Emily

I push my bedroom door shut and open up my laptop on the bed. Dad’s still at work, and Tania’s in the conservatory. While I’m waiting for the computer to boot, I have second thoughts and open the door a crack. That way I’ll be able to hear if she comes upstairs. I’m not doing anything wrong though. I’m just finding out the truth. For Dad.

The email Dom sent me with links to family history sites is sitting in my inbox. I click to the first site and select the births section. There’s lots of information I could put in. Mother’s surname, precise date and place of birth, but I can only work with what I know. I type in the name: Tania Highpole, and select a date range that would allow her to be anything from forty-eight, which is what she claims, to sixty. I select Penzance as the place, because that’s all I’ve got to go on. No results.

I click back and take the place out to search nationwide. Still no results.

Okay. Try to think, Emily. Maybe she’s changed her name. Maybe she’s been married before. She hasn’t mentioned that, but she hasn’t mentioned much. I change my search to Marriages, but all I’ve got is the bride’s first name and a possible surname for the groom. No results again.

I’m not even sure what I’m hoping to find. Obviously she was born somewhere, and Dom did say that not all the records are online, so she might be forty-eight and from Penzance exactly like she says. But she’s not. I’m sure she’s lying. No guests at all for the wedding. No ties to stop her moving across a continent with a man she’s only just met. I have to find out what her big secret is. It’s not snooping. I’m only looking at public information that anyone could access, and I’m doing it for Dad. He’s not thinking straight. I’m looking after him.

Another idea strikes me. Passport. She came back from Verona with Dad. She must have a passport, and it must be somewhere in this house. I stand on the landing for a minute, and listen, but there are no sounds of movement downstairs. Tania must still be in the conservatory. Where would her passport be? My dad keeps all his important documents in a box in his study, but if she’s not who she says I reckon she’ll have kept hers private. I sneak into their bedroom. Where would she hide it? I run through all the obvious places. It’s not in her underwear drawer. It’s not on her bedside table. I kneel down and peer under the bed. There’s a suitcase. I stop for a second and listen. Still nothing. I pull the suitcase out as quietly as I can and open it up. Empty. I shove it back under the bed and stand up. Try to think like Tania. There must be somewhere. Everyone has somewhere that they keep their most personal things. I’ve got a jewellery box that I only keep presents from my dad in, and folded up in the bottom there’s a birthday card from my 5^th birthday, written in my mum’s writing, and a photo of her holding me when I was a new-born baby.

That’s what I’m looking for. I’m looking for Tania’s memory place. I scan the room again. There’s no jewellery box or chest. I open and close the drawers again. There’s no envelopes stuffed underneath her clothes. There’s nothing. So far as I can tell, Tania is a woman with no memories at all.