Cecelia Ahern - The Gift & Thanks for the Memories

When is a coincidence just a coincidence, though? And when, if at all, should it be seen as something more? At a time like this? When I am lost and desperate, grieving for a child that was never born, and tending to my wounds after a defeated marriage? This, I have found, is the time when what was once clear has instead become cloudy, and what was once considered bizarre has now become a possibility.

It is during troubled times like these that people see straight, though others watch with concern and try to convince them that they can’t. Weighted minds are just so because of all of their new thoughts. When those who have passed through their troubles and come out the other side suddenly embrace their new beliefs wholeheartedly, it is viewed with cynicism by others. Why? Because when you’re in trouble you look harder for answers than those who aren’t, and it’s those answers that help you through.

This blood transfusion – is it the answer or merely an answer I’m looking for? I find that, usually, answers present themselves. They are not hidden under rocks or camouflaged among trees. Answers are right there, in front of our eyes. But if you haven’t cause to look, then of course you will probably never find them.

So, the explanation for the sudden arrival of alien memories, the reason for such a deep connection to Justin – I feel it running through my very veins. Is this the answer that my heart is currently raging within me to realise? It hops up and down now, like Skippy, trying to get my attention, trying to alert me to a problem. I breathe in slowly through my nose and exhale, I close my eyes gently and place my hands over my chest, feeling the thump-thump, thump-thump that is raging within me. Time to slow everything down now, time to get answers.

Taking the bizarre as a given for just one moment, as people in trouble do: if I did indeed receive Justin’s blood during my transfusion, then my heart is now sending his blood around my body. Some of the blood that once flowed through his veins, keeping him alive, now rushes through mine, helping to keep me alive. Something that came from his heart, that beat within him, that made him who he is, is now a part of me.

At first I shiver at the thought, goose bumps rising on my skin, but on further thought, I snuggle down into the bed and hug my body. I suddenly don’t feel so lonely, feel glad of the company within me. Is this the reason for the connection I feel with him? That in flowing from his channels to mine, it enabled me to tune into his frequency and experience his personal memories and passions?

I sigh wearily, knowing nothing in my life makes sense any more, and not just since the day I fell down the stairs. I had been falling for quite some time before that. That day … that was the day I’d landed. The first day of the rest of my life, and quite possibly, thanks to Justin Hitchcock.

It has been a long day. The business at the airport, the Antiques Roadshow , then finally the clanger at the Royal Opera House. A tsunami of emotions has come crashing down upon me all in twenty-four hours, pulled me under and overwhelmed me. I smile now, remembering the events, the precious moments with Dad, from tea at his kitchen table to a mini-adventure in London. I offer a wide toothy grin to the ceiling above me and a thanks to beyond the ceiling.

From the darkness I hear a wheezing, short rasps drifting into the atmosphere.

‘Dad?’ I whisper. ‘Are you OK?’

The wheezing gets louder and my body freezes.

‘Dad?’

Then it’s followed by a snort. And a loud guffaw.

‘Michael Aspel,’ he splutters through his laughter. ‘Christ Almighty, Gracie.’

I smile with relief as his laughter intensifies, becomes so much bigger than him that he almost can’t bear it. I giggle at the sound of his laughter. He laughs harder on hearing me, and I at him. Our sounds fuel each other. The springs of the mattress beneath me squeak as my body shakes, causing us to roar even more. Thoughts of the umbrella stand, going live with Michael Aspel, the group cheering ‘Tchaikovsky!’ at the camera, the hilarity grows with each flickering scene.

‘Oh, my stomach,’ he howls.

I roll onto my side, hands on my belly.

Dad continues to wheeze and bangs his hand repeatedly on the side cabinet that separates us. I try to stop, the panic of a stiffening stomach sore but hilarious at the same time. I can’t stop and Dad’s high-pitched wheezing sets me off even more. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him laugh so much and so heartily. From the pale light seeping through the window beside Dad, I see his legs rise in the air and kick around with glee.

‘Oh. My. I. Can’t. Stop.’

We wheeze and roar and laugh, sit up, lie down, roll around and try to catch our breaths. We stop momentarily and try to compose ourselves but it takes over our bodies again, laughing, laughing, laughing in the darkness, at nothing and everything.

Then we calm down and there is silence. Dad farts and we are off again.

Hot tears roll from the sides of my eyes and down my plumped cheeks, which ache from smiling and I squeeze them with my hands to stop. It occurs to me how close happiness and sadness are. So closely knitted together. Such a thin line, a thread-like divide that in the midst of emotions, it trembles, blurring the territory of exact opposites. The movement is minute, like the thin thread of a spider’s web that quivers under a raindrop. Here in my moment of unstoppable cheek-and stomach-aching laughter, as my body rolls around, my stomach clenched, all the muscles taut, my body jumps about, is racked by emotion and therefore steps ever so slightly over the mark, and into sadness. Tears of sadness gush down my cheeks as my stomach continues to shake and ache with happiness.

I think of Conor and me; how quickly a moment of love was snapped away to a moment of hate. One comment to steal it all away. Of how love and war stand upon the very same foundations. How, in my darkest moments, my most fearful times, when faced, became my bravest. When feeling at your weakest you end up showing more strength, when at your lowest are suddenly lifted above higher than you’ve ever been. They all border one another, those opposites, and how quickly we can be altered. Despair can be altered by one simple smile offered by a stranger; confidence can become fear by the arrival of one uneasy presence. Just as Kate’s son had wavered on the balance beam and in an instant his excitement had turned to pain. Everything is on the verge, always brimming the surface, a slight shake, a tremble sends things toppling. How similar emotions are.

Dad stops his laughter so abruptly it concerns me and I reach for the light.

Pitch-black so quickly becomes light.

He looks at me as though he’s done something wrong, but is afraid to admit it. He throws the covers off his body and shuffles into the bathroom, grabbing his travel bag and hitting off everything in his path, refusing to meet my eyes. I look away. How quickly such comfort with someone can shift to awkwardness. How in the very second you reach a dead-end, moments when you are convinced you know exactly where you’re going are altered. A realisation in less than a second. A flicker.

Dad makes his way back to bed wearing a different pair of pyjama bottoms and with a towel tucked under his arm. I turn off the light, both of us quiet now. Light so quickly becomes darkness again. I continue to stare at the ceiling, feeling lost again when only moments ago I’d been found. My answers of only minutes ago are again transformed into questions.

‘I can’t sleep, Dad.’ My voice sounds childlike.

‘Close your eyes and stare into the dark, love,’ Dad responds sleepily, sounding thirty years younger too.

Moments later his light snores are audible. Awake … and then gone.