Dear Mum
Dear diary
Dear anyone
Dear Mum, is it weird, me writing to you? It feels weird but it’s kind of comforting too. As if you might actually read it. As if you might write back.
Mrs
Sorry, that bit got smudged. Auntie Gina says I should cry as much as I want to, and no one’s going to judge me for it. But I judge me. You’ve been gone for almost a year and I’m sick of crying. Mrs Savage says the human body is made up of 60% water, and I reckon I’ve cried a good 58% of it. Maybe when that last 2% is gone, I’ll just float away like a cloud.
Except then Dad would be left by himself, and that wouldn’t be fair. (He cries too, though he pretends he doesn’t.)
Mrs Savage gave me another poem today. She slipped it into my hand as I was leaving, so no one else would see. This one’s by a man called Billy Collins, and it’s about dead pe
Sorry, more smudges
It’s about dead people rowing themselves across heaven in glass-bottomed boats, and looking down on us while we’re making a sandwich or putting on our shoes.
I hope – I really hope you’ve got a glass-bottomed boat, Mum. It’s exactly the sort of thing you’d like. And if you have, then you already know about Clara, who is sweet, and slightly mad. I AM NOT A DUCK. See what I mean? Ha ha ha. (No, that wasn’t a proper laugh. I think I’ve forgotten how.)
I don’t know what I’m going to write to you about. Maybe the stock theft thing. Last night, I wasn’t sure about helping Dad – not because I didn’t want to, but because I didn’t really believe we could do anything. And besides, it’d mean I’d have to talk to people, which is kind of hard at the moment.
But now I think we have to help him. Because I’m not leaving here, Mum. You loved Little Dismal, and so does Dad and so do I. And if you truly have got a glass-bottomed boat, it’ll be right above us somewhere. And if we moved, you might not be able to find
Smudges. Sorry.
Lots of love from Olive