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61 " and charismatic stranger who sweeps "
― Lisa Jewell , Then She Was Gone
62 " Laurel knew simultaneously that she was overreacting and also that she was not overreacting. When you are the parent of a child who walked out of the house one morning with a rucksack full of books to study at a library a fifteen-minute walk away and then never came home again, then there is no such thing as overreacting. The fact that she was standing in her adult daughter’s kitchen picturing her dead in a ditch because she hadn’t left a cereal bowl in the sink was perfectly sane and reasonable in the context of her own experience. "
63 " strikes of lightning. She saw her mother, stirring a teabag in a mug. She saw her father, "
64 " nowhere else to go. She went to her handbag and "
65 " She hasn’t seen Hanna smile for so long she’d forgotten what it looked like. "
66 " In fact, it was her who told me to call you. On Sunday. She can barely talk, it takes her an age to form a sentence; usually all she wants to talk about is dying. But she told me to call you. She said it was fantastic that I'd met you. She literally put my phone in my hand. It's the most" -she glances down at her lap- "the most maternal thing she's done in a decade. The most human thing she's done in months. It moved me. "
67 " Mathilde. She was French. Quite pretty. We kissed "
68 " Eritrean "
69 " She’s very bright. Really very bright. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was Mensa level. "
70 " All of those messy Christmases, each a perfect gem, all gone, all turned to ash. "
71 " bin that everyone seemed intent on not emptying, contents pressed down into its bowels by the lazy, flat-palmed hands of her family. "
72 " I am brave, and I am brilliant, and I am strong.. "
73 " And she felt it then, like a needle in her heart, the love her mother always talked about. ‘You won’t understand how much I love you until you’re a mother yourself. "
74 " But she felt it now and all the pain in her heart was for her mother, her mother who she knew would be crying and worrying and feeling the meaning of her life slipping away from her. She couldn’t bear it. She truly couldn’t bear "
75 " Cooking doesn’t just nurture the recipient; it nurtures the chef. "
76 " The blame game could be exhausting sometimes. The blame game could make you lose your mind… all the infinitesimal outcomes, each path breaking up into a million other paths every time you heedlessly chose one, taking you on a journey that you’d never find your way back from. "
77 " I'm not going to tell you in ten years you'll look back and wonder what the hell you were thinking, because I remember being 21 and thinking my personality was a solid thing, that 'me' was set in stone, that I would always feel what I felt and believe what I believed. But now I know 'me' is fluid and shape-changing. So whatever you're feeling now, it's temporary. "
78 " But she is remembering now. Cooking doesn’t just nurture the recipient; it nurtures the chef. "
79 " Now that even the cat was gone, though he’d made a big effort to stay alive for her and lasted until he was almost twenty-one. "
80 " To anyone who finds this note [it begins], my name is Ellie Mack. I am seventeen. Noelle Donnelly brought me to her house on 26 May 2005 and has kept me captive in her basement for about a year and a half. I have had a baby. I don’t know who the father is and I’m pretty sure I’m still a virgin. Her name is Poppy. She was born in around April 2006. I don’t know where she is now or who is looking after her but please, please find her if you can. Please find her and look after her and tell her that I loved her. Tell her that I looked after her for as long as I could and that she was the best little baby in the world. Also please let my family know that you found this note. My mum is called Laurel Mack and my dad is called Paul and I have a brother called Jake and a sister called Hanna and I want you to tell them all that I’m sorry and I love them more than anything in the world and that none of them must feel bad about what happened to me because I am brave and I am brilliant and I am strong "