After the Rain Read online

  NATÁLIA GOMES has an MLitt in Literature & Creative Writing and an MEd in Education. Inspired by her teaching experiences, Natália started writing fiction with a focus on mental health among young adults. Her debut novel Dear Charlie is endorsed by Amnesty International and was longlisted for the 2018 International Dublin Literary Award and We Are Not Okay was selected for Nottingham’s Big City Reads in 2019. Natália is currently a full-time writer, PhD student and mummy to a crazy toddler.

  Follow Natália on Instagram @ndgomes and on Twitter @nd_gomes

  Also by Natália Gomes

  Dear Charlie

  Blackbird

  We Are Not Okay

  Copyright

  An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2021

  Copyright © Natália Gomes 2021

  Natália Gomes asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue record for 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 e-book 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.

  Ebook Edition © June 2021 ISBN: 9780008291822

  Version 2021-06-30

  Note to Readers

  This ebook contains the following accessibility features which, if supported by your device, can be accessed via your ereader/accessibility settings:

  Change of font size and line height

  Change of background and font colours

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  Text to speech

  Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780008291815

  For Scott and Eilidh xx

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Author

  Booklist

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Note to Readers

  Dedication

  Note on the text

  Alice’s Playlist

  Jack’s Playlist

  Epigraph

  Alice

  Jack

  Spring Awakens: Part 1

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Summer Blooms: Part 2

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Fall Backwards: Part 3

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Winter Darkness: Part 4

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Alice

  Jack

  Acknowledgements

  About the Publisher

  Note on the text

  To ensure Jack and Alice’s chapters are completely authentic to their voices we have matched the spelling to their backgrounds. Therefore Alice’s chapters use American spelling and Jack’s use British spelling.

  Alice’s Playlist

  Smith & Thell – ‘Alice’

  Of Monsters and Men – ‘Wild Roses’

  First Aid Kit – ‘It’s a Shame’

  Juke Ross – ‘Shadows in the Dark’

  Phoebe Bridgers – ‘Georgia’

  Birdy – ‘People Help The People’

  First Aid Kit – ‘Emmylou’

  Joy Williams – ‘Ordinary World’

  Gabrielle Aplin – ‘Home’

  London Grammar – ‘Strong’

  Jack’s Playlist

  Dermot Kennedy – ‘After Rain’

  Imagine Dragons – ‘Birds’

  Lord Huron – ‘The Night We Met’

  The Head and the Heart – ‘Another Story’

  Seth Talley – ‘New Day’

  The Collection – ‘Beautiful Life’

  Vance Joy – ‘Mess is Mine’

  The Head and the Heart – ‘Lost in my Mind’

  AHI – ‘Ol’ Sweet Day’

  Of Monsters and Men – ‘Human’

  ‘The whole world is divided for me into two parts: one is she, and there is all happiness, hope, light; the other is where she is not, and there is dejection and darkness …’

  Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

  Alice

  There’s nothing like the smell of a library.

  A combination of dust, musk and ink.

  Many of the books found in libraries, especially in the UK where they tend to be pre-nineteenth century prints, use materials like cotton, linen and groundwood pulp to make the pages. Even though it smells a bit like coffee and cigars, it’s really cellulose decay we’re smelling when we get to the heart of a library space. Most position their study tables here, right in the middle, to allow its most devout booklovers to bask in the smell whilst being surrounded by stacks and pillars of reading material, most of which they’ll never get through in their lifetime. Because a human lifetime is too short to read all the amazing books in the world. Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Twain, Joyce, Woolf, Orwell, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Hemingway, Austen, Dickens, the Brontë sisters.

  The best libraries have all of the above.

  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a book snob. I read pretty much anything, and I am a self-proclaimed sci-fi and fantasy geek. I’m not ashamed. I would just as easily pick up a Tolstoy book (if I had months to spare to get through one) as I would a novel by Wells, Bradbury, Tolkien, Brooks, Gaiman or Martin.

  To me it’s all the same. It’s not the material, or how high it ranks in the bestseller lists or whether it’s featured in Cambridge University’s handbook of Faculty Recommended Texts issued by their English department each year. It’s much simpler than that.

  For me, it’s the act of reading. The process of picking a book that you really want to jump into immediately, then the finding of the perfect space in which to do so. Now, the latter is much more dif
ficult than the former. Finding the right book has never been a problem for me. I know what I want even when I don’t know. I’ll browse the shelves at the library, occasionally shifting between floors, genres, and alphabetical collections. But when I spot a title, I just know. The search is over. Most people have stacks of books by their bed; TBRs, book bloggers call them – To Be Read. But me, I’ve always had just one sitting on my bedside cabinet. A sole literary journey. That one book I commit to until I’m done cover to cover and need to choose another. Then I keep going. I keep a log of all the books I’ve read and each year try to beat my record. Stephen King reads eighty-four books a year. I’ve yet to beat him. But I will one day.

  So the perfect reading space. It has to be quiet enough where you can really immerse yourself in the story world being presented to you by the author, but not so quiet where the world gets invaded by your own wandering thoughts – Do I feel like another latte? How many have I had today? What’s worse for you – a muffin or a Danish? What did Mom say she was making for dinner tonight? What’s that tapping sound, who has a laptop here?

  So the perfect amount of background noise to assist you, then the perfect temperature. If the space is too hot, you get restless and pulled away from the pages of your book, and if it’s too cold you get preoccupied with trying to warm yourself with additional clothing, hot drinks, and maybe a blanket if you have access to one. Then the seat you’re on – not too soft where you melt into it and suddenly feel a nap coming on, and not too hard where backache strikes you at a pivotal moment in the narrative. Yes, this sounds like an impossible task – finding the right space to read in. But considering how much I’ve moved around in my rather short lifetime, I’ve always found one. In Texas, it was this little book nook in their local library, on the East Coast there were many coffee shops to choose from, usually around the Harvard or MIT campuses. Those students are also searching for the perfect space, but to write scientific essays in or jot down philosophical musings. Having only lived in London for three months, I have already narrowed it down to two spaces – the library on St James’s Square and a coffee shop in Southwark.

  Today, being a Saturday morning and a popular time for coffee and brunch with friends, I chose the library. My corner has a comfy weathered leather armchair underneath a large window that looks onto the square. After this, I’ll take a walk towards Leicester Square and see if it’s dry enough to find a bench to sit on and a tree to shelter under from the rain.

  I climb up on my knees and gaze out the library window. The trees billow in the rainy breeze and stretch their branches long. Although wet from the rain, it was still fairly warm when I left the house this morning, by British standards, of course, maybe a little chilly by American, but I brought a fleece-lined raincoat today. I pull the collar of my cardigan across my throat and breathe in its warmth. This, what they call ‘summer’ here, is more like fall to me. I don’t get it. How can people go outside in shorts and camisoles in weather like this? I lean in and spot a runner in the square. One foot in front of the other, he dodges strollers, couples, friends, dog-walkers, fellow athletes, even the rain.

  Ugh.

  Another thing I don’t get – voluntary torture in the form of running.

  Why?

  Jack

  There’s nothing like the first step of a long run.

  The moment your foot hits the ground and you’re propelled to the next step. The initial shock to the muscles as the impact shoots up the ankle to the calves, knees and to the thighs. You feel it everywhere, in your belly, your chest. When people ask me to describe what running’s like, I always say the same thing – ‘It’s freeing.’ Because that’s exactly how I feel when I step outside – free. When the air hits your face – free. When your muscles warm and your momentum builds – free. When you pass cars stuck in traffic and clusters of people huddled in long queues standing at bus stops, tube stations and outside quaint local cafés – free. Everyone’s static, sedentary, but you, you’re free.

  I used to run to music. I used to need motivation to get moving, to go faster, but not now. Now I run without headphones, without playlists, without the suffocation of noise to drown out what’s really important to me on a run. The freedom. You can’t get that exhilarating feeling from a perfectly crafted playlist that builds from a warm-up music sequence to a series of high-paced beats aimed at synchronising your stride. That point where your muscles don’t ache anymore, where your lungs don’t want to burst from your chest, where that small part within you urging you to slow or begin your cool down early finally silences and accepts what you’ve known all along. That running is incredible.

  I reach Covent Garden as the rain gets heavier, passing a bride holding a white umbrella standing next to her groom as they pose for photos by the Seven Dials clock, and continue on to Leicester Square. The crowds are overwhelming here. Tourists with extended selfie sticks posing in front of the Shakespeare statue, families feeding the pigeons, kids throwing coins into the fountain, couples huddled into each other in shop doorways sheltering from the rain. I know so many other run routes away from the hustle of central London, but sometimes I love coming here. I love cutting through the crowds, sidestepping to avoid the drones that flock here like the hungry pigeons. I love the challenge of dodging the obstacles of city life. It gives me a thrill. I only run in the city on Saturday mornings, before squash games or breakfast with the guys. The rest of the time I run near my house in Surrey taking in the quieter routes – the river trails, parks, woodland areas. Sometimes I love the silence, where it’s just you and nature. Where the only sounds surrounding you as you speed up are those of the trees in the breeze, the rain on their leaves, the birds overhead, and the pounding of your feet on the ground.

  It’s like a drum. You’re creating your own music.

  Thud.

  Thud.

  Thud.

  Free.

  No burdens. No responsibilities. Just me. My runs are my own, I don’t share them with anyone.

  Except Strava.

  I have to post my runs otherwise I won’t get kudos from my 492 followers. Speaking of, what’s my pace like so far?

  ‘Hey, watch it!’

  I turn and see a girl bent over, her books and a yellow polka dot umbrella scattered on the ground around her. Did I do that?

  ‘You just ran right into me, jerk!’

  Damn, I forgot to hit ‘pause’, my Strava post is already ruined. My pace is way down, and now I’m barely jogging on the spot. I’ll still get the kudos, I always do, but now it looks like my pace is slower than yesterday’s. People will think I’m getting tired.

  I glance down at the phone still in my hand, raindrops on the screen, and hit ‘pause’. Then I take a step towards her to help with the books.

  ‘No, don’t bother,’ she yells at me. ‘Clearly your phone is more important than watching where you’re going.’

  She’s American. I know her from school, I think. A recent transfer, perhaps. I open my mouth to say hi but an empty coffee cup rolls by her feet, the milky brown contents spilled out on a couple of book covers. I close my mouth; maybe not the time. The rest of the liquid is down her coat. Her cheeks are burning red like her curly hair and she looks like she’s about to go off again so I start edging backwards. She looks angrier now. She either wants my help or she doesn’t. I don’t think she even knows. So I turn around and hit ‘resume’ on my run. I’d be all the way around the corner by now if it wasn’t for her, probably onto the next segment of my run. That two-minute exchange cost me my PB pace. My legs are seizing up from the abrupt stop.

  I feel the heat before I hear the noise. It strikes my face, my shoulders, my bare shins. It burns at first then it erupts, a dirty fog engulfing me and I don’t feel pain anymore.

  I don’t feel anything.

  Spring Awakens

  Part 1

  A bird’s first song,

  A bud’s first bloom,

  Raindrops on my hand,

  Seedli
ngs under my feet,

  The sharpness of its birth is on my fingertips,

  Nothing is as new and raw as spring,

  Nothing is as temporary,

  For its beauty will eventually wilt and die,

  Leaving us to wonder, what will remain after?

  Alice Winters

  Alice

  The car alarms.

  They throb and vibrate against my ear drums. That’s all I hear since I left the hospital an hour ago. The ringing. Everything feels different. The air around me, the mattress underneath me, the quilt on my fingertips as I drag them into a fist. My toes turn inside my new trainers and make a triangle. The white is almost too white. They’re too clean, too new, too pure. I hadn’t expected to have to take them out of the box so soon, but I didn’t have anything else to wear. When I arrived at the hospital, I was missing one completely. Now these shoes feel tight on me. My toes are crushed against the front. I squirm, the fabric stiff around my ankle crease. I need them off. I tuck one foot behind the other and gently ease one off then I bend down to yank the other one. A sharp pain stretches across my spine. I place a hand over my mouth to stifle a cry, wondering if I just split the stitches. I’d hit something sharp on the ground when I fell backwards with the second blast. I think that’s when I lost my shoe.

  ‘Alice?’

  My mom stands in the doorway, a mug of tea in one hand and a plate of sandwiches in the other. All I see is lettuce sticking out the sides.

  ‘I’m not hungry.’ My voice sounds gravelly like I have a bad cold.

  ‘You didn’t eat anything at the hospital either.’ She puts the plate and mug down on my desk then hovers in the doorway. ‘Do you want a hand getting into a bath?’

  ‘I probably shouldn’t take a bath because of the stitches, so I’ll just take a lukewarm shower.’

  She wants to help so badly. I know that feeling, of needing to do something, anything, but also knowing that whatever I do isn’t going to be enough. I didn’t help people. I didn’t guide the old lady onto the steps by the casino. I didn’t usher the little boy and his mom to the side to let the police pass. I didn’t signal to the paramedics that the vendor who saved me had glass in his face and needed medical assistance. I didn’t hold the hand of the woman across the street that had blood all over her, whose purse lay about two meters from her, beside what I think was her left foot. I didn’t do any of that. I just stood there and looked across the road. For him. For the runner.