Nine Perfect Strangers

Thank you for that first year of my marriage to Henry which, to be honest, God, was one of the happiest of my life.

Thank you for a career that has given me virtually nothing but pleasure and I’m sorry for all that fuss about the review. I’m sure that reviewer is one of God’s children too.

Thank you for my health, you’ve been quite generous in that regard, and it was rude of me to make such a fuss over a bad cold.

Thank you for friends who are more like family.

Thank you for my dad, even though you took him a little early.

Thank you for Bellinis and all champagne cocktails.

Sorry for complaining about a paper cut while others suffered atrocities. Although, to be frank, that’s why I gave up believing in you – that whole paper cuts for some versus atrocities for others thing.

Carmel cried into her wet towel and jumped at the sound of yet another crash.

Frances imagined the balcony of her room hanging at an angle and then smashing to the ground in a shower of embers.

She imagined billows of black smoke illuminated by fiery light against a summer night’s sky.

‘The smoke in here isn’t getting any worse,’ she said to Carmel, to be comforting. ‘Napoleon and Heather did a good job with the towels.’

She could still smell and taste smoke, but it was true, it wasn’t getting any worse.

‘We might be fine,’ said Frances tentatively.

‘We will be fine,’ said Napoleon. He sat between his wife and daughter, holding their hands. ‘It’s all going to be fine.’

He spoke with such assurance and Frances wished she hadn’t caught sight of his face as he readjusted the wet towel, because it was filled with despair.

It’s coming for us, she thought. It’s coming for us and there is nowhere to hide.

She remembered Masha saying, ‘I wonder, do you feel that you’ve ever been truly tested in your life?’

Jessica lifted her head from her knees and spoke in a muffled voice through her towel. ‘She never even heard all our presentations.’

It was cute the way she still wanted to see logic in Masha’s actions. She would have been the kid who couldn’t stand it when the teacher forgot to do the quiz that had been promised.

‘Do you think Yao is still alive?’ asked Zoe.

chapter seventy

Yao

Yao dreamed of Finn.

Finn was very keen that Yao wake up.

‘Wake up,’ he said insistently. He banged together a pair of cymbals. He blasted a horn in Yao’s ear. ‘Mate, you really need to wake up to yourself.’

Yao returned to consciousness while Finn receded. He felt the imprint of something soft and scratchy against his cheek. He lifted his head. There was a cushion on Masha’s desk. He remembered the feeling of the needle in his neck. The surprise of it, because that was not a decision he could respect.

He heard the sound of something burning. He smelled smoke.

He lifted his head, turned around and saw her, smoking a cigarette, looking out the window.

She turned to face him and smiled. She looked sad and emotional, but resigned, like his fiancée when she broke off their engagement.

Masha said, ‘Hello, Yao.’