‘What, no filter?’
‘Yup.’ He took another sip and gave an innocent look. I rolled my eyes and turned back to Rose.
‘I’ve thought about that. But what if – I dunno. What if she’d locked this J away in her mind until she almosthadforgotten about him? I mean, our minds do this sort of thing all the time. Sometimes in response to trauma, sometimes just to protect us from feelings that might hurt us. But what if I played her some of these songs, andbecauseher mind is more pliable than most, she does remember?’
‘I suppose so,’ Rose said, cautiously. ‘But I still don’t really understand why you need to know so desperately?’
I sighed. Rose had a point. WhydidI feel such an urgent need to know who this mystery ‘J’ was? Was it because of the things Dad had said to me about never knowing why Mum had chosen him, or because of the turmoil my mind was in about my own self-inflicted mess?
‘I’m just nosy I suppose,’ I said.
‘Me too,’ Sam said, sloshing his drink around so the ice cubes clinked in the glass.
I sighed. The truth was, my instinct was to stay well clear of letting Mum listen to any of these songs. And yet there was something about the note I’d found hidden in the tape that made me need to find out who this man was, and that made me wonder whether this wasn’t the key to getting my mum back: music made Mum open up, it lifted her out of her broken mind and let her believe she was somewhere else, sometimeelse. It made her happy; it made her Penny again.
What if one of these songs could do that, and unlock the secret of this mystery man at the same time?
My thoughts were interrupted by a tug at my neck. Sam was leaning over me, pulling at something.
‘What’s this?’
It took me a second to realise what he was talking about and my heart stopped. Oh shit.
‘It’s a necklace,’ I said, trying to hide the wobble in my voice.
‘I can see that smarty pants. It’s new though, isn’t it? Who bought that for you? It can’t have been Greg.’
Poor Greg. Lovely as he was, he wasn’t the world’s most creative present buyer, usually opting for something practical like a pair of walking boots or a hairdryer over something useless but thoughtful.
‘Okay, it wasn’t Greg.’
Rose was intrigued now too, and was peering at it questioningly.
‘Oh my God, it’s from Adam isn’t it? You’ve seen him again!’ Sam smacked the sofa, which emitted a cloud of dust.
‘No!’
‘It is; you’ve gone bright red.’ Sam wriggled round to face me and leaned his elbows on his knees, legs crossed. ‘Come on Donnelly. Spill. What’s going on with you and sexy rock star Adam Bowers?’
Despite these two having been my best friends for so long, the time I’d been spending with Adam was something I’d wanted to keep to myself for a while longer. I hadn’t wanted it to be analysed, to make it more or less than it actually was. I’d wanted to hold it to myself, to keep it secret just a little bit longer, because the more we talked about it the more obvious it would be to us all that what I was doing was wrong.
‘I helped him, that’s all.’
Sam waited, not saying a word. I crumbled first.
‘He asked me if we could try and find some of his memories with music, and I agreed.’ I kept my eyes trained on my hands in front of me. ‘I mean, it is my job.’
‘Okaaay. And you’re sure there’s absolutely no other reason why you’d want to help him?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Mm hmm,’ Sam said. ‘So, where did it happen, this little therapy session?’
‘At his house.’
‘His house as in the Bower House?! You went there for this professional assessment?’
I nodded.
