The curtain slides open and a woman’s face appears. When she sees Laura, she starts screaming. In Polish. Laura stands up and holds out her hands to calm her.
‘It’s okay,’ Laura says, knowing the woman can’t hear her, and even if she could, she might not understand English. ‘Please …’
The lights in Solomon’s apartment go on.
Laura panics. He can’t find her here, not like this. The balcony door slides open and Solomon steps out sleepily. He’s not wearing a top and his tracksuit bottoms sit dangerously low on his hips. Despite her panic, Laura can’t help but take him in. He rubs his eyes as if he can’t quite believe what he’s seeing.
‘Laura?’
She starts to cry again, feeling ridiculous, pathetic, mortified and relieved to see him again. All those feelings, all at the same time.
Solomon bangs on the door. He can hear Katja inside, screaming, and a child howling. She’s not answering the door, but she sounds like she’s talking to someone in the apartment. She’s shrieking and crying, the little boy is crying. Others have stepped out of their apartments into the corridor and glare sleepily at Solomon as he bangs on the door, as if this is all his fault. He ignores them. His heart pounds, he needs to get inside.
‘Katja!’ Solomon raises his voice, ignoring the hushing and shushing from his neighbours.
At last she opens the door. Her terrified eyes are red raw, tears stream down her face, snot down her nose. A baby is in her arms crying, a little boy clinging to her leg, and she has a phone to her ear.
‘I’m Solomon, your neighbour,’ he says when the terrified expression gives way to confusion. They’ve never spoken, aside from a few quick hellos as they’ve passed each other in the hall, but nothing more than that, nothing friendlier than that.
‘There’s a burglar on the balcony,’ she says to him, then returns to rapid fire Polish as she speaks down the phone. She leaves the door open and moves inside the apartment. She paces the wall furthest away from the balcony, as if afraid to go near the burglar who remains trapped out there, sitting on the cold hard floor, covering her face with her hands.
‘Have you called the guards?’ Solomon asks.
‘The what?’
‘The police.’
‘No! My husband! His friends will come.’
‘No, no, no,’ he says, trying to take the phone from her to explain to the man on the phone, but she whacks him hard on the arm and takes him by surprise. The baby howls, the little boy tries to kick him.
‘Katja, listen,’ he pleads, trying to calm her, to stop her screaming down the phone. ‘This is a mistake. She’s not a burglar. She’s my friend. The burglar on the balcony. She’s my friend.’
She finally stops and looks at him suspiciously.
‘This is a misunderstanding. My friend was trying to surprise me. She went to the wrong balcony.’ In actual fact, Solomon has absolutely no idea what Laura is doing on this balcony, she could be a burglar for all he knows, but he’ll defend her till the end. He’s seen Katja’s husband. He doesn’t want to meet his friends.
‘It’s a mistake. She got the wrong balcony.’
‘Why would she want to climb to your balcony?’
‘To … to … to be romantic, you know? Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet. The balcony. You know? Trust me, she is not a burglar. It’s a misunderstanding. Tell your husband to call his friends off.’
She thinks about it then fires a machine-gun drill of angry words into the phone.
As she does, Solomon opens the sliding doors and crouches down to Laura, who’s still huddled on the ground, hugging herself even tighter at the sound of the door opening. Her face is buried between her knees, her arms wrapped around her legs, which are tucked tight to her body.
‘It’s okay,’ he whispers, moving close, trying to see her face.
‘I was trying to set it free,’ she says, weeping.
‘Trying to set what free?’ He frowns.
‘The bird.’ She finally looks up. ‘I could hear the bird. It woke me up. It was trying to get out. I was trying to set it free, but it wasn’t there …’
He realises what she was trying to do. ‘Oh, Laura.’ He wraps his arms around her and pulls her close to him. He squeezes her tight, feeling her skin beneath her top where it has raised on her waist. He kisses the top of her head, breathes her in. He could stay like that for ever. She clings to him as hard as he holds her, and he’s feeling this embrace with every fibre of his being, wanting this moment more than anything.
She moves her face from where it is nestled to his bare chest and looks up at him. Her forehead brushes his chin as she moves, his skin tingles, hers is on fire. Their hearts pound with the closeness. She lifts her chin to gaze at him, their lips so close, their breaths already touching. She searches his eyes and finds her answer. His pupils are dilated, she sees the want in them. She smiles.
Then Katja comes to the door, the baby still crying on her hip.
‘Let’s go,’ he whispers, not wanting to move but wanting to get out of there before the husband returns. Laura moves with him, their hands finding one another and linking tightly. As they stand, Solomon sees a figure on the balcony next door. On his balcony. It’s Bo. She’s been watching them.
‘I’m sorry,’ Laura sniffs, pulling her legs under her body as she curls up on the armchair. She wraps a blanket around herself, shudders. She can’t look them in the eye.
Bo and Solomon view her from the couch. And while it’s back to two against one, the positions have changed. Bo sits as far away from Solomon as she can, perched at the very edge of the couch.
‘I had a nightmare, I woke up feeling trapped, I could hear the bird.’ She shakes her head.
‘What did it sound like?’ Bo asks, testing her.
Laura thinks about it, then shakes her head, no sound coming. ‘I think I’m going crazy.’ She rubs her eyes tiredly. ‘What was I thinking?’
‘No, you’re not,’ Bo says quietly, and Solomon looks at her in surprise.
She ignores him. She takes a chair from the kitchen table and moves it close to Laura’s armchair, so that she’s in front of her. Solomon’s not sure whether she’s deliberately blocking his view of the woman he hasn’t been able to take his eyes off since he met her, or if she just wants him out of her own eyeline. ‘What has happened to you has been crazy. How on earth you’re expected to deal with it is beyond me. This has been your way. Becoming a cat burglar.’
Laura looks at Bo in surprise and they both start laughing, breaking the nervous tension.
‘The bird is a canary. I had one as a kid. It stays in the cage. It sleeps inside at night,’ Bo explains.
‘Oh.’ Laura sniffs. ‘I should have known that.’
‘I think it was less about you releasing the canary and more about you feeling trapped, you wanting to get out of there,’ Bo offers.
Solomon is stunned by this exchange. He remains silent, feeling, probably for the first time, that Bo can handle her.
‘Everyone has been so kind,’ Laura says. ‘I didn’t have any reason to feel that way. You and Solomon have been so good to me, welcoming, hospitable.’ Her eyes flicker quickly in his direction and then back to Bo again, not wanting to betray the woman who is being so understanding. ‘I didn’t want to ruin things for you, embarrass you, let you down.’
‘You haven’t,’ Bo says, annoyed – but not with Laura, with herself. ‘We … I can only speak for myself, but I should have protected you. I threw you to the lions, I watched it happen. I told myself it was for your own good, but it wasn’t.’
Laura and Solomon look at her in shock.
‘No, you didn’t, you saved me,’ Laura says. ‘I’m so grateful for everything.’
‘Don’t be,’ Bo says quietly. ‘Please. We all got so excited about you, about how precious and rare and exciting you are, that we lost ourselves in you. Your talent—’
‘Oh, I don’t have a talent,’ Laura interrupts. ‘Alan, he has a talent. He’s u
p all night, every night, working on his routine. He writes it, performs it, even sews his own dummy when it needs to be repaired. He’s travelled the country for the past fifteen years, taking every gig imaginable. He’s been shouted at, laughed at, paid next to nothing, just to hone his skill.’
As she says the word hone she sees Gaga with her knife, but no sound comes to her or from her. It’s gone. This enrages her even more.
‘Alice, for all her shortcomings, spends four hours in the gym every day – every single day. Nothing passes her lips that isn’t for a purpose, she folds herself into a thousand little pieces, has dedicated her entire life to her craft. Sparks has been doing card tricks since he was seven. Seven! He spends six hours practising every day. Selena sings like an angel, and there’s a twelve-year-old girl who leaps through fire on the lawn. That’s talent. What am I? Some weirdo who opens her mouth and mimics sounds. There’s nothing original about me. I’m like a parrot, or a a a … monkey. I’m a freak of nature. A weirdo, I belong in a circus, not in this talent show. I’m a con, a liar. They’re right in what they say about me. I’m not original, I’m not unique or authentic. I mimic sounds and half the time I don’t even notice what I’m doing. I shouldn’t be here, I know that. I shouldn’t have forced my way into your lives, I shouldn’t have forced you two apart – I know that’s what I’ve done and I’m sorry …’ The tears fall. ‘But I didn’t know what else to do. I don’t have anywhere else to go, I can’t go back. I’m trying to move forward all the time but I’m grasping at everything and can’t catch on to anything …’ She trails off as the tears fall.
Solomon’s eyes fill. If Bo wasn’t here, he’d stand up, he’d go to her, he’d take her in his arms, he’d kiss her, every inch of her, tell her how beautiful she is, how talented she is, how perfect in every way she is. How she is the most unique, talented, authentic person he has ever met. How she captivates him just by being. But he can’t, Bo is in the room and any sound he makes or any move he makes will betray him, betray Bo. So he sits in silence, feeling trapped in his own body, watching as the woman he loves falls apart at the seams, in front of the woman he tried to love.
And the woman he tried to love speaks for him, stronger than him, stronger than he’ll ever be and he’s grateful to her for that.
‘Laura, let me tell you about your skill,’ Bo says, speaking with conviction. ‘Part of your ability is that you showcase the world’s beauty. You recognise the tiniest details in people, animals, objects, everything. You hear things that we don’t even notice or that we’ve long stopped hearing. You capture those things and you display them to the world. You remind us of what’s beautiful.
‘People say that’s what I do in my documentaries. I show the world characters and stories that have been hidden. I find the story, the people, then I help them to tell the world. You, you do it all through a simple sound. One whiff of my mum’s perfume and I’m transported back to my house as a kid. One sound from you moves every single person to another time and place. You touch everyone, Laura. You have to understand that.
‘Solomon told me that when his mother heard you mimicking the harp music at her birthday party, she said it was the most beautiful sound she had ever heard. She has been making that sound for fifty years, but she heard it for the first time through you. Do you understand how important that is? When you met Caroline in wardrobe, it took you one minute to bring her to tears; you made her feel like she was six years old again, sitting with her mother in her workshop. I don’t think you have any idea of the way you touch people. You find the beauty in the world, the sadness in the everyday, the extraordinary in the ordinary, the whimsical in the mundane. Laura, you got into the show through mimicking a coffee machine for an entire minute.’
They laugh.
‘You are important. You are relevant. You are unique – and you deserve to be up on that stage just as much as anyone else. So what if you don’t have to rehearse – that doesn’t mean you’re not good enough. Should we all have to struggle to be truly great? Because it comes easily to you, does that make you any less talented? Or does that make you even more astounding? It’s the greatest lesson that you can teach us: what you have comes from within. It’s a natural, rare, God-given skill.’
‘It’s gone,’ Laura whispers.
‘It’s still in there. It’s like the hiccups. You got a fright and they went away, but they’re in there. You’ll find it again.’
‘How?’
‘Maybe if you remember how it began, that might help bring it back. You stopped feeling curious, or intrigued, you fell out of love with things. You’ll be inspired again.’ She glances at Solomon, almost as if she’s handing the baton over to him. Does she really mean what Solomon thinks she means? The awkward look in her eye, the sad but resigned tone. She stands up. ‘You have until tomorrow night. I’ve been helping Jack today, trying to figure out a set-up that will help you perform, that will help you feel comfortable. No more dancers in spandex, no more dancing bears in the woods. You’re going to feel right at home up there. Well … I better leave you guys …’ She looks around awkwardly, gathering her things under Solomon’s watchful gaze. He wants to say something but doesn’t know what. He’s not sure if he understands correctly. She disappears into the bedroom and he hears her unzip a case. His heart pounds.
He looks at Laura, wondering if she understands the greatness of what’s happening, but she’s in her own world, her mind mulling over all the things Bo said.
Solomon makes his way to the bedroom. He finds Bo packing her things.
‘Bo—’
‘Bo—’
Solomon and Laura speak at the same time.
‘Yes?’ she answers Laura, going to the door.
‘You said if I could remember where it came from in the first place …?’
‘Yes, it was just an idea …’
‘Have you got your camera here?’
Bo’s cheeks pink. ‘That’s not what I meant. I wasn’t asking you to …’
‘I know you weren’t. But I want to tell you.’
‘Laura we’re not allowed to continue with the documentary. StarrGaze Entertainment lawyers have been very clear on that point.’
‘I don’t care what they say, this is my mouth, my words, my thoughts, they don’t own them.’
Solomon and Bo look at each other. He gives her the nod.
Rachel is with Susie at the hospital, Susie is in labour. But Laura wants to do this now so Bo sets up a camera on a tripod. Solomon takes care of the sound. It’s done quickly without fuss. Laura is ready to talk.
37
Isabel got sick very fast. She weakened quickly. She’d been taking all of their home-made medicines, everything they could research and make for themselves. At no point did she want to take hospital drugs. She was against chemotherapy, she wanted to try alternative therapies, specific nutrition plans. She was very thorough in her research, Gaga too. They had always been like that, almost like everything they’d learned in their lives was all for that moment. She did liver-flush therapy, high pH therapy, which ensured she ate foods high in alkaline and balanced her body pH. And then when she couldn’t eat whole foods any more she was on a liquid protocol.
‘If I’m going to die,’ her mother reaches out and wipes a tear from her daughter’s cheek. ‘I’m going to die healthy.’
Laura smiles and sniffs her tears away. She kisses the back of her mother’s hand.
The work studio is in the house so that Gaga and Laura can work on the clothes alterations and care for her at the same time, though Gaga still deals with the customers in the garage. Their home is private. Protection of Laura has always been their main priority though now Gaga struggles with leaving her ill daughter. Laura often thinks that even though she is by her mother’s side, Gaga wants to be there herself. She is letting the business go, letting standards drop, just so that she won’t have to leave her. Her mother’s health has deteriorated fast, they sit up with her all night, supposed to be taking t
heir shifts in turns but neither of them wanting to be asleep when the moment comes. It is on one of those days that Gaga is dealing with a customer in the garage, that Laura is alone with her mum. Laura can tell by the change in her mother’s breathing that something is happening.
‘Mummy,’ Isabel says, in a raspy voice, sounding like a child.
It is the first word she has said in days.
‘I’m here, Mum, it’s Laura,’ Laura takes her hand and holds it to her lips.
‘Mummy,’ she repeats. Her eyes are open, they look around as if searching for Gaga.
Laura’s heart pounds. She hurries to the window and peeks through the blinds toward the garage. There’s no sign of Gaga, the customer’s car is still in the drive. She looks back from her mother to the garage, feeling trapped, the most trapped she’s ever felt in her life. If she calls Gaga, the customer will hear or see her. They’d all made a pact that Laura would never be seen, not until she’s the legal age. It was long understood and long unspoken. The idea of her being out in the world before she’s sixteen terrifies them.
Laura is torn. Her mother’s breathing is shallow, she knows she’s leaving the world, she can’t call Gaga and risk anybody discovering her existence, but she can’t let her mum go thinking that she’s on her own.
The panic. The hot feeling that overwhelms her body, as sweat breaks out on her brow and trickles down her back. The palpitations. The cold fear. She is losing her mum and while she wants to shout to the world for help, she knows she can’t risk being taken away from Gaga too. She would lose everything.
She doesn’t want her mum to die thinking she is alone, just as she will feel without hers. She doesn’t want Gaga to know that her daughter died without her thinking she was there. She sits beside her, closes her eyes and wills every single part of her to solve the problem, to save her in the moment.
She opens her mouth and sings, and when she sings, she hears Gaga’s voice, the voice of an older woman with a Yorkshire accent. Isabel squeezes her hand.