ALLY

Up in the little converted washroom, it's dark. It's been dark for a while. I don't know if it was already dark when I sat down on the floor. It certainly wasn't dark when I opened the doors of the new DIY wardrobe. So, the sun must have set somewhere between then and the moment I felt my life being taken away from me.

My bags are still on the neatly made DIY bed. Closed. My stuff still inside. My books. My clothes. My laptop. My phone. No one called or messaged to see if I got here okay. No one called or messaged to tell me they made it back home safe either. Nothing changed. It only got dark and cold.

I hear the door creek open behind me but I don't turn around. I hear Emily's soft sigh as she sees me on the floor. I wait for her to say something, give her time to take in the fact that everything is exactly the same as she left it God knows how many hours ago. For all I know, or care, I may have been sitting on the stone floor staring at the back of the empty wardrobe for days, weeks.

I close my eyes against the stinging and a single tear escapes. I let it fall so that she doesn't see me wiping it. Just when I am about to ask her what the fuck she wants she says in that strange accent of hers, "I made soup. If you want something else that's okay too, I can whip something up. Just let me know if you're hungry."

Hungry?

Is she serious? No, I'm not hungry! My stomach writhes in protest of the idea of food.

I bite my tongue and stare fixedly at the back of the wardrobe until the door creeks to a close again.

#

Two days later. My bags are open but the wardrobe is still empty. My dad called this morning. He asked Emily if I was doing okay. She told him to talk to me and ask me himself but I shook my head at her. I didn't want to speak to him. He had no right to expect me to.

Emily just gave me a sad look and walked back out with the phone telling him that I'm still asleep. Maybe if he called later. But he didn't call. Nobody did. Not my friends. Not Jake.

I slide back into the DIY bed and pull the purple covers over my head. I hate purple.

#

According to the date on my phone, I have been in this room for three weeks now. I finally unpacked yesterday. Not that getting my clothes from the wardrobe instead of straight from my bag makes me feel any better. But I was angry. I was angry and upset and I needed something to do. I had been stalking Jake's Facebook hoping to get some idea of where he is and what he's doing and why he hasn't returned any of my calls or messages when he suddenly came online.

I hit him with another casual 'hey!' No smiley faces this time. I'm all smiley-faced out. The message was marked as seen the instant I sent it. But there was no reply. Tears were stinging the back of my eyes again. Why wasn't he talking to me?

And then I got my answer. His profile picture changed. He had the cover of 30 Seconds to Mars' latest album and replaced it with a picture of him in his real leather jacket, the one that makes him look at least two years older, the one I like so much. Sally Brooks was hanging on his arm with an in-your-face smile and a skirt so short it would make a prostitute blush.

#

I'm hot. I wipe the sweat on my face against the purple sheets before I fling them off me. The room is drenched in sunlight. It must be way past nine o'clock.

I reach over the bedside table for my phone. Quarter to ten. The bedside table is empty save for my retro alarm clock.
Where is she? Where is Emily with the coffee? Is that it? Has she given up on me too? What if she has? What will I do then? What if she won't let me stay with her anymore?

I mean, I'm sure she won't miss me, I'm not exactly good company. But I haven't given her any trouble either. I mostly stick to my room, save for ten minutes in the evening when I go down to eat something and then I come back up here. I'm very quiet. I can't possibly be disturbing her. All I do is scroll through mum's messages, reading them over and over again, trying to imagine her voice talking to me. Then I scroll through Jake's messages and cry myself to sleep. Then at some point I'll be woken up by a bad dream and do the same thing again.

I sit up and stare at the empty surface of the bedside table. I strain my ears to see if I can hear anything coming from downstairs. Nothing except for some boisterous children playing out on the alley steps.

I get out of bed and walk up to the bedroom window, opening it in hope for some breeze to replace the air inside. But it's just as still and stuffy outside. The sun is already blistering in the blue, cloudless sky. This island is like the fucking desert. Or maybe it's just my room.

I switch on the clinking fan and sit in front of it on the edge of the bed.
What if something happened to her? She always brings coffee at exactly nine o'clock, leaves it on the bedside table and leaves, slamming the door on her way out to make sure she wakes me up, even though I'm sure she knows I'm more often than not just pretending to be asleep. Emily and I don't talk very much but she always gives me the feeling that she can read my thoughts. That's why I've started to avoid eye contact recently. That and the fact that her hazel eyes are exactly like my mother's.

She reminds me of her. A lot. Ten minutes in the same room with her feel like hours of gut-wrenching heart-breaking tension that I'm not sure I can bear the weight of. I keep my eyes lowered at my food and try to focus on the music coming from the black DAB radio that always seems to be on in the background. But it's not enough to ignore her presence. I try so hard to pretend that I am really alone in the room but when she speaks, all I hear is my mother. She sounds just like her. The tone of her voice, the way she speaks so softly and so patiently, like she has all the time in the world, like there is nothing more important than whether I like the food in front of me or whether I had a good night's sleep.

And that's when I start to break down under all the anger and all the guilt and sadness that engulfs me so wholly that I can't make heads or tails of what emotion is stronger or why it's even there. All I know is that every time I try to answer, something in my throat snaps and something in my soul cracks and all I want to do is go back to my bed and cry.
But this morning it's different. This morning my bedside table has no coffee mug on it and that is just wrong.

I stand up and make my way to the door. I hear the faint music coming from two stories below as soon as I reach the stairs. I wonder if she leaves it on even when she leaves the house. Maybe she went out shopping or met up with a friend.

Does Emily have friends? I wouldn't know, would I?

I go down one step, then another and the air turns slightly cooler. Not much, but the shift in temperature makes it slightly easier to breathe. I go down the rest of the stairs until I reach the first landing. I take a look down the corridor that leads to her bedroom. Her door is closed and the high window at the end of the narrow hall is open. The curtains are lifted onto a heap on the ledge, just like my mum used to put them before she mopped the floor.

My hands start to shake at the memory of her humming out of tune as she finished her housework while I did my homework. I take a deep breath and slowly go down the next flight of stairs.
The smell of coffee reaches my nose as the music gets louder in my ears. I try to focus on the song to figure out what it is. It takes me a while to realise that the man's succulent voice is singing in Maltese.

I turn to the left and walk into the kitchen and a wave of relief tinged by a hint of confusion washes over me as I take in the scene in front of me.

Grandma Emily is at the counter making coffees for the both of us, hips wriggling absentmindedly to the beat. She turns around and places the mugs on the table then hides a bottle of anisette as she winks at me and says, "Don't tell your Dad."

#

My body drops onto the couch heavily. My head falls into my hands and my fingers lose themselves in my hair as though trying to hide in shame.

Nanna Millie didn't even look at me before she walked up to her room. I hear the door close behind her and the soft thud feels like a punch in the gut.

How could he do this to her?

She took me in. She took his only daughter off his hands. She did it without question, without resentment, even though he had kept me and my mother away from her all these years. And this is how he thanks her? By gambling away her money? Money she sent him to help him pay my mother's medical bills!

Because that's what he told her. That was his excuse for getting rid of me. He had too many bills to pay and he needed to work longer hours. My mother's treatment had left him bankrupt. That's what he said.

So, my grandmother took on another job to help him out. She was hoping once things got better, he might at least come to visit me. Because even though I never said anything, she knew I missed him. I missed my family. I missed my life back home.

But not anymore. Now, I know that home isn't there anymore. It hasn't been there since the day my mother died. And it has never been as clear as it is now. Millie is my only family. She opened her home to me and I have to make up for what my father did.

I go up to my room and turn on my laptop. I type 'Malta vacancies' into the search engine and start scrolling through the listings. My heart falls as I notice that many posts demand higher educational levels than what I have. I was supposed to start higher education this year. In fact, I was thinking about asking Millie to help me figure out how I can get into a school here. I had already emailed my secondary school administration office for my transcripts and a reference letter. But that will have to wait.

I have to find a way to repay what dad took from Millie.

Dad.

What kind of a father would do something like this? He neglected my mother when she was sick. He neglected me after she died and when even that wasn't enough, he sent me away. And now this.

I have to fix this. I can't lose Millie too. Not now. Not after everything she's done for me.

And then I see it.

'Sales Assistant wanted to work in a beauty store in Paola. Must be able to read, write and converse in Maltese or English. Previous experience is considered an asset.'

Bingo!