Sarah Lean - 3 Book Collection

“What sort of people?”

“People who used to be on earth.”

I thought that heaven was up there somewhere, that’s what people said, but maybe the distant stars might be the people gone from earth. Maybe that’s what a ghost is, one of our stars come to visit us.

“What are stars like?” Sam tapped.

“If there were no stars, it would just be completely black.”

That’s probably what it was like for Sam being blind. Like there are no stars in the night sky, no moon, no street lights, no torches.

“There’s no noise up there either,” I spelled, “nothing. All we have is the stars and they make you feel you’re not alone.”

Sam smiled. “Are you a star?” he tapped.

“Not me, I’m not the star.”

“Who then?”

There was no going back. “My mum,” I spelled. “She died last year.”

Sam went quiet for a minute, so still.

“Why would she go so far away?” he tapped.

Maybe it was because of what Sam spelled, I don’t know, but it felt as if she was right there, in the shed, right next to me.

“Maybe she didn’t,” I tapped.

Sam didn’t say anything. He was leaning up on his elbow, grinning.

“Why are you laughing?” I tapped.

And suddenly I wasn’t going to tell him. He was going to laugh at me, say it wasn’t true, and I felt stupid that I was going to trust him. He might be blind and deaf, but he was just like all the others. I pushed his hand away.

He wiped his hand over his mouth, wiped the grin away.

“Not laughing, happy. What’s the matter?” he spelled, holding my hand tight.

“You’re just like all the others,” I spelled. “They think I can’t see her, but I can.”

Sam sat cross-legged with his head drooping and I sat with my back to him. Of all the people it was stupid to tell Sam. How could he believe what he couldn’t see?

When I turned round, there was a gentle smile on Sam’s moon-coloured face.

“Can anyone else see her?” he spelled slowly.

And that’s when I knew what I had to do.

“I think Jed can,” I spelled.

32.

THERE WAS A REALLY OLD SILVER TAPE RECORDER on my bed, one that Dad used to play music on when he was young. The little note stuck to it said, Play me.

“This is your dad speaking … This is a message for Cally,” it said. Then a sigh and shuffled paper. “You can say anything you like into this recorder. And, if you want, you can let anyone you like listen to it. But if you want to record something and don’t want anyone to listen to it, then that’s all right too.” It went quiet again. “That’s it for now. Over and out.”

I pressed it to my ear and played it again. The same words. The same message.

Dad came in. “Your burger’s getting cold,” he said. He put the plate on my bed.

“Did you listen to it?” he said, picking up the tape recorder.

He played it back, heard the soft crackle of no reply after his message. He tapped the button, rewound. He sighed.

“Dr Colborn’s idea, you know, the expert,” he said, holding up the recorder. “She wrote me a letter.”

What did she know? She was just going to make everything worse.

I stared through the wet window. I wondered what Dad would say if Jed said he could see Mum too. Would he believe Jed? Would he see that Homeless belonged with us?

“Hello-oh,” Dad said with the recorder at his mouth, “is there anybody there?” He played it back. Then he spoke into it again.

“Hello, yes, this is Cally’s dad. I’m sitting on Cally’s bed at the moment, which, even though it’s teatime, still hasn’t been made.”

He sighed again, kept the tape running. “Cally won’t tell me what colour she wants her bedroom painted so I’m going to have to guess. She didn’t look too keen when I suggested pink.” He lay down on the bed, smiling. “So I’m guessing maybe brown, or possibly grey.”

He lifted his head, saw my folded arms and frowning face. “Maybe not,” he said into the recorder, lying flat again.

He sat up, dragged one of the boxes over and peeled back the lid. “She still hasn’t unpacked any of her things yet either, although her dirty clothes are all over the floor.”

He pulled things from the box. “So what have we got here? Books …” He placed them on my bed. “You need to sort these books out; some of them are baby books. You don’t read these any more.”

He pulled out more things. “Smelly shoes,” he carried on, “boxes of beads for losing down the back of the sofa, necklaces, old jeans, old felt tips.” He emptied everything on to my bed.

“Come on, Cally, it’s about time you sorted this stuff out and put it away or threw it away. You were supposed to do that before we moved. We’ve been here weeks now, and we’re staying put, you know that. You can’t live out of boxes forever.”

He sighed again. “What am I going to do with you?”

Hadn’t I tried to tell him a thousand times? If he would just let her still be here with us, just say, “Remember when your mum said …” Bring her back with words.

He found a picture sticking out from under the bed, the one Mum and I drew of each other. We held it between us. He left the recorder running.

“You know what she’d say right now?” his heart couldn’t help saying.

She used to say it all the time when Dad moaned or argued and went on and on about work and boring stuff. I remembered her rolling her eyes and pulling faces at him. I remembered her giving him a hug. And she said it in my heart just as Dad said it:

“Play us a tune or sing us a song, but for heaven’s sake stop going on.”