A Part of Me and You: An empowering and incredibly moving novel that will make you laugh and cry. Emma Heatherington

just like you.’

      ‘Who?’ she asks. ‘Someone from England? Don’t tell me, it’s the accent that gives me away.’

      Her voice is dripping with sarcasm and I can’t help but laugh just a little.

      ‘My mind is a bit mixed up and I thought you were someone you couldn’t possibly be, but now I realise – I realise you remind me of me actually,’ I tell her and this seems to get her attention.

      ‘Yeah, right,’ she says. ‘You have no idea who I am or what I’m like, so how can I remind you of yourself. That’s stupid.’

      ‘Believe me,’ I tell her. ‘When I was a lot younger. I was exactly like you are now in a lot of ways. Exactly.’

      And it’s true. She really is just like me twenty years ago and it’s like looking at my own reflection, not physically, but in her I see the same sense of deep despair and anger that she feels inside right now. The hopelessness. The fear that the one person who you need the most is going to leave you soon and that no one else in the whole world can understand what you are going through.

      ‘My name is Shelley,’ I say to her and her tear-filled eyes meet mine again. ‘I live in the house over there on the hill, the one across from the lighthouse. I wonder … would you like to come over and get dried off and call your mum from there? She must be worried sick.’

      She doesn’t look so hard around the edges now. Her lip trembles and I see she is just a little girl, really. She is a lot younger at heart than she looks, beneath the makeup and the attitude and the tears.

      ‘You’re scared, right?’ I say to her and she nods, biting her lip. ‘Is your mum sick?’

      Her bottom lip trembles more and she breathes in stifled muffles, trying so hard not to let it all go.

      ‘She is … she is very sick,’ she stutters. ‘She’s dying.’

      ‘I’m so sorry,’ I mumble.

      ‘She’s dying and I’m so afraid that she’s going to die really soon and I don’t know what I’m going to do without her. It’s so unfair!’

      I gasp inside. This is like looking in the mirror, like looking back in time.

      ‘Of course, you’re scared,’ I say to her. ‘Is that why you’ve run away from her? To lash out and cry here on your own.’

      She nods again and I wait for a backlash from her but instead she leans forward to pat the dog who has settled at her feet, still feasting on her bag of chips.

      ‘You’re scared because there is nothing you can do and you’re angry and frightened,’ I continue. ‘And you are so frightened you are going to be left on your own and it feels like no one understands what you are going through.’

      She looks at me like I have read her mind, then tries to speak and her voice breaks when she does.

      ‘She thinks I don’t know the truth but I do know,’ she sniffles. ‘I heard her talking to Aunty Helen before we left and she said this would be our last holiday ever. Like, how am I meant to enjoy myself when I know it’s our last holiday ever? I am so mad! She must think I’m stupid but I just don’t know what to do. She could at least tell me instead of trying to pretend everything is okay when everything is just awful. I’m not a baby, I should know the truth!’

      I put my arm around her and hold her close as her shoulders heave.

      ‘Cry all you want,’ I say to her. ‘Cry and get it all out if that’s what you came here to do.’

      The rain mixes with my own tears as she sobs and gasps for breath in between sniffles and lets all her pain out. She grasps my coat as she cries and I squeeze her tight, wondering where on earth I have mustered up the courage to sit and empathize so much with someone I have never met, when I can barely hold a conversation with my own husband these days. I haven’t spoken to my closest friends like this in such a long time but I want to help her. I need to help her.

      ‘Do you want to come with me and Merlin and we’ll call your mum before you really do get sick out here?’ I ask her when she begins to settle. ‘I don’t have my phone with me but we can contact her or I can take you to her?’

      She shakes her head.

      ‘I have my own phone here in my pocket,’ she says. ‘But thanks anyway. I can call her and make my way back. She’ll be so worried. I need to go back.’

      ‘Yes, that’s a good idea,’ I tell her.

      ‘Why do you care?’ she asks me. ‘How do you know what I am going through?’

      ‘Unfortunately, I know all too well,’ I explain. ‘I know you are feeling so many things right now but your mum is only doing her best for you.’