‘I don’t know, I fell asleep. She told me she’d stay until it got light. When I woke up and it was dark and she was gone, that’s when I realized. I should have got it earlier –’ a sob escaped – ‘but I didn’t . . .’
Dad put his hand on my shoulder again, this time gently. ‘Calm. Down. OK? Calm down.’ I bit down on my lip, trying to steady myself. ‘What is the fastest way for us to get in contact with Sarah? If I call your mother, will she have a number?’
‘Yes.’ But what if she protested? What if she was as dismissive as he had been? ‘Call Rosie’s mum.’ The answer came to me in a rush of relief. All those times calling Rosie’s landline; aside from my own, it was the only number I knew by heart. ‘She’ll have it.’
I recited the number twice as he scribbled it down on to his notepad, checking it three times to make sure it was right.
‘You’ll call Shell right now?’ I pressed. ‘And then Sarah? Straight away?’
‘I will call them both,’ he promised. ‘But you have to go back to your room and go to bed. Right now. Claudia, will you take her back upstairs?’
The nurse moved around the wheelchair, giving my shoulder a reassuring squeeze.
‘I’ll come and see you in the morning,’ Dad said. ‘Let you know everything’s fine, OK?’
‘She’s tried before.’ I blurted this out as Claudia reached for the handles of the wheelchair. She paused, her eyes swivelling towards my dad.
This time they all exchanged glances. I noticed Dad’s fingers tense over the notepad. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, but by now even he seemed worried. He looked at Claudia again. ‘Thanks, Claudia.’
It was 3.27 a.m. when I made it back to my hospital room, and it was Claudia who spotted the note. Next to the empty box of Jaffa Cakes, written on the back of a leaflet about juvenile diabetes.
I’m sorry for everything.
Buonanotte.
Love, Suze xx
This is the image I have:
Around the time I was hobbling across the hospital tiles, Suzanne sat herself down on Brighton beach. She swallowed the pills in groups, three handfuls in total, pausing between each to force down the vodka. When she’d finished she took the empty bottle and half buried it in the stones, so it wouldn’t get smashed or blow away. She slid her earphones carefully into her ears and scrolled through her iPod albums until she found Abbey Road. She listened with her eyes closed, and she didn’t even cry.
And then, during the second chorus of ‘Octopus’s Garden’, she fell asleep.
After
I hadn’t expected to sleep at all after Claudia left the room, but the drugs in my system, the pain and the panic caught up with me and pulled me under. I woke up more than once, drowsy and disorientated, convinced I could hear voices, before sinking back into sleep.
I dreamed snapshots of confusion and colour: sunflowers that towered over me, blocking out the sun, bending on impossibly long stalks; dancing kites with yellow tails, the string biting into my hands; Suzanne on the other side of the road, standing with her back to me at the seafront railings, blonde hair tousled in the wind; Tarin surrounded by origami birds, painting the bedroom walls green; pebbles on Brighton beach rolling under my feet like a waterfall cascade, carrying me away; Rosie, her face close to mine, saying, ‘Caddy? Caddy?’
And then the unmistakable reality of a hand on my shoulder. I opened my eyes; the world lurched and righted.
‘Caddy.’ My father’s voice, unusually soft. Not a question, not a request, not a reprimand. Just my name.
When I spoke, my voice came out cracked and husky, like I’d been crying in my sleep. ‘Did you find her?’
‘Yes.’ He looked tired. His hair was dishevelled, like he’d been running his fingers through it. ‘We found her.’
The terror that seized me was absolute. I felt instantly cold, my throat closed up. I tried to speak, but he got there first.
‘We found her in time,’ he said, inclining his head and meeting my gaze with a steadiness that made me let out my breath, my heart rate calming. ‘It’s OK. We found her in time.’
Relief is a flat word for an emotion that feels so boundless. I felt at once full and emptied by it. I cried, of course, but once the tears were done I wasn’t sure quite what to do with myself apart from grill my parents for details, which I did, at length. They were unusually patient with me, answering all my questions until I had the fullest picture I could of what had happened.
As promised, Dad had called Rosie’s mother and then Sarah, who’d called the police. Once she’d finished talking to them, her phone rang again. This time it was Rosie’s mother on the end of the line, relaying possibly the six most important words Rosie had ever said: ‘Tell them to try the beach.’