf96-5e04-aa9a-a65e47ff4f36)
Chapter Eight (#ua4f5aa2d-2e9e-54d7-b183-11ceafd400cc)
Chapter Nine (#ua45534a9-dcb3-5884-bb94-d57b49408a2c)
Chapter Ten (#uad423ac8-74f5-5d63-bc76-bb465cf841b0)
Chapter Eleven (#u63ae3be0-cbc9-595d-9bed-b003ce8840a0)
Chapter Twelve (#u1f915906-51d9-5b02-b0a1-5c7673251317)
Chapter Thirteen (#ue1b81a05-89ac-53bc-8fc8-47d98e995f26)
Part Two (#u9b446aa8-165d-53c3-b8a7-e1b4a6e1edfa)
Chapter Fourteen (#u951ca3a0-28d3-5c54-a2a0-28e13251ced6)
Chapter Fifteen (#u71f0ce69-3304-5733-a85a-ad7ab4f48cc6)
Chapter Sixteen (#u1291bd9b-b6dd-5ac3-abc4-9cfcd96aee2e)
Chapter Seventeen (#u86bc2f0c-5304-52b4-9551-540de2a79104)
Chapter Eighteen (#u806e4826-0f7c-5cdb-a446-2ddb7171bc95)
Chapter Nineteen (#ubd73bce7-5367-5fee-bb57-310e1b6d67d1)
Chapter Twenty (#ue8629ee1-8d30-5b44-a141-230ebaded5ce)
Chapter Twenty-One (#u7fde1b60-fe4d-598b-848b-b696a0b26d92)
Chapter Twenty-Two (#uf6dfbec9-3c05-5ea7-88c5-0908b88f7185)
Part Three (#ua3c07e56-9d4c-5e25-a9ce-5e9ec7cfe0ce)
Chapter Twenty-Three (#u83c3194c-f575-5f10-a69d-b876b572022c)
Chapter Twenty-Four (#ua3f00d40-f40a-5c9d-8d4b-1e0a40a37e16)
Chapter Twenty-Five (#u6a176468-b756-5d02-8488-ccffbf2ae7b3)
Chapter Twenty-Six (#ud74e159d-9707-5846-b139-7139c09a48e4)
Chapter Twenty-Seven (#u0ca0b4ef-fd77-5f2f-bbdd-b224fc4a1121)
Chapter Twenty-Eight (#ubc96c91a-1a5c-5fda-b6ab-ec2b2659264c)
Chapter Twenty-Nine (#u7b97c33d-6402-57f7-8dcb-295122a984ca)
Chapter Thirty (#ud7d38336-5b9c-5b62-9674-00c271cf2655)
Chapter Thirty-One (#uc093a366-ae11-581b-8143-c41f9e622d70)
Chapter Thirty-Two (#u5b5cd79b-6a09-55fc-a178-3369b15701c3)
Chapter Thirty-Three (#u3ae583b5-2777-585b-8b95-39bba8b0194a)
Chapter Thirty-Four (#u6ee80bc0-abe7-5b39-b8b0-cd9497c656de)
Chapter Thirty-Five (#ub462c8e7-adc9-59d5-8688-df060336262b)
Chapter Thirty-Six (#uf4108f80-c553-5eec-8f36-e5437eb9c947)
Acknowledgements (#uf0c57c4c-b67d-5d5d-bfc3-35c067657033)
About the Author (#u64f4a5a1-a607-5572-a080-b120e31de678)
About the Publisher (#u5bf68029-2500-5a9b-be2c-31019e5f99f1)
PROLOGUE (#ulink_ba4378ec-95b6-540f-adff-769e3d6a9ace)
Ruby
There’s a face looking down at me. Big and blurry, not quite in focus. I close my eyes and open them again, slowly, but it’s still there. Go away. I don’t know who you are. Let me sleep. I need to sleep.
Other faces now, working their way into shot, waving about around the edges like the petals of a daisy, opening and closing, opening and closing. My back feels cold, and I’m lying on something hard. And wet. I don’t know how I got here. Or where here is.
‘It’s okay, sweetheart. Don’t try to move.’
Mike. Mike always calls me sweetheart. Calls everybody sweetheart. Is he here?
‘You’ve been in an accident. Just hold on there. The ambulance is on its way.’
It’s a woman now, bending down next to me. What does she mean, hold on? What am I supposed to hold on to? I try to reach for her hand, but mine won’t move. It just lies there, like a piece of dead meat. Disconnected.
The woman’s knees are bony, pressed against my side, and there’s water running off her mac and dripping onto my hand. I’m lying in the road. And it’s raining. How did I end up in the road? She touches my shoulder. Her face is white, really white, as if she’s had a shock; seen a ghost or something.
Why do I feel so cold? Did I forget to put the heating on? Where’s my duvet? I just want everyone to go away and leave me alone, so I can close my eyes and go back to sleep. But there’s so much noise. People talking, whispering, crying. Why is someone crying? Sirens now. Getting louder, closer.
And a minute later – or is it five? ten? – the thumping of a door. Two people in bright yellow jackets are squatting in front of me, touching me, talking to me, asking me my name. I stare at the yellow. It’s the same yellow as Lily’s new pyjamas, but without the rabbits. Lily likes rabbits. My stomach lurches. Lily. Where’s Lily?
‘Your name, sweetheart,’ one of them says again. ‘Can you tell us your name?’
I try to lift my head, to look for her. She should be here, with me, but she isn’t. My head falls back down, hard, as if I can’t hold its weight. Someone is clamping something around my neck now, and I can’t move any more. The sky is everywhere. It’s all I can see, like a thick grey blanket falling over me. I can feel the wetness at the back of my head, running down my neck, creeping inside my hood. It’s warm, sticky. Not like rain at all. Something – everything – hurts. Really hurts.
‘Lily …’ I say. ‘Lily …’
And then I’m gone.
PART ONE (#ulink_8a26db19-8759-53c6-96f8-6186519882d3)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_5e3930ff-d70a-5d3a-915e-607c5a0db224)
Archie was hungry. Lily let his wet ear slip out of her mouth. She rubbed a sweaty hand over her eyelids and yawned, cuddled Archie up tight to her chest, then threw the covers back and held him up at arm’s length, tugging his little knitted trousers off over his feet.
Archie should have pyjamas for when he went to bed. Or to wear in the daytime sometimes, when there was nothing special to get dressed for. Lily had been wearing hers all morning, and so had Mummy.
Lily’s pyjamas were yellow, with bunnies on, and yellow was her new favourite colour. When they got a garden of their own she would grow yellow daffodils, and have a real live bunny of her own too. Mummy had promised.
The curtains were half closed, but little shadows of light darted about like jumping frogs on the ceiling. There was a lot of noise outside. Loud noise. Lily didn’t like loud noise. When people shouted, or fireworks banged, or balloons popped. She hated those things. You had to close your eyes and put your hands over your ears when they happened. She didn’t want fireworks or balloons at her birthday party. Just presents. Mummy said she was going to be three. She’d held up her fingers to show Lily what three looked like. Baa baa black sheep. Three bags full. She’d like a bouncy castle too, at her party, but castles were very big and cost lots of money so she didn’t think Mummy would really get one. But maybe she’d get her a bunny, if they had a garden by then.
Out in the street, there was a wailing, screeching sound, like she imagined the big bad wolf would sound if he was very angry and coming after the pigs. Mummy had left one of the little windows open right up at the top, and the wind was blowing in, making the bottom of the curtain move. I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down …
Lily remembered the story of the wolf and the pigs. One of the ladies at the nursery had read it to them, when they all sat in a circle before they went home, but Lily didn’t like it. She didn’t like the story, and she didn’t like the noise. She tried to cover her ears and pull the quilt up over her head all at the same time, making sure she hung on tightly to Archie to keep him safe, and to stop him from being scared.
The noise went away. She peeped cautiously over the top of the covers and, when she was sure there was no wolf, she settled Archie on the pillow beside her and sat up in bed. She’d only had a nap, not an all-night sleep, but her nappy felt heavy, and she was thirsty. She wanted some juice. Bena juice. That was her favourite, except maybe Coke, but she wasn’t allowed that very often. Only on special days. Lily didn’t think this was a special day.
Maybe Archie could have some juice too, as he’d been good. She yawned, and called out for Mummy, fiddling with a black thread that had come loose from Archie’s eye and was hanging down over his nose. Mummy would mend that, with something from her big red sewing tin that used to have biscuits in it, or with the glue that Lily wasn’t allowed to touch. Mummy was good at mending things. It saved buying new, she always said.
Lily waited but Mummy didn’t come, so she called again, louder this time.
Lily climbed out of bed, her foot springing onto the book she’d left open on the rug, flipping the pages over and making the spine snap shut. The baby in the flat upstairs was crying. It did that sometimes. Today it was doing it lots. It sounded sad, like Archie. Maybe it wanted some juice too. She walked over to the door, peered out into the empty hall, and called out again.
‘Mummy …’
But Mummy didn’t come. Nobody came.
