Me Before You: a novel

know we’ve had our differences, but please…It’s vital that you come
now.
“Shit. I’ve never seen Mum like that,” Treena continued.
Passport, wallet, door keys. Door keys? For what? I no longer
had a home.
Katrina glanced sideways at me. “I mean, she’s mad now, but
she’s in shock. You know she’ll be all right in the end, right? I mean,
when I came home and told her I was knocked up I thought she was
never going to speak to me again. But it only took her—what?—two
days to come around.”
I could hear her babbling away beside me, but I wasn’t really
paying attention. I could barely focus on anything. My nerve endings
seemed to have come alive; they almost jangled with anticipation. I
was going to see Will. Whatever else, I had that. I could almost feel
the miles between us shrinking, as if we were at two ends of some
invisible elastic thread.
“Treen?”
“Yes?”
I swallowed. “Don’t let me miss this flight.”
My sister is nothing if not determined. We queue-jumped, sped
up the inside lane, broke the speed limit, and scanned the radio for

---

the traffic reports, and finally the airport came into view. She
screeched to a halt and I was halfway out of the car before I heard
her.
“Hey! Lou!”
“Sorry.” I turned back and ran the few steps to her.
She hugged me, really tightly. “You’re doing the right thing,” she
said. She looked almost close to tears. “Now fuck off. If you miss the
bloody plane on top of me getting six points on my license, I’m never
talking to you again.”
I didn’t look back. I ran all the way to the Swiss Air desk and it
took me three goes to say my name clearly enough to request my
tickets.
I arrived in Zurich shortly before midnight. Given the late hour, Mrs.
Traynor had, as promised, booked me into a hotel at the airport and
said she would send a car for me at nine the following morning. I had
thought I wouldn’t sleep, but I did—an odd, heavy, and disjointed
trawl through the hours—waking up at seven the next morning with
no idea where I was.
I stared groggily around the unfamiliar room, at the heavy
burgundy drapes, designed to block out light, at the large flat-screen
television, at my overnight bag, which I hadn’t even bothered to
unpack. I checked the clock, which said it was shortly after seven
Swiss time. And as I realized where I was, I suddenly felt my
stomach clench with fear.
I scrambled out of bed just in time to be sick in the little bathroom.
I sank down on the tiled floor, my hair sticking to my forehead, my
cheek pressed against the cold porcelain. I heard my mother’s voice,
her protests, and I felt a dark fear creeping over me. I wasn’t up to
this. I didn’t want to fail again. I didn’t want to have to watch Will die.
With an audible groan, I scrambled up to be sick again.
I couldn’t eat. I managed to swallow a cup of black coffee and
showered and dressed, and that took me to 8 
A.M.
I stared at the
pale-green dress I had thrown in last night and wondered if it was
appropriate for where I was going. Would everyone wear black?
Should I have worn something more vibrant and alive, like the red

---

dress I knew Will liked? Why had Mrs. Traynor called me here? I
checked my mobile phone, wondering whether I could call Katrina. It
would be seven in the morning there now. But she would probably be
dressing Thomas, and the thought of talking to Mum was too much. I
put on some makeup and then sat down by the window, and the
minutes ticked slowly past.
I don’t think I had ever felt lonelier in my life.
When I couldn’t bear being in the little room any longer, I threw
the last of my things into my bag and left. I would buy a newspaper,
and wait in the lobby. It couldn’t be worse than sitting in my room
with the silence or the satellite news channel and the suffocating
darkness of the curtains. It was as I was passing reception that I saw
the computer terminal, discreetly placed in a corner. It was marked:
FOR USE OF GUESTS. PLEASE ASK AT RECEPTION
.
“Can I use this?” I said to the receptionist.
She nodded, and I bought an hour’s token. I knew suddenly very
clearly who I wanted to speak to. I knew in my gut that he was one of
the few people I could rely on to be online at this time. I logged on to
the chat room and typed on the message board: