It’s only when I close the notebook and see his name written in full on the front page that I realize I could just google him.
It turns out that Tuul is the third most common surname in Mongolia and every single boy is called Chingis. That’s if his name really was Chingis. There were pages and pages of Chingis Tuuls. I’d also forgotten that I didn’t read Mongolian. So there were pages and pages of strange-looking letters with his name highlighted every now and then. Maybe he’s the president now or the winner of Mongolia’s Got Talent or something.
Of course, Julie O’Connor’s not an unusual name, either. If he was googling me from Mongolia, what would he find? Pages and pages about a girl who runs a kayak school in California. A woman who makes coats to order in Cleveland. An aromatherapist in Newcastle. Even “Julie O’Connor + Liverpool” gives you a dieting blog, a barrister, two grief counsellors and street dance lessons. Even if you just search Facebook there are more than two dozen of us, with only our profile pictures to identify us. And I’m sure none of us look like we did when we were eleven.
And anyway, why would he be looking for me? He probably still thinks it was my fault he got deported.
I scan the Polaroids and add them to my Facebook page. I even change my profile picture to that photo of the coat hanging in the cloakroom.
Two days later, he tries to add me as a friend. Maybe it was a coincidence. Maybe he’s been checking all the Julie O’Connors in the world every day for years. I don’t know. But he’s tried to add me. So I accept the add, say thanks and ask if he wants the coat back.
He puts “yes please” and messages me his address. And he tags me in this photograph…
Afterword
A few years back, just after my book Millions came out, a teacher asked me to come and visit her primary school. The teacher’s name was Sue Kendall and the school was Joan of Arc Primary in Bootle. It was my very first “author visit” – the first time I’d ever heard myself described as an author, the first time I’d ever strolled into an unfamiliar building and had a bunch of strangers sit in a circle and listen while I told a story. Amazing. I felt like Homer.
I’ve done it hundreds of times since, but it still feels full of ancient magic to me. And I remember pretty much every detail of that first time. There was a big boy there called Christian, who was one of the inspirations for the overgrown Liam in my book Cosmic. Mrs Kendall and Joan of Arc Primary are always popping up in my stories. But the thing I remember most is meeting a girl called Misheel. She was a refugee from Mongolia and she just lit up the room. The other children were touchingly proud of her and told me about the time Misheel turned up to the school disco in full Mongolian costume with her elaborate headdress and fabulous robes. They knew all about Mongolia – its customs and epic landscape – because of her. Her presence massively enriched their lives. Everyone must have felt the same way because she was chosen to lead the Lord Mayor’s procession that year. There’s a line in this book about Xanadu being hidden in the heart of Bootle, and that’s what she seemed to be – a wonder of the world living among them.
Then one day the Immigration Authorities came and snatched her and her family in the middle of the night. Misheel managed to get one phone call through to Sue Kendall before one of the officers grabbed her phone. And, of course, she has not been seen since. I don’t know much about immigration policy or the politics of our relationship with Mongolia. Maybe there is some complicated reason why a depopulated and culturally deprived area like Bootle shouldn’t be allowed generous and brilliant visitors. I do know that a country that authorizes its functionaries to snatch children from their beds in the middle of the night can’t really be called civilized.
The Joan of Arc children were upset, of course, and one of the things that most worried them was that Misheel had left her coat behind. They knew that it was cold in Mongolia and worried about how she would manage without it. That image of the left-behind coat really haunted me. I talked to my friends Carl Hunter and Clare Heney at the time, and we planned to make a documentary in which we took some of the kids to Mongolia to look for Misheel and give her back her coat. But it never happened.
Then last year Jane Davis asked me to write a book for Our Read. I went to meet her with a pocketful of stories – stories about the Gold Rush, about the future, about ghosts – all of them thought through and ready to go – but somehow I found myself talking about Misheel instead. I said, “But actually that’s not a story, that’s just something that happened.” But we both knew that this was the one I wanted to write really. And that Carl and Clare should be working on it with me.
I changed Misheel into a boy for this book. Because this isn’t Misheel’s story. It’s a made-up story. I didn’t want to tell Misheel’s story because I didn’t want that story to be over. Strangely, as I was putting the finishing touches to this book, I bumped into Sue Kendall and she told me that Misheel had – for the first time ever – rung her that morning from Mongolia. I wanted to know everything that had happened to her. But that really is a different story…
Carl, Clare and Frank
Frank Cottrell Boyce won the 2004 Carnegie Medal for his first children’s book, Millions. He has since written three novels for children, including Framed, which was shortlisted for the 2005 Carnegie Medal and the Whitbread Children’s Book of the Year Award, and Cosmic, which was shortlisted for the 2009 Carnegie Medal, the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize and the Roald Dahl Funny Prize. Frank is an accomplished, successful and well-known screenwriter. He lives with his family in Liverpool.
Carl Hunter is a film-maker and also plays bass guitar for Liverpool-based band The Farm. Clare Heney is a film‑maker and photographer. She and Carl both lecture in media at Edge Hill University.
Frank, Carl and Clare have collaborated on a number of projects, including the film Accelerate.
Frank Cottrell Boyce wrote The Unforgotten Coat to support The Reader Organisation, helping them in their aim to bring about a Reading Revolution.
The Reader Organisation is a pioneering charity, working across the UK and beyond, making it possible for people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities to enjoy and engage with reading. The work they do is driven by a love for great literature and a strong belief that shared reading is a deeply powerful activity that can significantly enrich and improve lives and the communities we live in.
Through their hundreds of “read aloud” Get into Reading groups, Read to Lead training, Our Read campaign, Community Theatre and Reader-in-Residence projects in NHS trusts, care homes, prisons, schools and libraries, The Reader Organisation is transforming society’s collective approach to reading – making literature accessible, available, emotionally rewarding and fun.
This book is part of the Reading Revolution! Please go out there and share it with someone you know.
Visit www.thereader.org.uk to learn more.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously.
This Walker edition first published 2011 by Walker Books Ltd
87 Vauxhall Walk, London SE11 5HJ
Text © 2011 Frank Cottrell Boyce
Photographs © 2011 Carl Hunter and Clare Heney
Photograph on page 106 by Chay Heney
Cover photograph © 2011 Eva Garcia Ibañez de Opacua
The right of Frank Cottrell Boyce, and Carl Hunter and Clare Heney to be identified as author and photographers respectively of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, taping and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data: a catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-14063-3561-3 (ePub)
www.walker.co.uk
Frank Cottrell Boyce, The Unforgotten Coat
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