The Memory Library, page 1
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The Memory Library
KATE STOREY
Published by AVON
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
www.harpercollins.co.uk
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2024
Copyright © Lisa Timoney 2024
Cover design by Ellie Game/HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
Cover photographs: Getty Images (books, front cover) and Shutterstock.com (all other images)
Lisa Timoney asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 978-0-00-865854-0
Ebook Edition © February 2024 ISBN: 978-0-00-865855-7
Version: [2023-12-30]
For
Zoe and Vicky
X
Contents
Cover
Readers adore The Memory Library
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About the Author
About the Publisher
Prologue
Sally
Thirty-Four Years Ago
Despite her years of experience reading aloud to children, Sally was horrified to find she couldn’t stop her voice from wavering. It started when she came to the words ‘A woman in a lonely home’ in Jo’s poem, near the end of Little Women. The phrase seemed to describe her so exactly, she lost control of her vocal cords.
She was reading her daughter’s bedtime story, so forced a cough to disguise the emotion in her voice. She shuffled closer to Ella on the single bed, giving her thin leg a squeeze through the duvet. Turning the well-thumbed page, she angled the book to catch the light from the bedside lamp and read on, “Be worthy, love, and love will come.”
She paused, swallowing hard. Ella looked up, dark eyes reflecting the twinkling fairy lights wound around the bedpost behind them.
Sally gathered a smile. ‘You, my darling, are worthy of love.’ She tweaked Ella’s nose. ‘All the love in the world.’
‘You are too, Mummy,’ said Ella. ‘And Daddy.’
The last part of her daughter’s statement was predictable. There was no Mummy without Daddy in Ella’s small world. To be honest, Sally was relieved she featured at all. Ella had been a daddy’s girl from the moment she could express a preference and Sally tried not to mind. She was glad, in a way, that Ella’s bond with Neil was still as strong as ever. He could do no wrong in the eyes of their daughter, despite being too busy to attend her birthday pool party at the Arches earlier that afternoon. Ella’s devotion suggested she was blissfully oblivious to the increasingly frequent arguments and the dismissive way her dad spoke to her mum. Or she didn’t care. But that was too unpleasant to think about.
She should be oblivious at her tender age. Being eight was a magical time of life, in Sally’s opinion. She adored teaching Year Four children because, at that age, they were smack bang in the middle of living delightfully playful yet serious lives. To Sally, children this age were like butterflies emerging from their chrysalises and she thought it a privilege to be a part of the process.
‘I like Jo’s poem,’ Ella said.
She reached for the copy of Little Women, which Sally’s own mother had given to her thirty years before, and began to read in a voice a tone infinitesimally lower than her childish voice of last year. She read the poem with a faltering rhythm as she attempted unfamiliar words, pointing to lament, then immortal, with a bitten fingernail, waiting for Sally to pronounce them and then explain the meaning before reading on.
Sally glanced around the darkening room as Ella read the closing pages of the book, her gaze pausing on the wardrobe and chest of drawers with pink handles, then the duvet cover with its pattern of colourful Russian dolls. How long until Ella wanted a more grown-up bedroom, with posters of pop stars Sally had never heard of?
Ella’s voice grew louder as she read, ‘“Oh, my girls, however long you may live, I never can wish you a greater happiness than this!”’
Sally felt the sentiment of that familiar final line to her core. She pulled Ella towards her and dropped kisses on top of her head. ‘Did you like it?’ she asked, drawing away and looking into her face.
‘I loved it!’ Ella squealed. ‘I want to be Jo when I grow up!’
Sally’s heart swelled. She reached under the bed and pulled out a new copy of Little Women. Solemnly, she handed the book with the illustration of Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy on the jacket to Ella. ‘This is your special copy to keep forever.’
Ella’s eyes grew wide. ‘Thank you, Mummy.’ She opened the front cover slowly.
Sally held her breath. The tradition of giving her daughter a book inscribed with a message had turned eight years old today, but for the first four years at least, it hadn’t held any significance to Ella. To see that she now anticipated the note and opened the book with such reverence made Sally’s throat clog with tears. She watched Ella’s face as she read what she’d carefully written on the inside page.
A moment later, Ella turned, wrapping her arms around Sally’s neck. Despite a bubble bath, her hair still smelled of chlorine from the swimming pool. Sally recalled the joy on her daughter’s face when she and her friends had held hands, whooped and leapt into the pool, splashing and giggling with utter glee. She stored it in the album of special memories in her mind, wondering how Neil could choose work, or anything else, above spending today with his only child.
With her arms still around her little girl, Sally heard the bang of the front door closing and her husband’s fading footsteps on the pavement of Circus Street below. Her body t
Relieved when the question didn’t come, she pushed her face further into Ella’s hair and whispered, ‘Happy birthday, Ella. Happy birthday, my gorgeous girl,’ all the time wondering what she needed to do to keep her small family together, and determined not to let Ella see her tears.
Chapter One
Ella
Present Day
The trill of her phone echoed around the open-plan kitchen, making Ella jump. She’d only just poured her first coffee of the day. If she was Queen of the World, no devices would be activated until 100mg of caffeine had been absorbed into her bloodstream. She played the “If she was Queen” of the World game a lot in her head. It didn’t get her anywhere. The phone kept ringing.
Glenda’s name was on the screen. That made her uneasy. She did the maths; it was seven a.m. here in Sydney, so it was ten p.m. back in London. Why would her mother’s next-door neighbour be ringing her at this time?
Ella took the phone off charge and accepted the call.
‘Hi, Glenda.’
‘Ella,’ Glenda’s voice sounded tinny and even more cut-glass than she remembered. ‘I hope you’re well?’
She had a breakfast meeting. No time for small talk. ‘Yes, Glenda. Listen,’ she said, taking a slurp of coffee and waving good morning to Charlie, who was wandering down their slatted staircase in a T-shirt and boxers. Why couldn’t her husband put some trousers on before coming downstairs, like a civilised person? Their open-plan living space was mainly encased in glass, and she was sure random delivery drivers could do without the intimate image of Charlie’s anatomy. ‘Can I call you back another time? I’ve got a meeting—’
‘It’s your mum,’ said Glenda. ‘She’s had a bad fall.’
Ella put the cup down. ‘A fall?’ Her mother was only seventy-two. She’d seemed fit and healthy the last time Ella had FaceTimed her. When was that – last week? The week before? She certainly didn’t seem in any way doddery. She still cycled everywhere. The bike. That must be it. Ella knew cycling in London was a terrible idea. She’d told her mother that plenty of times before. ‘Is she all right? Did she fall off that bloody bike?’
Charlie came to her side, eyebrows knitted.
‘No, I haven’t seen her on the bike for a while. I’ve just left her at the hospital.’
Charlie was standing too close, his eyes screwed up as if he wanted answers when she didn’t know what the hell was going on herself. Ella turned her back on him and marched towards the floor-to-ceiling window. She held the phone to her ear and looked out over the valley. ‘What happened? How is she?’
She sensed Charlie hovering behind her and, exasperated, she switched the call to speaker mode and held the handset flat.
‘She’s gone into surgery,’ Glenda’s voice boomed into the room.
‘Surgery?’ Ella’s mouth went dry. She felt Charlie’s hand on her shoulder and, for the first time in a long time, she didn’t want to shrug him off. ‘What for?’
‘She’s broken her right wrist, or maybe it was fractured? Is there a difference? Anyway, they’re pinning it . . . or something . . . I can’t quite remember what the doctor said. Something about a complicated—’
‘Is she all right?’
‘Well, no, dear. She’s broken her wrist and two of the fingers on her other hand.’ Glenda sounded irritated. ‘She was very distressed. It was upsetting to see her so vulnerable.’
Ella tasted bitter coffee at the back of her mouth. Vulnerable wasn’t a word she would ever choose to describe her mother. But Glenda knew Sally as well as she did, probably better, so what she said must be true. ‘Sorry, right. Okay.’ The thought of her mother lying on a table in an operating theatre made her light-headed. They might not be close, but she didn’t like to think of her mum alone and in pain. ‘Is it just her hands? Did she hurt anything else?’
‘She’s got some bruising on her face. It’s a blessed miracle only her hands are broken,’ said Glenda. ‘And the state of the place! It’s going to take some sorting out.’
‘What happened?’ Ella’s mind went back to her childhood home. She saw the handsome Georgian building, which was already in disrepair when she was last there, and that was years ago. Guilt tried to take hold of her, but she fought it. It wasn’t her fault that house no longer felt like her home.
‘She left the bath running.’
Ella raised her eyes to the ceiling, then glanced at Charlie, whose face was uncharacteristically serious.
‘From what I can gather, she rushed in when she realised it was flooding, slipped on the tiles and tried to break her fall with her hands.’
Ella covered her mouth. She could see the scene unfold: the water cascading over the top of the claw-foot bath onto the black and white tiles, her bird-like mother tearing in and skidding on the water, pitching forwards, arms outstretched. The snap of bones.
Charlie took the phone from her, holding the speaker near his mouth. ‘Hi, Glenda. Charlie here. Obviously, Ella’s a bit upset, so can I get the details?’
‘Hello, Charlie.’ Glenda’s voice seemed to melt. That happened a lot, especially with older women, who found Charlie irresistible. His voice alone seemed to do the trick. He was the type of man who made eye contact and actually listened when women spoke. A rare breed, especially in Sydney. Watching him now, Ella wondered when she’d stopped appreciating that kind of attention. Now his habit of talking about everything just felt inefficient. There wasn’t enough time in the day to sit around in your pants, chatting. Not enough time in her day, anyway. She felt the minutes ticking away. ‘Did she hit her head, or anything?’ he asked.
‘She must’ve caught her face on the way down, but the doctors didn’t seem unduly concerned about the bruising on her cheek. They checked for concussion. They were very thorough with X-rays and all that business. She’s got an infection of some sort, but they’re giving her antibiotics for that. She’s going to be up the creek without a paddle for a while though, since both hands are scuppered.’
Ella could see where this was leading and took the phone back from Charlie. ‘I can’t tell you how much I appreciate all you do for her, Glenda. It means the world to know she has you to look out for her.’
‘Well, you know I do what I can.’ There was a pause. Ella closed her eyes, anticipating what was coming next. ‘But it’s May in a couple of days.’
Charlie shrugged in incomprehension, but Ella knew exactly what Glenda meant. She’d been her neighbour too when she was a child and Ella remembered waving from the street when Glenda and her husband climbed into a taxi for their annual month away in Antibes.
‘When do you fly?’
‘In two days. I’m sorry, Ella, but the house in France is ready. I have friends joining me. I can’t—’
‘Of course,’ said Ella. ‘Of course.’ She scrunched her face, embarrassed. ‘I don’t suppose there’s anyone else . . . ?’
‘There are students on the other side now,’ said Glenda. ‘So, they won’t be of much use, though they seem nice enough. One of the girls is American and her family must be incredibly wealthy because they bought the house for her to live in with her friends while she studies at university. Imagine that.’
Ella tried to imagine but failed. The houses on Circus Street would be astronomically expensive to buy these days. She knew it had been a stretch for her parents in the late Seventies, despite them both working and her father making partner at the law firm he worked at.
‘And, I don’t know . . . your mother seems to have been keeping to herself more recently.’
That didn’t sound like her mum at all. Ella’s abiding memories were of her mother preparing for a committee meeting at the library, or a jaunt to see her favourite stallholders at the market. It was part of the reason she didn’t feel quite so guilty about living on the other side of the world. Her mother was never going to be lonely without her. She was too busy.
‘She needs you, Ella.’
She stared through the window at the blue sky. The weather was less predictably warm now May was approaching. Soon, she’d need to remember to take her jacket to work, and before she knew it, she’d be leaving in the dark and getting home after sunset. After Willow was asleep.
She thought of London in the spring, the trees budding in the private garden in the middle of Gloucester Circus. She thought of her mother alone in a hospital bed. ‘Is she in Lewisham Hospital? Could you give me the details?’
