Big Island

Table of Contents Other Books by Emily O’Beirne PART ONE Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 PART TWO Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35 Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Chapter 38 Chapter 39 Chapter 40 Chapter 41 Chapter 42 Chapter 43 Other Books from Ylva Publishing About Emily O’Beirne Sign up for our newsletter to hear about new and upcoming releases. www.ylva-publishing.com Other Books by Emily O’Beirne A Story of Now series: A Story of Now The Sum of These Things Future Leaders: Future Leaders of Nowhere All the Ways to Here Standalone: Reaction Time Here’s the Thing Points of Departure PART ONE Chapter 1 Samira Samira drops her bag on the floor and eyes the envelope sitting on her bed, stamped and all. She can’t remember the last time she received anything by actual mail. It’s a brochure, with just the briefest of notes printed in small, sharp letters. Sounds like your kind of thing, fellow black sheep. It’s from her uncle Micah. A pamphlet for a short summer journalism course in Tasmania, run by a husband and wife who worked as an investigative journalist team for years. As soon as Samira sees their names, she knows exactly why he sent it. But the address makes her wonder why he bothered. That question is answered at dinner. Her father is fuming as usual. He’s in his blue suit. His “friendly” suit, her older sister calls it, as opposed to his “heads will roll” charcoal or his “make a deal” pinstripe. Blue is for school visits and old people’s homes. “You know what some hack wrote today?” He glares at his iPad. “That I spoke out against the carbon tax. Six bloody years ago! We didn’t even know about climate change back then.” Samira had been eleven then, and she knew. “Careful, Dad.” Her sister glances up from her phone. “The under-thirty-fives hate a climate denier.” He grunts. “I just think there are more economically effective solutions.” “Don’t worry.” Tehra’s lime green fingernails tap at her phone. “I’m on damage control.” Samira smirks into her salad. That probably means making a TikTok telling “the youth” how their dad planted some trees at a school fete last year. “I can’t afford to have those newspaper bastards slandering me this year,” he grumbles. “Stop agonising.” DeDe, Samira’s grandmother, pokes a piece of carrot into the parrot cage. DeDe never really sits down to dinner; she just holds court by Rudy’s cage. She insists on taking it into every room she’s in so everyone can be privy to the bird’s every mood. “They’ll write what they write.” DeDe should know. The media did a fair bit of demonising of Samira’s grandparents back in their greyhound-breeding days. Samira’s father turns to her. “I’m going to need you to come to a charity afternoon tea with me on Saturday, okay? The ladies were asking about you.” She swallows a sigh and nods. Is she going to have to be her father’s accessory at public appearances for the rest of her life? She thought going viral lasted minutes. It’s been eight years. Her sister is frowning. Why doesn’t she know that Samira would give anything for it to be Tehra that they wanted? How much better would that be for everyone? “Samira’s uncle Micah called me today,” DeDe says to her father. “You haven’t answered his calls. He wants us to send Samira down this summer.” Samira’s fork stops midway to her mouth. “Me?” “He took a liking to you, apparently.” Her dad finally yanks his gaze from his screen. “What’s this?” So that’s why Micah sent the brochure. Samira chews slowly, feeling the vaguest flickers of excitement. Two weeks away from here? Away from the boredom of her summer job handing out pamphlets promising that her dad will be the best thing that ever happened to local politics. Even though she knows that if they weren’t related, she’d never vote for him. Instead, two weeks doing a journalism course in a place where no one knows her or her family? Amazing. She plays it cool, though. “I thought you were going to help out at the campaign office these holidays?” her father says. “And you had that dance camp thingy?” “I missed out on a place. It filled up really quickly.” “I could make a call?” “That’s okay.” When her father makes calls, or gets one of his friends to, he usually gets what he wants. This time, she isn’t sure she wants him to. “She probably should get to know her mother’s only sibling, you know,” DeDe says. “Get to know her heritage.” That’s the word she uses for the fact that Samira’s mother was Turkish. Well, her mother’s parents were. DeDe has no idea what that means. Neither does Samira, really. Her mother never got a chance to tell her. Her father just clenches his jaw and goes back to his iPad. The fact that he doesn’t say no is promising. Having DeDe invested is three-quarters of the battle. “Why would you even want to go to Tasmania?” Her sister plucks a piece of tomato out of her salad with a neon talon. “I heard it’s cold and dull as crap. Wasn’t it basically a prison for convicts?” Samira doesn’t care if it’s cold. Or boring. The course won’t be. And she already knows her uncle isn’t boring. Not one bit. As she eats her dinner, there’s this small charge of excitement. Maybe this could actually happen. * * * Samira’s only met Uncle Micah a handful of times. The last time was a year ago, when he flew in for the anniversary of her mother’s