Cecelia Ahern - There’s No Place Like Here

“Maybe she’s not well, Terence. In fact she looks very pale.” Helena’s voice was close to my ear now. “Sandy, would you like to-”

That’s when I passed out.

“Sandy.” I could hear my name being called and felt a warm breath on my face. The smell was familiar; sweet coffee that sent my heart into its usual flutter, fanning my body and causing excited chills to chase one another just below the surface of my skin.

Gregory’s hand softly brushed back strands of hair from my face as though gently brushing away sand on an excavation site to reveal something far more precious than me. But that’s what he was, my excavator, the one who unearthed all that was buried beneath to discover my hidden thoughts. One hand was placed at the back of my neck as though I was the most fragile thing he’d ever held; the other softly traced the line of my jaw, occasionally running up my cheeks and through my hair.

“Sandy, honey, open your eyes,” the voice whispered close to my ear.

“Move back, everybody!” a louder and more aggressive voice shouted nearby. “Is she OK?” His voice got louder, closer.

The comforting hand moved from my hair to my hand and grasped it tightly, his thumb soothingly stroking my skin as he spoke quietly, “She’s not responding, call an ambulance.” His voice was distorted and it echoed in my head. My head hurt.

“Oh, mother of Jesus,” the voice muttered.

“Sean, get the kids back into the school, don’t let them watch this,” my savior said calmly.

Sean, Sean, Sean. I knew that name. Knew that voice.

“Where’s that blood coming from?” he panicked.

“Her head. Get the kids away.” My hand was held tighter.

“He hit her hard, the bastard.”

“I know, I saw. I was watching her from the window. Call the ambulance.”

Sean’s shouts to the kids to go inside moved farther away and I was left in the echoing silence with the angel. I felt soft lips on my hand.

“Open your eyes, Sandy,” he whispered. “Please.”

I tried to but they felt as if they were glued together, like a lotus nestled in the mud forced to open its petals ahead of time. My head was heavy, my thoughts clumsy and slow, as it throbbed and pulsated repeatedly with abnormally strong force in the protective hand that cradled it. The ground felt cold and rough beneath me. Concrete. Why was I on the ground? I struggled to get up but my body resisted the action, my eyes wouldn’t open.

I heard the ambulance in the distance and I fought to open my eyes. They opened just a slit. Ah. Mr. Burton. My savior . He held me in his arms, looking down at me as though he’d just discovered gold in the Leitrim roadway. He had blood on his shirt. He was hurt? His eyes looked hurt as they searched my face. I suddenly remembered the great big pimple on my chin that I wished all day I’d popped that morning. I tried to move my hand to cover it but it felt like my hand had been dipped in concrete and left to dry. “Oh, thank god,” he whispered, his hand holding mine tighter. “Don’t move yet, the ambulance is almost here.”

I had to cover my pimple. I was finally this close to Mr. Burton after four years and I looked a mess, my seventeen-year-old hormones were ruining the moment I’d been dreaming of. Hold on, he’d said “ambulance.” What had happened? I tried to speak and a croak passed my lips.

“It’s going to be OK.” He hushed me, his face close to mine.

I believed him and forgot my pain for a moment while I once again self-consciously felt my face.

“I know what you’re trying to do, Sandy, so stop it.” Gregory attempted to laugh lightly while carefully removing my arm from my face.

I groaned, words still not coming to me.

“He’s not so awful, you know. His name is Henry. He’s been keeping me company while you’ve been so rudely passed out. Henry, meet Sandy, Sandy, meet Henry, although I don’t think you’re a very welcome guest here.” Gregory ran his finger across my chin, lightly brushing the blemish as though it were the most beautiful thing about me.

So there I was with blood running from my head, a pimple named Henry on my chin, and a face so aflame it could have powered the entire town. I began to close my eyes again, the sky seemed so bright it pierced my pupils and sent spears of pain through my sockets and into my already throbbing head.

“Don’t close your eyes, Sandy,” Gregory said more loudly.

I opened them and caught the worry in his face before he had a chance to hide it.

“I’m tired,” I finally whispered.

“I know you are”-he held me tighter-“but stay awake with me for a while, keep me company until the ambulance gets here,” he pleaded. “Promise me.”

“Promise,” I whispered before shutting my eyes again.

A second siren arrived on the scene, a car pulled up nearby, I could feel the vibrations on the concrete near my head and I feared the tires would run over me. Doors opened and slammed.

“He’s over there, Garda,” Sean was back, shouting. “He drove straight into her, wasn’t even looking,” he said, panicked. “This man here saw it.”

Sean was quieted down, I heard a man crying. Heard garda voices trying to comfort, radios crackling and beeping, Sean being led away. Footsteps came closer to me, there was mumbling above my head of concerned voices. All the time Gregory whispered in my ear words that sounded pretty, the vowels easy in my ringing ears. The sounds shut out the sirens, the cries of fear, the shouts of panic and anger, the feel of the cold concrete and the sticky wet trickling down my ear.

As the ambulance sirens got louder, Gregory’s tones became more urgent as I began to drift away in his arms.

“Welcome back,” I heard as I awoke to see a worried Helena wafting a fan in my face.

I groaned and my hand flew to my head.

“You’ve got a nasty bump so I’d advise you not to touch it,” she said gently.

My arm kept moving.

“I said don-”

“Ouch.”

“Serves you right,” she said haughtily and walked away.

I squinted around the unfamiliar room, feeling the egg-sized bump that had formed above my temple. I was on a couch; Helena was at a sink facing a window. The light was bright and illuminated her, blurring her around the edges as though she were a holy vision.

“Where are we?”

“My home.” She didn’t turn around, continued rinsing a cloth.

I looked around. “Why do you have a couch in the kitchen?”

Helena laughed lightly. “Of all the questions you could have asked, that is the first one you chose.”

I was silent.

“It’s not a kitchen, it’s a family room,” was her reply. “I don’t cook here.”

“I don’t suppose you have electricity.”

She grunted, “Once you get a chance to look around outside you’ll see we have a system of what we call solar panels .” She dragged out the words as though I was slow. “They’re similar to the ones found on pocket calculators and they generate electricity from the sun. Each house has its own power voltage system,” she said excitedly.

I lay back in the couch, feeling dizzy and closed my eyes. “I’m aware of how solar panels work.”

“They exist there, too?” She was surprised.

I ignored her question. “How did I get here?”

“My husband carried you.”

My eyes flew open and I winced with the pain. Helena still didn’t turn around and the water still flowed.

“Your husband? You can get married here?”

“You can get married anywhere.”

“Not technically true,” I protested meekly. “My god, electricity and marriage? This is too much for me,” I mumbled, the ceiling beginning to swirl above me.