The Things That Matter

The Things That Matter

Andrea Michael

One More Chapter

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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2021

Copyright © Andrea Michael 2021

Cover design by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2021

Cover photographs © Adrian Muttitt / Arcangel Images (main image) and Shutterstock.com (flowers)

Andrea Michael asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record 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: 9780008370237

Ebook Edition © May 2021 ISBN: 9780008370220

Version: 2021-04-23

Content notice: miscarriage

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

Thank you for reading…

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About the Author

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About the Publisher

For my husband:

Above all else, adventures.

Damaged people love you like you are a crime scene before a crime has even been committed.

They keep their running shoes beside their souls every night, one eye open in case things change whilst they sleep.

— Nikita Gill

Prologue

2006

Aylesbury Prison and Young Offenders Institute

He looks different.

That’s all I can think as I see him walk out of the prison and into the fresh air. His dark brown hair is cut short, and he’s muscled, like he’s a troubled American teen from the movies, returning from military school.

He holds himself differently, taking up space. Squared shoulders, like he’s daring anyone to bump into him or look at him the wrong way.

The Dan I knew before was lithe, his sixteen-year-old body showing only the faintest muscle beneath pale skin. Now, even though it’s only been a few months, he looks… he looks like a man.

It’s happened so gradually, I shouldn’t be shocked. But it’s different seeing him out here in the world.

I’ve been visiting every week since he was sent here, bunking off lessons whenever I needed to. School have been pretty understanding about ‘everything that went on’ and if I’ve learnt anything from my mother, it’s that you’ve got to take advantage of that kindness when it comes along. People don’t give it often. It’s reserved for when something really bad happens.

The journey from Luton took me about an hour and a half each way; three buses and a walk either end. But I didn’t mind. All I wanted to do was see him. To smile so he’d know I was okay, to tell him funny stories and keep his mind off everything. To give him a countdown of the days until he was out and back to me again.

I put every last bit of energy I had into making him happy, or as happy as he could be in there. I counted his smiles on each visit, collecting them like it was a video game, a little ‘ding’ in my head when I made one appear.

Dan was trying hard for me too, I knew. He didn’t ask me about the foster home they’d tried to put me in after everything happened, because there was nothing he could do. When I told him Sharon next door had agreed to take me in, at least until I could finish my GCSEs, he breathed a sigh of relief and his smile was like sunshine.

Three months. It didn’t seem that much, not really. But for a nice boy from a nice family, who’d done nothing wrong, three months seemed like a lifetime. Especially when the nice family didn’t want to know Dan after everything happened – they couldn’t handle the embarrassment.

People like us don’t do things like that, Daniel. Your father’s business, his contacts, you know how people are. How they talk. We can’t risk it, you must understand. Be reasonable, Daniel.

I’d been there when his mother said it, when she explained why she wasn’t coming to court the day he was sentenced. How he didn’t hear anything from them, not his parents or his brother or sister. I didn’t ask about his family any more. We were each other’s family now, that was the promise we made.

He looks across the yard at me in the bright daylight and holds up a hand to shield his eyes from the sun. He looks… strong. Strong and capable and yet, somehow like a stranger. Fear clutches at me, just for a moment. Has he changed? Have our plans, a teenage romance and big dreams of escape and new starts, have they been foolish? Are we just stupid kids like everybody said?

‘How will you make money Natasha? Love doesn’t feed an empty belly, or pay the gas bill,’ Sharon said this morning when I packed my backpack with the few things I owned and hoisted it onto my shoulders. I knew I wouldn’t be taking the three buses back to Luton again.

‘I know how to survive, don’t worry about that.’

She hadn’t looked convinced. I wanted to tell her I’d been looking after myself for most of my life. That it had been years of rifling through coat pockets at school for change to buy dinner, or making a Mars bar last two days. I knew all about food banks and clothes exchanges and every single way there was of surviving. And I would teach Daniel. If he wanted to learn.

Daniel, who was used to living in a four bedroom detached home, and had never once considered that he wouldn’t have a hot meal and a pressed school uniform. Who had never gone to bed hungry and angry. At least, not before prison.

He never blamed me. Even as we stood in that court room and the judge declared he was guilty of manslaughter, even as his face lost all colour and his knees buckled. It took less than a second for Dan to compose himself, smile at me and hold me close as he told me it was worth it.

In that moment I had promised myself that I would do everything I could to make it up to him, to make it true. To be worth it.

Dan approaches me, suddenly within arm’s reach, and he smiles that same soft smile. That hasn’t disappeared. Neither have the butterflies in my stomach or that voice in my gut that says, ‘This one, this one is for you.’

We stand looking at each other awkwardly.

‘I can’t believe you’re finally here.’

‘Me neither. The outside world. First thing I want to do is eat a huge steak and chips. Or a burger. Oh, or Thai food!’ He grins at me, those beautiful blue eyes still warm and loving, unchanged. He’s still here, he’s still mine. ‘Actually, no, this is the first thing I want to do.’

He kisses me, and I know. I know I’ve been right all along. That every time I fell asleep on the bus home from the prison and missed my stop, or every time one of the other inmates had leered at me during visiting hours, or the number of times Dan’s mother had called me a ‘grubby little bitch who ruined everything’ whenever I pleaded with her to visit her son. It was worth it, it had all been worth it.

Dan takes the backpack from me, putting it over his shoulder, and taking my hand in his as we start walking in no particular direction. Just, away. Our fingers interlink the way they always did, his thumb tracing my palm. Even that simple gesture feels like home.

‘So, what now? Where do we go?’ He kisses my hand.

‘Anywhere we want,’ I say, desperate to be that little ray of sunshine, to make this moment everything he’s been dreaming about for the last three months. ‘Anywhere we want. We go and we build a life. Where do you want to go?’

‘Anywhere! Somewhere brilliant. Shall we flip a coin? Find a globe to spin?’

I want to tell him it won’t be easy. That we’ll have to work and struggle. That he’s never really had to think about it before. But that sounds negative. In many ways I’m so much older than him.

I need to give him the option. I stop walking.

‘There’s still time to back out, Dan. Go home, apologise? See if they’ve changed their minds?’

He tilts his head as if it’s a trick question. Those blue eyes meet mine and he shrugs.

‘I’ve had as much time as they have to think about this. If they don’t want me, then I don’t want them. Let’s… let’s go live good lives, Taz. Great lives! And one day they’ll come crawling back and I’ll tell them to do one. Because we’re each other’s family now, that’s the deal, right?’

‘Right.’

He’s still in there, the dreamer, the one who sees the good, who sees the light. The one who reaches for happiness above all else. They didn’t take that away.

We’re going to be okay.

Better than okay.

We’re going to be perfect.

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