Page 88 of The Book Swap

The sparkle is in her eyes. Her hair bouncing in curls. Her face warm. She grins at me, the way she used to when she’d meet me after work. Every time she saw me.

“I never said goodbye,” I say. “I’m so sorry.”

My room’s now bare of all my things. Only the furniture belonging to the landlord remains, Bonnie’s chair included.

“It’s okay.”

“It isn’t. But if I said it out loud, it was real.”

“I know.”

I scan her face, so happy to see her this way.

“I get it now. I’ll never be ready to say it, will I? I just have to say it anyway.”

She smiles. Nods her head. “I’ll be glad to get out of this chair to be honest.”

I laugh through my tears as she winks at me.

“I need something though. A way of knowing you’re still with me.”

She looks out of the window and back at me. “I’m always with you. I’m in you. Around you. Part of you. Like...like the Snowman.”

I frown, not following.

“You know in The Snowman where he’s just a heap of clothes and a pile of melting snow at the end, but he isn’t gone. Not really. The snow keeps falling. The boy’s got a constant reminder of their time together.”

I nod.

“I don’t want to be snow though,” she says, screwing up her face. “I’ll be the sun. Every time the sun is shining, that’s me. Okay?”

She’s looking sleepy. I forgot how she had this knack of just napping whenever she felt like it. You’d be on the sofa having a chat and then you’d look over and boom. Eyes closed, mouth open.

“Okay,” I whisper, nodding. I lick my lips, ready to say it. To say everything I should have said that day. I don’t know how to start.

I look down at the floor beneath me. A crack of sunlight breaks through the window and lands at my feet.

Lifting my eyes, I laugh.

“Told you,” Bonnie says. “There I am.”

I pause.

“Bonnie?”

“Yes, Erin.”

“I will never love anyone the way I love you.”

“I know,” she says, standing up. “Ditto.”

“Even after everything?”

“Especially after everything.”

I nod. I know it’s time. I have to do it.

“Leave right now or I’ll tell everyone about the time you turned up to school with no knickers on and cried on your lunch break.”

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