The Sudden Appearance of Hope

Chapter 47

Total fucking fail.

Total fucking breakdown.

A woman sits in her hotel room, hugging her pillows to her chest, and cries — she cries — like a fucking six year old.

Hope Arden get your fucking act together!

No good.

Hope Arden — the woman who was Hope Arden, before Hope Arden became no more than a blip in a digital record, a carbon footprint — this woman, sits now in a grey room in a grey hotel beneath a grey sky, and cries.

I want Luca Evard here to hold me, I want Gauguin staring in surprise, I want Filipa Pereyra looking at me in wonder, I want my mum who crossed the desert, my dad who told me never to turn to crime. I want Parker from New York, the one I can’t remember; Byron14, I want Reina bint Badr al Mustakfi, I want

someone

to say my name.

Gauguin didn’t even remember me long enough to chase after me when I fled from his sight.

Filipa will not remember eating noodles with me.

I am dead in all but deed.

My deeds are worthless.

one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen twenty eins zwei drei vier fünf sechs sieben acht neun zehn elf zwölf dreizehn vierzehn fünfzehn sechszehn siebzehn achtzehn neunzehn zwanzig twenty-one twenty-two twenty-three twenty-four twenty-five twenty-six twenty-seven twenty-eight twenty-nine…

I am the number one thousand four hundred and seventeen.

It is there where I stop crying.

Stand up.

Wash my face, cold water.

Wash my hands, two presses of soap on the dispenser above the sink.

Tidy my hair.

Stand up straight.

At one thousand four hundred and seventeen, I became disciplined again.