The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

In which much is revealed, but not necessarily resolved, concerning ‘The Man Who Was No Hoax’

When I finally open my eyes, I can see my old clock lying on the bedside table. It’s odd being able to pick up your own heart. The cuckoo doesn’t work any more. And there’s dust on it. I feel like a ghost leaning against a gravestone and calmly smoking a cigarette, except for the fact that I’m alive. I’m wearing a strange pair of pyjamas and two tubes have been fitted into my veins – something else to drag around with me.

I inspect my new heart without clock hands. It doesn’t make any noise. How long have I been asleep? Getting up is hard. My bones ache. Méliès is nowhere to be found. But there’s a woman dressed in white sitting at his desk. His new belle, I guess. I wave at her. She looks startled, as if she’s just seen an apparition. Her hands tremble. I think I might have frightened somebody at last.

‘You’ve no idea how happy I am to see you back on your feet . . .’

‘Me too. Where’s Méliès?’

‘Sit down, I need to explain a few things.’

‘I feel like I’ve been lying down for a hundred and fifty years, so standing up for five minutes isn’t going to hurt me.’

‘Honestly, it’s better if you sit down . . . I’ve got something important to tell you. Something nobody ever wanted to explain before.’

‘Where’s Méliès?’

‘He went back to Paris a few months ago. You’ve been asleep for a long time. He asked me to look after you. He loved you very much, you know. He was fascinated by the effect your clock had on your imagination. When you had your accident, he blamed himself terribly for not telling you about your true nature, even if he couldn’t be certain whether doing so would have changed the course of events. But you need to know the truth, now.’

‘What accident?’

‘Don’t you remember?’ she says sadly. ‘In Marbella, you tried to wrench out the clock that was stitched on to your heart.’

‘Oh yes . . .’

‘Méliès tried to graft on a new heart, to cheer you up.’

‘Cheer me up? I was at death’s door!’

‘Yes, we all think we’re going to die when we’re separated from someone we love. But I’m talking about your heart in the mechanical sense of the word. Listen carefully, because I know you’ll find what I’m about to say hard to believe . . .’

She sits down by my side and takes hold of my right hand. I can feel her trembling.

‘You could have lived without either clock, old or new. They don’t interact directly with your physical heart. They aren’t real prosthetics, they’re just placebos which, medically speaking, don’t do anything.’

‘But that’s impossible. Why would Madeleine have made all that up?’

‘For psychological reasons, I expect. To protect you from her own demons, as many parents do, one way or another.’

‘Look, you don’t understand this kind of medicine, it’s as simple as that. At least now I realise why she always insisted I got my heart looked after by clockmakers and not doctors.’

‘I know it’s a shock to wake up to this. But if you plan to live a real life at all, then you’ve got to stop getting wound up – if you’ll forgive the pun – by all this nonsense.’

‘I don’t believe you for a single second.’

‘And that’s a perfectly normal reaction. You’ve believed in this cuckoo-clock heart story all your life.’

‘How do you know about my life?’

‘I’ve read about it . . . Méliès wrote your story down in this book.’

The Man Who Was No Hoax, it says on the cover. I leaf through it quickly: our epic journey across Europe; Granada; meeting up with Miss Acacia; Joe’s comeback . . .

‘Don’t read the end right away,’ she admonishes me.

‘Why not?’

‘First, you need to get used to the idea that your life isn’t linked to your clock. That’s the only way for you to change the ending of this book.’

‘I could never believe that, let alone accept it.’

‘You lost Miss Acacia because of your iron belief in your wooden heart.’

‘I don’t have to listen to this.’

‘You might have realised what was going on, if the story of your heart wasn’t anchored so deeply inside you . . . But you must believe me now. Right, now you can go ahead and read the third section of the book, if you like, even though it’ll be painful for you. One day, you’ll be able to put all this behind you.’

‘Why did Méliès never tell me?’

‘Méliès said you weren’t ready to hear it yet, psychologically speaking. He deemed it too dangerous to reveal the truth to you on the evening of the “accident”, given your state of shock by the time you’d made it back to the workshop. He blamed himself dreadfully for not having told you before . . . I think he got seduced by the idea of your cuckoo-clock heart. It doesn’t take much for him to believe in the impossible. It cheered him up to watch you becoming a grown man with such complete belief . . . until that tragic night.’

‘I don’t want those memories dredged up for the time being.’

‘I understand, but I do need to talk to you about what happened immediately afterwards . . . Would you like something to drink?’

‘Yes, please; but not alcohol, my head still hurts.’

While the nurse goes in search of something to help me recover from my emotional overload, I look at my battered old heart on the bedside table, then the new clock under my crumpled pyjamas. A metal dial, with clock hands protected by a pane of glass. A sort of bicycle bell sits on top of the number twelve. The clock feels scratchy, as if somebody else’s heart has been grafted on to me. I wonder what that strange woman in white is going to try and make me believe next.

‘While Méliès headed off into town that day, to find a clock that would temporarily calm you,’ she says, ‘you tried to wind up your broken clock. Do you remember that?’

‘Yes, vaguely.’

‘From what Méliès described to me, you were virtually unconscious and bleeding heavily.’

‘Yes, my head was spinning, I could feel myself being dragged down . . .’

‘You suffered internal bleeding. When Méliès realised this, he suddenly thought of his old friend, Jehanne d’Ancy, and came in great haste to find me. He might have forgotten my kisses all too quickly, but he always remembered my nursing talents. I was able to stem your haemorrhaging just in time, but you didn’t regain consciousness. He still wanted to carry out the operation he’d promised you. He said you’d wake up in a better psychological state if you had a new clock. Call it an act of superstition on his part. He was terrified of you dying.’

I listen to her tell my story; she could be giving me news about somebody I once dimly knew. It’s difficult to connect these wild imaginings with my own reality.

‘I was terribly in love with Méliès, even if it was unrequited. That was why I chose to take care of you at first, to stay in touch with him. Then I grew attached to your character as I read The Man Who Was No Hoax. I’ve been immersed in your story ever since, in every sense. I’ve watched over you from the day of your accident.’

I’m completely taken aback. My blood is pumping strange lighthouse signals into the right side of my brain. It could be true. It could be true.

‘According to Méliès, you destroyed your heart in front of Miss Acacia. You wanted to show her how much you were suffering, and at the same time how much you loved her. It was a rash and desperate act. But you were just a boy then – worse, a young man with childish dreams, who survived by muddling dreams and reality.’

‘I still was that childish teenager, until a few minutes ago . . .’

‘No, that stopped when you decided to let go of your old heart. And that’s precisely what Madeleine was frightened of: you growing up.’

The more I repeat the word ‘impossible’, the more ‘possible’ it sounds inside my head.

‘I’m only telling you what I’ve read about you in the book Méliès wrote. He gave it to me just before setting off for Paris.’

I open the book again. I read how, while I was sleeping, letters arrived for me from Edinburgh. That Méliès wrote to Dr Madeleine to explain everything that had happened. But the letter that came back was penned by Arthur. Then I read the news that, secretly, I had always been half dreading:

The morning that wee Jack left us, Luna, Anna and I returned to the top o’ the mountain to find the door to the house half-open and no one in sight. Madeleine’s workshop was destroyed, ye’d think a storm had just swept thro’ it. All o’ her boxes had been opened and even the cat had gone.

We set off in search o’ Madeleine, finally tracking her down to St Calford’s prison. During the few minutes we had wi’ her, she explained that the police had arrested her just after our departure, but that we shouldnae worry, it wasn’t the first time she’d been banged up, and everything would sort itself out in the end.

I’d like to be able to write that she was released, I’d like to be able to tell ye that she cooks with one hand while mending somebody with the other, and that, even though she misses wee Jack, she’s bearing up. But later that same day Madeleine left us. She set out on a journey from which she’ll never return. She left her body behind in prison and set her heart free.

I know this news will hit wee Jack hard. But, dear Méliès, I must ask you to let him know that even in the depths of sadness, he must never forget that he gave Madeleine the joy o’ being a real mother. That was her life’s dream. Ye ken what I mean?

We sent the news by Luna’s pigeon, but when the letter got lost our nerve failed us. Bloody bird! That wee Jack still believed Madeleine to be alive was too much for us to bear, but we weren’t yet strong enough to tell him the truth. And now Jack is also sleeping . . . Och, Méliès, I’ll try not to reread this letter, otherwise I might never have the courage to send it to you.

Anna, Luna and I wish wee Jack all the strength he needs to recover from his ordeals, and hope that he will one day understand Madeleine’s – and our – need to shield him from the wicked world.

Arthur

PS—Dinnae forget to sing ‘Oh when the Saints!’ to wee Jack.

Silence.

‘When is Méliès coming back?’

‘I don’t think he’ll ever come back. He’s the father of two children now, and he’s working hard on his idea of photography in motion.’

‘A father? How much time has passed to make Méliès a father? And for me to have lost my Madeleine-mother?’

‘To start with, he used to write to the two of us every week. Now, whole months can go by without me hearing any news; I think he fears I’ll have to announce . . . your death.’

‘What do you mean, whole months?’

‘It’s the fourth of August, 1892. You’ve been asleep for nearly three years. I know you won’t want to believe that. But just look at yourself in the mirror. Your long hair is a measure of how much time has gone by.’

‘I don’t want to look at anything just now. There’s too much to take in as it is.’

‘During the first three months, you used to open your eyes for a few seconds a day at most. Then one day you woke up and uttered the odd word about Dr Madeleine or Miss Acacia, before returning to your state.’

The mere mention of their names stirs up feelings that are contradictory, but stronger than ever.

‘Since the beginning of the year, your periods of wakefulness have become longer and more regular. Right up until today. People do wake up from long comas like yours. After all, it’s just a very long night of sleep. What an unexpected joy to see you standing on your feet at last. Méliès will be beside himself . . . But be warned, you might experience a few after-effects.’

‘Meaning?’

‘No one comes back from such a long journey unscathed; as it is, it’s remarkable you can remember who you are.’

I catch my reflection in the glazed workshop door. Three years. And Dr Madeleine no longer of this world. Three years. I’m one of the living dead. What have you done with these three years, Miss Acacia?

‘Am I really alive, is this a dream, a nightmare, or am I dead?’

‘You’re very much alive; different, but alive.’

Once I’ve got rid of those horrible tubes pinching the hairs on my arms, I try to gather my wits and emotions as I eat my first proper meal.

Miss Acacia has taken over my thoughts. So I can’t be doing too badly. I’m as obsessed by her as I was on my tenth birthday. I’ve got to find her. I can’t be sure about anything any more, except the one thing that matters: I still love her. Just thinking about her being apart from me stokes my fiery nausea. Nothing makes any sense if I don’t try to find her.

It’s not even a choice. I have to go back to the Extraordinarium.

‘You can’t go there like that!’

But I set off in the direction of town without finishing my meal. I’ve never run so slowly. The fresh air in my lungs feels like gusts of steel. I could be a hundred years old.

On the outskirts of Granada, great cauldrons of ochre dust are whipped up so that the whitewashed houses seem to blur into the sky. I see my own shadow in a small street but I don’t recognise it; nor do I recognise the new reflection that bounces off a window pane. With my shaggy locks and beard, I look like Father Christmas before he got a big belly and white hair. But that’s not all. My aching bones have changed the way I walk. My shoulders seem to have expanded, and these shoes hurt my feet, as if they’re too small for me now. Children hide under their mothers’ skirts when they see me.

At a bend in the street, I happen upon a poster starring Miss Acacia. I stare at it for a long time, trembling with melancholic desire. Her gaze has grown more self-assured, although she still doesn’t wear glasses. Her nails are longer, and she paints them now. Miss Acacia is more ravishing than ever, while I’ve turned into a caveman in pyjamas.

When I get to the Extraordinarium I head straight for the Ghost Train. My favourite memories rush up at me, finding their place again inside my head. Unhappy memories don’t waste any time in joining them.

I’m taking a seat in one of the carriages when, all of a sudden, I notice Joe. He’s sitting on the landing, smoking a cigarette. The ride appears to have been extended. Suddenly . . . I can see Miss Acacia, sitting a few rows behind me. Be quiet, my heart. She doesn’t recognise me. Be quiet, my heart. Nobody recognises me. Quite frankly, I’m having a hard time recognising myself. Joe tries to frighten me the way he does the other passengers. He won’t succeed. That said, when I see him kiss Miss Acacia at the exit to the Ghost Train, I know his talents for trampling on other people’s dreams are alive and kicking. But I won’t be discouraged, not this time. Because now I’m the one who’s the Outsider.

Miss Acacia takes a puff of Joe’s cigarette. The intimacy this implies makes me feel as sick as seeing them kiss. They’re only a few metres away. I hold my breath.

He kisses her again; the way you might roll up your sleeves and do the washing-up. How can you kiss a girl like that without thinking about it? I don’t say anything. Give her back to me! You’ll see how much heart I’ll put into it, whatever that heart might be made of. I’m all shaken up, and it takes every bit of strength I’ve got to hold my emotions in check.

Her sparkling voice, like strawberry-flavoured tear gas, stings my eyes. Will she ever recognise me?

Am I strong enough to tell her the truth this time, and if it goes wrong, am I strong enough to hide it from her?

Joe goes back inside the Ghost Train. Miss Acacia walks past me. The wreaths of her perfume are as familiar as an old bedcover full of dreams. I could almost forget she’s the lover of my bitter enemy.

‘Hello,’ she says, noticing me. My shoulders sink under the dead weight of her non-recognition. I notice a bruise on her left knee.

I dive straight in, without really knowing what I’m doing.

‘Still not wearing your glasses, then?’

‘No, but I don’t like people teasing me about it,’ she says with a relieved smile.

‘I know . . .’

‘What do you mean, you know?’

I know we fought because of Joe and jealousy, I know I threw my heart away because I loved you crookedly, but I want to learn everything afresh because I love you more than all the world. There you go, that’s what I should have said. The words flit across my mind and head for my mouth, but they don’t come out. I just cough instead.

‘Why are you wearing your pyjamas outside? You haven’t run away from hospital, have you?’

She talks to me gently, as if I were an old man.

‘I didn’t run away . . . I’ve come back from a very serious illness . . .’

‘Well, Señor, you’re going to need some clothes now!’

We smile at each other, the way we used to. For a moment, I think she’s worked out who I am, or at least that’s what I secretly wish for. ‘See you soon’, we say, and I head back to Méliès’ workshop with a sort of twisted hope.

‘Don’t put off revealing your true identity,’ the nurse insists.

‘I need a bit longer, the time to get used to her again.’

‘Well, don’t take too long about it . . . You’ve already lost her once by hiding your past. Otherwise she’ll bury her head in your chest, only to discover there’s another clock in place of the old one. Speaking of which, why don’t I get rid of it once and for all?’

‘Look, we will get rid of it, but I need more time. It was Dr Madeleine’s masterpiece, after all. Let’s just wait until I’m feeling a bit better, all right?’

‘You’re feeling better already . . . How about I cut your hair and shave off that prehistoric beard of yours?’

‘No, not yet. By the way, you don’t happen to have one of Méliès’ old suits still hanging around?’

Every now and then, I position myself in a key spot, not far from the Ghost Train. That way, we can run into each other, as if by chance. The rapport we strike up resembles what we used to have so closely that I don’t know if I’m laughing or crying. Sometimes, during our silences, I tell myself that she knows but isn’t saying anything. Except that’s not her style.

I’m careful not to harass Miss Acacia. I’ve learned my lesson from my first accident in love. Instinctively, I still want to push things, but the pain slows me down; or at any rate stops me being in such a rush.

I’m starting to manipulate the truth again. But I’m enjoying nibbling the crumbs of her presence from the safety of my new identity, and the thought of ending all this makes my stomach lurch.

This game has been going on for more than two months and Joe doesn’t seem to have noticed anything. Méliès’ shoes are starting to hurt my feet now. As for his suit, I look like I’m going fishing disguised as a magician. Jehanne, my nurse, thinks this metamorphosis is a result of my long coma. My bones are trying to make up for lost time after being compacted like springs for three years. As a result, I’ve got curvature of the spine which affects my whole body. Even my face is changing. My jaw is more thickset, and my cheekbones more prominent.

‘Here comes Mr Neander-Cute dressed up in his brand new suit,’ Miss Acacia calls out when she sees me coming. ‘All you need is a trip to the hairdresser’s and we’ll have you back to being a fully civilised man,’ she tells me today.

‘If you call me Mr Neander-Cute, I’ll never shave my beard off again.’

It came out just like that, dragando piano, as Méliès might whisper.

‘You could shave it off, and I’d still call you Mr Neander-Cute, if you’d like . . .’

So we’re back to these deliciously confused emotions. I can’t savour them fully but it’s already a lot better than being apart from her.

‘You remind me of an old lover I once had.’

‘More of the “old” or the “lover”?’

‘Both.’

‘Did he have a beard?’

‘No, but he was a mysterious figure like you. He believed in his lies, or rather his dreams. I thought it was just to impress me, but he really did believe in them.’

‘Perhaps he believed in them and wanted to impress you at the same time.’

‘Perhaps . . . I don’t know. He died a few years back.’

‘Died?’

‘Yes, I laid flowers on his grave again this morning.’

‘And what if he only died to impress you, to get you to believe in him?’

‘Oh, he’d have been perfectly capable of something like that, but he wouldn’t have waited three years to come back.’

‘What did he die of?’

‘That’s a mystery. Some people saw him struggling with a horse, others say that he died in a fire which he accidentally started. As for me, I’m afraid he died in a fit of anger after our final argument. It was a terrible row. All I know for sure is that he’s dead, because they buried him. And anyway if he was alive, he’d be here. With me.’

A ghost hiding behind his beard, that’s what I’ve become.

‘Did he love you too much?’

‘You can never love someone too much.’

‘Did he love you badly?’

‘I don’t know . . . But let me tell you this: encouraging me to talk about my first love, who died three years ago, isn’t the best way of flirting with me.’

‘What is the best way of flirting with you, then?’

‘Not to flirt with me.’

‘I knew it. That’s exactly why I haven’t been flirting with you!’

She smiled.

I nearly, so nearly, told her everything. With my old heart, it would have popped out all by itself . . . but now, everything’s different.

I went back to the workshop just as a vampire reclaims his coffin – ashamed of having bitten a magnificent neck.

You’ll never be the same again, Méliès told me before the operation. Regrets and remorse press against a stormy gulf. Only a few months have gone by and I’m already fed up with my life in its muted version. I’ve finished convalescing now, and want to return to the heat of the fire without this mask of a beard and bushy hair. I don’t mind growing up a bit, and I’ve got to turn this false reunion around.

Tonight, when I go to bed, I’m eager to rummage among the memories and dreams that lie in passion’s dustbin. I want to see what’s left of my old heart, the one that let me fall in love last time.

My new clock hardly makes any noise, but I’m no less of an insomniac. The old one is tidied away on a shelf, in a cardboard box. Perhaps if I repaired it, everything would be just as it was before. No Joe, no knife between the clock hands. To travel back in time to that period when I loved guilelessly, when I forged my way, head down, without worrying about bumping into my dreams. Bring back those days when I wasn’t afraid of anything; when I could climb on board love’s rose-tinted rocket without fastening my safety belt. I’m older, today, and more sensible too; but as a result, I no longer dare leap towards the woman who’ll always make me feel like I’m ten years old. My old heart will continue to make me dream more than the new one, even though it’s battered and outside my body now. It’s the ‘real thing’; it’s mine. And like a fool, I went and smashed it. What have I become? My own impostor? A see-through shadow?

I grab the cardboard box and carefully take out the clock, putting it down on my bed. Curls of dust rise up. I slide my fingers inside my former gears. Pain, or the memory of that pain, is instantly revived; followed by a surprisingly comforting feeling.

After a few seconds, the clock goes clickety-clack, like a skeleton learning to walk again, then it stops. My rapture transports me from the top of Arthur’s Seat into the tender arms of Miss Acacia. I tie the clock hands back in position with two pieces of string; it’s not a very sturdy arrangement.

I spend the night trying to repair my old wooden heart; but being the pathetic tinkerer I am, I don’t have any luck. If only Madeleine were here, to flash that twitch of a smile before expertly manipulating my clock gears. Or Méliès, with all his sound advice. But by dawn, I’ve made up my own mind. I’m going to find Miss Acacia to tell her the whole truth. I’ve put my old clock back in the box. It’s a present for someone who has become a great singer. I won’t just give her the key this time, I’ll give her the whole heart too, in the hope that she might once again decide to tinker at love with me.

I walk down the main avenue in the Extraordinarium, like someone condemned to die. I cross paths with Joe, and our eyes meet as if we’re fighting a duel in a western, in slow motion.

But I’m not afraid any more. For the first time in my life, I imagine what it must be like to be in his shoes. Today I’m in a position to win back Miss Acacia, just as he was when he took on the job at the Ghost Train. I think about how much he must have hated me at school when I couldn’t stop talking about her, not realising that he was in agony because she’d gone away and never come back. This great tall fellow and I almost have something in common. I watch him stride off until he disappears out of sight.

Up on the Ghost Train walkway, Brigitte Heim appears. When I catch sight of her hairstyle, identical to the bristles on a broom, I turn back. She’s like a sallow witch who reeks of loneliness; and as unhappy as those piles of old stones she collects. I could have tried talking calmly to her, now that she no longer recognises me. But just the idea of her spitting spiteful remarks makes me feel tired.

Miss Acacia, or the gift of ensuring things never work out quite as they were planned . . .

‘I’ve got something to tell you.’

‘Me too.’

‘I don’t think it’s a good idea for us to carry on . . . Oh, you’ve got a present for me? What’s inside the box?’

‘A heart in a thousand pieces. Mine . . .’

‘You’re pretty single-minded, for somebody who’s not meant to be flirting with me.’

‘Forget about the impostor you saw yesterday. I want to tell you the whole truth now.’

‘The truth is you never stop trying to flirt, with your unkempt appearance and that suit you wear. And I’ll admit it works for me . . . a tiny bit.’

I grab her cheeks between my fingers. They’ve lost none of their glow. I place my lips on hers without saying a word. The softness of her lips makes me momentarily forget my best intentions. I wonder if I didn’t just hear a clickety-clack from inside the box. The kiss leaves me with an aftertaste of red peppers. A second kiss takes over from the first. We press harder this time, plugging back into electric memories, reconnecting with treasures buried deep beneath the skin. Robber! Impostor! hisses the right side of my brain. Wait! Let’s talk about it later, my body answers. My heart is being tugged in opposite directions; it beats wildly with all its might. I’m intoxicated by the pure and simple joy of rediscovering her, despite the nasty feeling that I’m also cuckolding myself. This kind of simultaneous happiness and suffering is too much. I’m used to rain after fine weather. But right now, flashes of lightning are streaking across the bluest sky in the world.

‘I asked to speak first . . .’ she tells me sadly, extricating herself from my embrace. ‘I don’t want to carry on seeing you. I know we’ve been circling around each other for months now, but I’m in love with someone else, and have been for a long time. It would be crazy to start a new relationship, I’m really sorry. But I’m still in love . . .’

‘With Joe, I know.’

‘No, with Jack, the old lover I told you about, the one you remind me of sometimes.’

A big bang of sensations wreaks havoc with my emotional connections. Tears come without warning, hot and long, impossible to hold back.

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t want to hurt you, but I’ve already married someone I’m not in love with. I can’t start all over again,’ she says, putting her slim arms around me.

My eyelashes must be spitting rainbows.

‘I can’t accept a present from you. I’m really sorry. Don’t make things any more complicated than they already are.’

I take my courage in both hands as I grab hold of the parcel containing my clockwork heart. ‘Open it anyway, it’s a present intended for you alone. If you don’t take it, nobody else can use it.’

She accepts, visibly embarrassed. Her carefully painted pretty little fingers tear off the paper. She feigns a smile. It’s a precious moment. Giving your heart wrapped up in a box to the woman of your life is no small undertaking.

She shakes the box, going through the motions of guessing its contents.

‘Is it fragile?’

‘Yes, it’s fragile.’

Her discomfort is palpable. Gently, she lifts the lid. Her hands dive to the bottom of the box and grab hold of my old clockwork heart. The top of the dial appears in the daylight, then the centre of the clock and its clock hands that have been stuck together again.

She looks at it. Not a word. She rummages nervously in her handbag, gets out a pair of glasses, which she clumsily perches on her tiny nose. Her eyes scrutinise every detail. She makes the clock hands turn clockwise and then anti-clockwise. Her spectacles mist up on the outside. She shakes her head slowly. Her lenses mist up on the inside too. Her hands are trembling; they’re attached to the inside of my chest. My body registers their seismic movements and reproduces them even though, technically speaking, she’s not touching me. My clocks ring out inside me, shaken by the trembling that grows stronger all the time.

Miss Acacia gently puts my heart down on the low wall that we snuggled up against so many times. Finally, she raises her head in my direction.

Her lips part and whisper:

‘Every day, I went there every single day. I’ve been laying flowers on your bloody grave for three years. From the day you were buried until this morning. I was there again only just now. But that was the last time . . . Because from now on, as far as I’m concerned, you no longer exist . . .’

She turns on her heel for good and steps slowly over the wall. My clockwork heart is still lying on top of it, clock hands pointing to the ground. Miss Acacia’s gaze passes right through me. She doesn’t even look angry; it really is as if I don’t exist any more. Her gaze is like a sad bird, hovering for a moment over the cardboard box, then flying off towards skies I’ll never know. The pitter-patter of her footsteps fades. Soon, I’ll no longer be able to see her voluptuous derrière rolling in a velvet backwash. The swish of her skirt will have vanished; and only a hint of her soft tread will linger on. She’ll be just ten centimetres tall. Nine centimetres, six, scarcely the size of an empty matchbox. Five, four, three, two . . .

This time, I’ll never, ever see her again.