Byrne, Tanya Heart Shaped Bruis

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.HEART-SHAPED BRUISETanya ByrneCopyright © 2012 Tanya ByrneThe right of Tanya Byrne to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.First published as an Ebook by Headline Publishing Group in 2012All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British LibraryeISBN : 978 0 7553 9306 0HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUPAn Hachette UK Company338 Euston RoadLondon NW1 3BHwww.headline.co.ukwww.hachette.co.ukTable of ContentsTitle PageCopyright PageAbout the BookAbout the AuthorDedicationChapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5Chapter 6Chapter 7Chapter 8Chapter 9Chapter 10Chapter 11Chapter 12Chapter 13Chapter 14Chapter 15Chapter 16Chapter 17Chapter 18Chapter 19Chapter 20Chapter 21Chapter 22Chapter 23Chapter 24Chapter 25Chapter 26Chapter 27Chapter 28Chapter 29Chapter 30Chapter 31Chapter 32Chapter 33Chapter 34Chapter 35Chapter 36Chapter 37Chapter 38Chapter 39Chapter 40Chapter 41Chapter 42Chapter 43AcknowledgmentsAuthor Q&A with Tanya ByrneReading Group QuestionsLast year, the psychiatric unit of Archway Young Offenders Institution was closed.A notebook was found in one of the rooms.The contents are as follows.About the BookThey say I’m evil.The police.The newspapers.The girls from school who sigh on the six o’clock news and say they always knew there was something not quite right about me.And everyone believes it.Including you.But you don’t know.You don’t know who I used to be.Who I could have been.Sometimes I wonder if I’ll ever shake off my mistakes or if I’ll just carry them around with me forever like a bunch of red balloons.Awaiting trial at Archway Young Offenders Institution, Emily Koll is going to tell her side of the story for the first time.Heart-Shaped Bruise is a compulsive and moving novel about infamy, identity and how far a person might go to seek revenge.About the AuthorTanya Byrne was born in London and studied in Surrey, where she still lives with her cat who goes by several names, none of which he actually answers to.After eight years working for BBC Radio, she left to write her debut novel, Heart-Shaped Bruise.She has a weakness for boys with guitars, drinks far too much tea and even though her mother tells her not to, she always talks to strangers.Tanya is currently working on her second novel.For Jacob.Reach for the sky.Juliet,I know you’ve been waiting three months for this letter, but I have to start by saying that this isn’t an apology.I’m not sorry.I’m not.If I have to spend the rest of my life crossing that word out of every dictionary I find, I will.So, if that’s what you’ve been waiting for me to say, why you keep writing to me, stop reading now.This is the only letter I’m going to write you, and the only reason I’m writing it is because you keep asking me why I did what I did.I guess you don’t believe them when they say that I’m out of my mind.I don’t know.I might be.My normal and everyone else’s normal isn’t the same any more.Mine is out of time, like I’m a record playing at the wrong speed or something.That’s why I’m letting them do this to me, why I swallow their pills and sit here, scratching my sins into the walls.But that’s not why I did it.You must know that, otherwise you wouldn’t be asking.So, okay, you want to know why? This is why: you stabbed my father.That’s it.What don’t you understand? China shop rules, Juliet: you break it, you pay for it, and you broke me.You got what you deserved.Now leave me alone.EmilyThat was the only thing I was supposed to write in this notebook.When Doctor Gilyard gave it to me yesterday, she told me to write the letter to Juliet and give it back when I was ready.I was going to, but, earlier, while I was hiding a cigarette on top of my wardrobe, I found a letter to someone called Will.I know I shouldn’t have, but I read it and – my heart.I didn’t think it still worked, but I felt it again, all hot and red and heavy in my chest.I don’t know why the letter is still here; it’s in an envelope with the address on it and everything.Maybe the girl who wrote it – Sonia, who loves Will, and slept in this bed before me – forgot to take it with her when she left.Or maybe she was too scared to send it.I’m not.That’s the first thing I’m going to do when I get out of here, because Will, whoever he is, deserves to know how much he’s loved.God knows, no one will ever love me like that.Not now.So I found Will’s letter on top of the wardrobe and you found this notebook there, too, and that’s the way it should be, I think.Everywhere I go I try to leave a piece of myself behind.I’ll never be lost because there are bits of me scattered all over London; compliments written on the back of Starbucks receipts, secrets scribbled in public toilets.It’s like I’m everywhere, all at once.Waitresses will think of me and smile.Bathroom walls will remember me.I’ll live for ever.You should try it – leave something on top of the wardrobe before you go.If there’s something you want to say to someone but you can’t, write it down and leave it behind for someone else to read.That’s why I’m writing this now.It’s easier this way, kind of like how you can tell the stranger sitting next to you on the bus all of your secrets, but you can’t tell your best friend because best friends never forget.So, here we go, I’ll be me and you be the stranger on the bus.This isn’t a journal.I’m eighteen; I don’t have the patience for journals any more.I don’t have the patience for straight lines, either.I tend to avoid them.So don’t expect this to be all this-happened-then-this-happened-then-this-happened because my brain doesn’t work like that.You’d be bored anyway.As for what you do with this notebook, that’s up to you.Tell the nurses, tell Doctor Gilyard.I don’t care.You can even put it back on top of the wardrobe and pretend you never saw it if you want.But I need to say this, to be rid of it.I can’t keep carrying it around with me; I’m buckling under the weight of it.I look at myself sometimes, at the broken lines across the palms of my hands and the creases in my elbows, and I can see myself coming apart at the seams.Like today, with Doctor Gilyard.I never speak first.Never.I’ve seen her once a week since I got here and I haven’t said a word without being prompted.But this morning, I sat down and before she even opened her notebook, I said: ‘I know what you think of me.’It came from nowhere, I swear.For a moment I thought I meant it, that I’d turned the corner she’d been dragging me towards.But then she took her glasses off and as she did, I saw her fingers flutter and I realised that I did that to her – I did that – and some imbalance in the universe tipped back in my direction.‘What do I think of you, Emily?’ she asked, but it was too late, the moment was gone; I’d faltered, but I’d still scored the first point.It was cruel, I suppose [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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