Chapter 1: The Funeral

Emmaline Johnson hated Tuesdays. On a Tuesday, her Father had left her Mother and moved away. On a Tuesday Emmaline's first boyfriend had broken up with her saying she was too 'clingy'. On a Tuesday, her mother had been hit by a drunk driver and killed on impact. The following Tuesday was her mother's funeral.

Emmaline Johnson had good reason to hate Tuesdays. At fifteen years old, she had lost the most important person in her life to a freak motor vehicle accident; the kind that never happened in the small town of Marfa Texas.

Emmaline and her mother were not from Texas – which explained their lack of the southern accent. Originally, they were from Chicago. However, when her bum dad had left, they had had to move. Therefore, at the age of ten her mother had packed up her and her things to move to the tiny artistic town.

Now five years later Emmaline stood before a closed coffin trying to imagine her mother as being inside. It was difficult to do. Just one beer too many and an idiot in a truck had taken away the only family Emma had left. Now she was alone – an orphan.

She still had a dad, who would be taking her to live with him in New York. Emma was sure it would not last very long. She had not seen her father in almost six years. She had no desire to see him now. Emma placed her fingers on the feeble wooden box and said her last goodbyes.

Fidgeting in her cheap black dress, Emma waited patiently while the priest conducted the simple service. She could see people's eyes on hers in the front row, boring into her back. She hated being the center of her attention. She hated being here.

As soon as the service was over, she ran from the small church. She ran down back streets until she reached what was left of her measly apartment. Most of her things were packed or sold. She only had two small suitcases of belongings left to her name now.

Emmaline curled up in a ball on the floor and began to cry, choked sobs escaping her chest. Rage curled around her throat like thorns. How could this have happened to her? How could anyone be so cruel as to do this to her?

She wiped her eyes and nose on the sleeve of her dress – a Christmas gift from when she was thirteen. Most of her mother's artwork had been sold to buy Emma's plane ticket to New York; her father had refused to pay, or to pick her up. She would have to find her own way to his apartment.

One photograph remained – one of her and her mother sitting on the couch giggling. It had been taken when Emmaline was twelve – one of the only good moments from the time around that age. Emma shuddered, not wanting to remember.

She packed up the photo and shouldered her bag. Her flight left in a few hours and she still had to drive to a major city airport in the cab she had booked last week.

"Goodbye Mommy." She whispered to the empty apartment. Emma closed the door on her old life.

"So you found it alright?" Paul Johnson called from the couch, his feet propped on the coffee table.

Emmaline, shivering, stepped into the darkened apartment. "Yeah, just fine Paul."

"Hey, come in here. I need to talk to you."

Emma sighed but walked into the room. She nervously eyed the beer her dad was drinking. She had been at the mercy of drunken men before.

"I talked to your grandparents on the phone – your maternal grandparents, in London." He continued.

"Oh." Emma nodded, not understanding where he was going.

"They want you to come and live with them instead, and I think it's a good idea. In fact, I already contacted the courts about it. They sent over documents for me to sign, and I already have and faxed them to your grandparents. I am taking them in tomorrow and they should be signed by a judge in about a week. So do not get comfortable."

Emma was shocked. She had not expected to enjoy being here, but her dad shoving her off before she had even arrived? Emma turned mechanically from the room and walked out to an empty bedroom that looked unoccupied.

"You can stay in that room until we book you a flight to London!"

Emmaline buried her head in the threadbare pillow and began to cry. The world was not fair. Only a week before she was displaced again? Did no one want her? These grandparents did apparently but she had never met them. She wanted her mommy back.

Her mommy who understood her, who loved her. The mommy who knew every dark little thing that had ever happened and still loved her. The mommy who did not judge her for all Emma's faults.

"I miss you Mommy."

Emmaline curled up on the bed and sobbed quietly into her pillow before falling into a fitful sleep.