can. I’ll be there tomorrow.’
Lasagne forgotten, I went to my bedroom, intending to get my passport out of the small safe I kept in my wardrobe but, instead, from my bottom drawer, I pulled out a faded blue manila folder. Tucked inside it was a pile of tourist leaflets I’d gathered over the past few months: seaplane rides, retro desert safaris; deep-sea fishing cruises, amphibious tours of old Dubai, camel polo lessons; menus from a clutch of top restaurants.
It was my ‘Dad’ folder; my plan of things to do when my father finally made it to Dubai. A year ago it would have been inconceivable to think that my father would fly to Dubai to see me: he’d always been ‘too busy’ when Mum came to visit. Six years, and not one visit from him—it was something I tried not to think about. If I did, it made me angry: father by name, but not by nature. Since I was eight, he’d not only been physically absent most of the time, but emotionally unavailable too. But then, last summer, for the first time in twenty years, he’d started to show an interest in my life.
‘So what’s it like over there?’ he’d asked. He’d brought us each a cup of tea and sat down with me in the garden. ‘How hot does it get? What do you do at the weekends?’ Then, tellingly, ‘What’s the museum like?’ Dad was an historian. If he was asking about museums, it meant he was thinking about visiting. And, after so many years of feeling like a spare—and not particularly wanted—part in my father’s life, the idea had come as a surprise to me—a welcome one at that: I’d lain in bed that night smiling in the dark. With Dad’s attention on me for the first time since I was little, I’d felt myself unfurling like a snowdrop in the first rays of spring sunshine. It had been a time of promise, of new beginnings. It had been a chance for us to put things right. Looking at the folder now, I raked my hands through my hair. I should have seized that chance then; insisted that Dad come to Dubai; told him straight out that I’d like him to come.
And now it would never happen.
I picked up one of the leaflets and traced the outline of a camel with my finger. Dad would have enjoyed riding across the sand dunes like Lawrence of Arabia, especially if there was a sundowner at the end of it. He’d have looked great in a kandora and ghutra, a falcon perched on his arm. Abruptly, I hurled the folder across the room, leaflets spinning from it as it frisbeed over my bed. Jumping up, I kicked out at the leaflets on the floor, sending them skidding across the laminate and under the bed.
‘Why?’ I shouted at the room. ‘Why now?’
Getting everything done in time to catch the 8 a.m. flight was a struggle. Booking a last-minute flight with the airline’s remote call centre had taken more energy than I’d felt I had to expend; a never-ending round of ‘can I put you on hold?’ while a sympathetic agent had tried to magic up a seat on the fully booked flight. Tracking down my boss on the golf course was even more difficult.
‘How long will you be away?’ he barked when his caddy finally handed him his phone at the eleventh hole. ‘Will you be back to close the issue?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. I had no idea how long it took to organise a funeral. ‘Emily’ll cope perfectly well. I’ll leave notes; she knows what to do.’
‘Well … she’s perfectly capable, I’m sure,’ my boss said. ‘Make sure you show her what to do.’ But then he surprised me. ‘Take as long as you need … and, um … all the best.’ It didn’t come naturally to him to be nice and I could practically hear his toenails curling with the effort, but I didn’t care—with my leave approved, I sat down to write my handover notes for Emily.
My phone lay silent on the table next to me. It’d been six weeks but I still hadn’t got used to it not buzzing with constant messages from James. I’d been the one to cut him out of my life but I would have given anything to be able to hear his voice again—the voice of the old James, at least. Our lives had been spliced together for so long that my heart hadn’t yet caught up with my head. I felt like he should know about Dad, but would he even care? I rubbed my temples, then picked up the phone and dialled. He picked up on the fourth ring. One more and I’d have hung up.
‘Hello James? It’s Evie.’
I heard the sounds of a bar in the background: music, laughter.
‘Evie.’ He was surprised, confused to hear from me. ‘What’s up?’
‘Um. I just wanted to let you know that, um, my dad died last night. I’m flying to England tomorrow. For the funeral.’
James’s voice, off the phone, ‘Ssh! I’m on the phone, keep it down. Wow, sorry to hear that, Evie.’
‘Well, I just thought you might like to know. Y’know.’
‘Yes, well, thanks for telling me …’ A shout went up in the background. He was in a sports bar; a team had scored.
‘OK then, bye.’
‘Cheers.’
I shouldn’t have called. The ‘cheers’ grated more than anything. That was what James said to people he didn’t care about. I’d always felt a little sorry for them and now I was one of them. I sighed. The truth was that James really didn’t care about me; he probably never had. The only person James cared about was himself. I poured myself a large glass of wine and turned my attention to packing.
‘Tell me about Graham,’ Miss Dawson said. ‘Were you very close? Did you see much of him at school?’
Rain slid down the windowpanes; the playing field outside looked sodden. I took a biscuit and thought about Miss Dawson’s question. Did I see much of Graham at school? Not really. He was two years above me and our social circles didn’t overlap much. Sometimes he liked to pretend he didn’t even know me. But I remembered one day when I’d been practising handstands up against the wall. The tarmac of the school playground had been gritty with tiny stones—it was the type of grit that, when you fell, dug holes in your knees, making the blood ooze out in mini fountains. After half an hour of non-stop handstands, I’d been looking at the speckles on my palms wondering if I could do any more when I realised the bullies had surrounded me, a circle of hard seven-year-olds.
‘Do a cartwheel!’ they’d shouted, their arms linked, their faces twisted. They knew I couldn’t; they knew I was still trying.
I’d looked at the floor, willing them to find someone else to pick on. My hands stung but, if I did a perfect handstand, would they go away?
The ringleader had started up the chant, the sing-song tone of her voice not quite hiding the menace that oozed like oil from her pores: ‘Evie can’t do a cartwheel!’ The others took up the refrain as they edged towards me, the circle closing in on its prey. ‘Evie can’t do a cartwheel!’
The lead bully had stepped forward. ‘Watch this,’ she’d said, turning her body over foot to hand to hand to foot, so slowly it looked effortless. ‘Let me help you.’ She came closer and I knew, I could tell by the way she approached, that, far from helping me, she was going to shove me onto my knees in the grit, kicking me and rubbing me in it until my socks stained red with blood. It wouldn’t have been the first time.
But then a miracle.
‘Leave her alone!’ a boy
