Jojo Moyes after you Contents 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 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS FOLLOW PENGUIN For my grandmother, Betty McKee c h apt er on e The big man at the end of the bar is sweating He holds his head low over his double Scotch, but every few minutes he glances up and out, behind him, towards the door A fine sheen of perspiration glistens under the strip-lights He lets out a long, shaky breath, disguised as a sigh, and turns back to his drink ‘Hey Excuse me?’ I look up from polishing glasses ‘Can I get another one here?’ I want to tell him it’s really not a good idea, it won’t help, it might even put him over the limit But he’s a big guy and it’s fifteen minutes till closing time and, according to company guidelines, I have no reason to tell him no, so I walk over, take his glass and hold it up to the op- tic He nods at the bottle ‘Double,’ he says, and slides a fat hand down his damp face ‘That’ll be seven pounds twenty, please.’ It’s a quarter to eleven on a Tuesday night and the Shamrock and Clover, East City Airport’s Irish-themed pub, which is as Irish as Mahatma Gandhi, is winding down for the night The bar closes ten minutes after the last plane takes off, and right now it’s just me, an intense young man with a laptop, the cackling women at table two and the man nursing a double Jameson’s waiting for either the SC107 to Stockholm or the DB224 to Munich – the latter has been delayed for forty minutes I’ve been on since midday, as Carly has a stomach-ache and went home I don’t mind I never mind staying late Humming softly to Celtic Pipes of the Emerald Isle, Vol III, I walk over and collect the glasses from the two women, who are peering intently at some video I looked down at our hands, which were entwined I found myself staring at them, as if I had to memorize how his felt against mine, as if I had failed to revise for some vital exam that had come too soon A strange panic was welling inside me, and I think he felt it because he squeezed my fingers ‘Got everything?’ He nodded towards my other hand ‘Passport? Boarding pass? Address of where you’re going?’ ‘Nathan is meeting me at JFK.’ I didn’t want to let him go I felt like a magnet gone awry, being pulled between two poles I stood aside as other couples stepped towards Departures together, towards their adventures, or extracted themselves tearfully from each other’s arms He was watching them too He stepped back from me gently, and kissed my fingers before releasing my hand ‘Time to go,’ he said I had a million things to say and none I knew how I stepped forward and kissed him, like people kiss at airports, full of love and desperate longing, kisses that must imprint themselves on their recipient for the journey, the weeks, the months ahead With that kiss, I tried to tell him the enormity of what he meant to me I tried to show him that he was the answer to a question I hadn’t even known I had been asking I tried to thank him for wanting me to be me, more than he wanted to make me stay In truth I probably just told him I’d drunk two large coffees without brushing my teeth ‘You take care,’ I said ‘Don’t rush back to work And don’t any building stuff.’ ‘My brother’s coming to take over the brickwork tomorrow.’ ‘And if you go back, don’t get hurt You are totally crap on the not-getting-shot thing.’ ‘Lou I’m going to be fine.’ ‘I mean it I’m going to email Donna when I get to New York and tell her I’ll hold her personally responsible if anything else happens to you Or maybe I’ll just tell your boss to put you on desk duty Or send you to some really sleepy station in north Norfolk Or maybe make you wear bulletproof vests Have they thought of issuing bulletproof vests? I bet I could buy a good one in New York if –’ ‘Louisa.’ He pushed a lock of hair back from my eyes And I felt my face crumple I placed it against his and clenched my jaw and breathed in the scent of him, trying to embed some of that solidity into myself And then, before I could change my mind, I let out a strangled ‘Bye’ that might have been a sob or a cough or a stupid half-laugh, I’m not sure even I could tell And I turned and walked briskly towards security, pulling my case behind me, before I could change my mind I flashed the new passport, the ESTA that was my key to my future at a uniformed official, whose face I could barely make out through my tears And then as I was waved through, almost on impulse, I spun on my heel There he was, standing against the barrier, still watching We locked eyes, and he lifted a hand, his palm open, and I lifted mine slowly in return I fixed that image of him in my imagination – the way he tilted forward, the light on his hair, the steady way he always looked at me – somewhere where I could draw it up on lonely days Because there would be lonely days And bad days And days when I wondered what the hell I had just agreed to be part of Because that was all part of the adventure too I love you, I mouthed, not sure if he could even see the words from here And then, holding my passport tight in my hand, I turned away He would be there, watching as my plane gathered speed and lifted into the great blue sky beyond And, with luck, he would be there, waiting, when I came home again Acknowledgements Thank you, as ever, to my agent, Sheila Crowley, and my editor Louise Moore, for their continuing faith and endless support Thanks to the many talented people at Penguin Michael Joseph who help turn a raw draft into something glossy on legions of bookshelves, particularly: Maxine Hitchcock, Francesca Russell, Hazel Orme, Hattie AdamSmith, Sophie Elletson, Tom Weldon, and all the unsung heroes who help get us authors out there I love being part of your team Huge gratitude to everyone who works alongside Sheila at Curtis Brown for your support, especially Rebecca Ritchie, Katie McGowan, Sophie Harris, Nick Marston, Kat Buckle, Raneet Ahuja, Jess Cooper, Alice Lutyens, Sara Gad and of course Jonny Geller In the US, thank you to the inimitable Bob Bookman It’s in the box, Bob! Thank you for friendship, advice and wisdomfilled lunches on related stuff to Cathy Runciman, Maddy Wickham, Sarah Millican, Ol Parker, Polly Samson, Damian Barr, Alex Heminsley, Jess Ruston and all at Writersblock You all rock Closer to home, thank you to Jackie Tearne (I will be up to date with email one day, I promise!), Claire Roweth, Chris Luckley, Drew Hazell, and everyone who helps me what I Thank you also to the cast and crew of Me Before You To be there as my characters were made flesh was an extraordinary privilege, and one I will never forget You were all, uniformly, brilliant (but especially you, Emilia and Sam) Thanks and love to my parents – Jim Moyes and Lizzie Sanders – and most of all to Charles, Saskia, Harry and Lockie My world And a final thank you to the legions of people who wrote, via Twitter or facebook or my website, caring enough about Lou to want to know what happened to her I might not have considered writing this book if she hadn’t continued to live so vividly in your imaginations I’m so glad she did ‘Me Before You, at its heart, is about two people who properly listen to each other; it is something good’ Independent on Sunday ‘Utterly absorbing and blissfully romantic’ Daily Telegraph Where Lou’s story began … Available to download now ‘Raw, funny, real and sad, this is storytelling at its best’ Marie Claire ‘Moyes does a majestic job of conjuring a cast of characters who are charismatic, credible and utterly compelling’ Independent on Sunday Available to download now ‘Another heart-stoppingly brilliant novel from Jojo Moyes’ Marie Claire ‘Wonderfully well-written and completely engrossing’ Daily Mail Available to download now THE BEGINNING Let the conversation begin Follow the Penguin Twitter.com@penguinukbooks Keep up-to-date with all our stories YouTube.com/penguinbooks Pin ‘Penguin Books’ to your Pinterest Like ‘Penguin Books’ on Facebook.com/penguinbooks Listen to Penguin at SoundCloud.com/penguin-books Find out more about the author and discover more stories like this at Penguin.co.uk MICHAEL JOSEPH UK | USA | Canada | Ireland | Australia India | New Zealand | South Africa Michael Joseph is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com First published 2015 Copyright © Jojo’s Mojo Ltd, 2015 The moral right of the author has been asserted ISBN: 978-1-405-90908-2 Thank you for evaluating ePub to PDF Converter That is a trial version Get full version in http://www.epubto-pdf.com/?pdf_out