like the time when Mia was 2 and she needed seven stitches across her right temple. Katie and her mother had been at a ballet performance and, during the interval, when Katie was pirouetting in the drinks lounge, her mother’s name was called over the tannoy. At the front desk, the theatre manager said, ‘Grace Greene? Your husband is on the phone.’ Katie watched the colour drain from her mother’s face and her eyes grow frighteningly wide as she held the phone close to her ear.
After that she remembered the evening in frames, like the illustrations in a comic book. She recalled a taxi ride in the dark. A hospital desk she couldn’t see over, even on tiptoe. Her sister lying in a bed with polished metal sides. Her mother’s pale hands clasped around her bag as she spoke to their father.
He said that Mia had tripped on the landing and fallen down the stairs, but over time other clues surfaced that suggested something entirely different. A nurse mentioned a motorbike; a neighbour had said her father’s name and used the word ‘irresponsible’.
They returned from the hospital the following day to find that their father and his belongings were gone. It wasn’t the only change. As time went on their mother seemed listless and vacant and, when she took her evening bath, Katie would hear her crying above the gush of the water.
Even as a child she could see the link between Mia’s accident and their father’s leaving. She remembered standing in the doorway of their mother’s bedroom, watching as Grace dabbed concealer on the dark circles beneath her eyes, and asking, ‘Did Daddy leave because of Mia?’ Her mother had dropped the gold make-up pot, taken three paces across the carpet, grabbed the top of Katie’s arm with one hand and slapped the back of her thighs with the other. Three months later, their belongings were in boxes and they took a coach to Cornwall.
Now, turning the pages of the journal, she had an uncomfortable feeling that this meeting with Mick would somehow be entangled with the rest of Mia’s trip. Stretched on her bunk she read swiftly but closely. She didn’t notice two other travellers coming in and out of the room, or hear the tropical rain begin to beat against the window. She simply continued to read, utterly absorbed in the pages of the journal as Mia recounted what happened the evening she arrived at their father’s house.
8
MIA
Maui, October Last Year
M ia waited on the doorstep. Even at dusk the air still held its warmth and she could feel a thin slick of sweat under the waistband of her shorts. She hooked a finger into the back of them and waggled it a little, encouraging air to reach her skin. Sweat prickled underarm and beads of moisture formed between her breasts as she waited.
She listened, barely breathing, for the sound of footsteps and eventually heard them, fast strides to reach the door. She took a step back, folding her arms and then refolding them less tightly.
Mick was exactly her height. He wore a loose white shirt with black shorts, to which a mobile was clipped. His face was rounder than she’d recalled from his photo, a definite fullness about the jowls, and his hair was steel grey, thinning at the sides, but cut short. He had Katie’s eyes, she could see: hazel with pale lashes.
They studied one another closely. Mia wondered what he made of the young, silent woman on his doorstep. Should she have dressed so casually in shorts and flip-flops, when perhaps a dress and sandals might have been more appropriate, more like something her mother or Katie would have worn?
Then, Mick chose his first word. It had the force of a slap: ‘Yes?’
He didn’t know who she was.
Her gaze fell away from his and came to rest on the doormat between them where a fly, caught in the weave, struggled to turn itself upright. When Mia had imagined this meeting – and she had imagined it many, many times – she had pictured an embrace of sorts, Mick instinctively reaching for
After that she remembered the evening in frames, like the illustrations in a comic book. She recalled a taxi ride in the dark. A hospital desk she couldn’t see over, even on tiptoe. Her sister lying in a bed with polished metal sides. Her mother’s pale hands clasped around her bag as she spoke to their father.
He said that Mia had tripped on the landing and fallen down the stairs, but over time other clues surfaced that suggested something entirely different. A nurse mentioned a motorbike; a neighbour had said her father’s name and used the word ‘irresponsible’.
They returned from the hospital the following day to find that their father and his belongings were gone. It wasn’t the only change. As time went on their mother seemed listless and vacant and, when she took her evening bath, Katie would hear her crying above the gush of the water.
Even as a child she could see the link between Mia’s accident and their father’s leaving. She remembered standing in the doorway of their mother’s bedroom, watching as Grace dabbed concealer on the dark circles beneath her eyes, and asking, ‘Did Daddy leave because of Mia?’ Her mother had dropped the gold make-up pot, taken three paces across the carpet, grabbed the top of Katie’s arm with one hand and slapped the back of her thighs with the other. Three months later, their belongings were in boxes and they took a coach to Cornwall.
Now, turning the pages of the journal, she had an uncomfortable feeling that this meeting with Mick would somehow be entangled with the rest of Mia’s trip. Stretched on her bunk she read swiftly but closely. She didn’t notice two other travellers coming in and out of the room, or hear the tropical rain begin to beat against the window. She simply continued to read, utterly absorbed in the pages of the journal as Mia recounted what happened the evening she arrived at their father’s house.
8
MIA
Maui, October Last Year
M ia waited on the doorstep. Even at dusk the air still held its warmth and she could feel a thin slick of sweat under the waistband of her shorts. She hooked a finger into the back of them and waggled it a little, encouraging air to reach her skin. Sweat prickled underarm and beads of moisture formed between her breasts as she waited.
She listened, barely breathing, for the sound of footsteps and eventually heard them, fast strides to reach the door. She took a step back, folding her arms and then refolding them less tightly.
Mick was exactly her height. He wore a loose white shirt with black shorts, to which a mobile was clipped. His face was rounder than she’d recalled from his photo, a definite fullness about the jowls, and his hair was steel grey, thinning at the sides, but cut short. He had Katie’s eyes, she could see: hazel with pale lashes.
They studied one another closely. Mia wondered what he made of the young, silent woman on his doorstep. Should she have dressed so casually in shorts and flip-flops, when perhaps a dress and sandals might have been more appropriate, more like something her mother or Katie would have worn?
Then, Mick chose his first word. It had the force of a slap: ‘Yes?’
He didn’t know who she was.
Her gaze fell away from his and came to rest on the doormat between them where a fly, caught in the weave, struggled to turn itself upright. When Mia had imagined this meeting – and she had imagined it many, many times – she had pictured an embrace of sorts, Mick instinctively reaching for
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