And with that, the ground shook like fury and every last remnant of the Midnight Library dissolved into dust.
At one minute and twenty-seven seconds aer midnight, Nora Seed marked her emergence back into life by vomiting all over her duvet.
Alive, but hardly.
Choking, exhausted, dehydrated, struggling, trembling, heavy, delirious, pain in her chest, even more pain in her head, this was the worst life could feel, and yet it was life, and life was precisely what she wanted.
It was hard, near impossible, to pull herself off the bed but she knew she had to get vertical.
She managed it, somehow, and grabbed her phone but it seemed too heavy and slippy to keep a grasp of and it fell onto the floor beyond view.
‘Help,’ she croaked, staggering out of the room.
Her hallway seemed to be tilting like it was a ship in a storm. But she reached the door without passing out, then dragged the chain lock off the latch and managed, aer great effort, to open it.
‘Please help me.’
She barely realised it was still raining as she stepped outside in her vomit-stained pyjamas, passing the step where Ash had stood a little over a day before to announce the news of her dead cat.
ere was no one around.
No one that she could see. So she staggered towards Mr Banerjee’s house in a series of dizzy stumbles and lurches, eventually managing to ring the doorbell.
A sudden square of light sprung out from the front window.
e door opened.
He wasn’t wearing his glasses and was confused maybe because of the state of her and the time of night.
‘I’m so very sorry, Mr Banerjee. I’ve done something very stupid. You’d better call an ambulance . . .’
‘Oh my lord. What on earth has happened?’ ‘Please.’
‘Yes. I’ll call one. Right away . . .’ 00:03:48
And that is when she allowed herself to collapse, forwards and with considerable velocity, right onto Mr Banerjee’s doormat.
e sky grows dark
e black over blue Yet the stars still dare To shine for you
