Picture Me Gone

  PRAISE FOR MEG ROSOFF’S

  THERE IS NO DOG

  “It is not often that a book comes along that is both arch and thoughtful, silly and smart. And this one’s not quite like anything else out there.”

  —Booklist

  “The premise here is startlingly original and as old as the ancient Greeks . . . cheeky and subversive fantasy fable.”

  —Horn Book

  “Irreverent and funny, this book . . . earns its place among the sharpest-witted tours de force of recent memory.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “. . . there’s no denying that Rosoff’s writing and sense of humor are a force of nature themselves.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Easy to read, thoroughly amusing, and thought-provoking, this title will appeal to teens who like their humor offbeat and irreverent.”

  —School Library Journal

  “Rosoff, author of several acclaimed YA novels . . . is an intriguing, iconoclastic writer who stretches the boundaries of YA fiction.”

  —VOYA

  “One must simply revel in the joyful singularity of Rosoff’s latest masterpiece.”

  —The Guardian

  ALSO BY

  meg rosoff

  There Is No Dog

  The Bride’s Farewell

  What I Was

  Just In Case

  How I Live Now

  G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

  An imprint of Penguin Young Readers Group

  Published by The Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014, USA

  USA | Canada | UK | Ireland | Australia | New Zealand | India | South Africa | China

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  For more information about the Penguin Group, visit penguin.com

  Copyright © 2013 by Meg Rosoff.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission in writing from the publisher. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, Reg. U.S. Pat. & Tm. Off. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  ISBN 978-0-698-13538-3

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Rosoff, Meg. Picture me gone / Meg Rosoff.

  pages cm

  Summary: When her father’s best friend goes missing, twelve-year-old Mila travels with him to upstate New York to visit friends and family who may lead to clues about his whereabouts. [1. Missing persons—Fiction. 2. Fathers and daughters—Fiction. 3. Coming of age—Fiction. 4. Mystery and detective stories.] I. Title.

  PZ7.R719563Pi 2013 [Fic]—dc23 2012048974

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  Contents

  Praise for There Is No Dog

  Also by Meg Rosoff

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  one

  two

  three

  four

  five

  six

  seven

  eight

  nine

  ten

  eleven

  twelve

  thirteen

  fourteen

  fifteen

  sixteen

  seventeen

  eighteen

  nineteen

  twenty

  twenty-one

  twenty-two

  twenty-three

  twenty-four

  twenty-five

  twenty-six

  twenty-seven

  twenty-eight

  twenty-nine

  thirty

  thirty-one

  About the Author

  For Brenda

  one

  The first Mila was a dog. A Bedlington terrier. It helps if you know these things. I’m not at all resentful at being named after a dog. In fact, I can imagine the scene exactly. Mila, my father would have said, that’s a nice name. Forgetting where he’d heard it. And then my mother would remember the dog and ask if he was absolutely sure, and when he didn’t answer, she would say, OK, then. Mila. And then, looking at me, think, Mila, my Mila.

  I don’t believe in reincarnation. It seems unlikely that I’ve inherited the soul of my grandfather’s long-dead dog. But certain traits make me wonder. Was it entirely coincidence that Mila entered my father’s head on the morning of my birth? Observing his daughter, one minute old, he thought first of the dog, Mila? Why?

  My father and I have been preparing for a journey to New York, to visit his oldest friend. But yesterday his friend’s wife phoned to say he’d left home.

  Left home? Gil asked. What on earth do you mean?

  Disappeared, she said. No note. Nothing.

  Gil looked confused. Nothing?

  You’ll still come? said the wife.

  And when Gil was silent for a moment, thinking it through, she said, Please.

  Yes, of course, Gil said, and slowly replaced the phone in its cradle.

  He’ll be back, Gil tells Marieka. He’s just gone off by himself to think for a while. You know what he’s like.

  But why now? My mother is puzzled. When he knew you were coming? The timing is . . . peculiar.

  Gil shrugs. By this time tomorrow he’ll be back. I’m certain he will.

  Marieka makes a doubtful noise but from where I’m crouched I can’t see her face. What about Mila? she says.

  A few things I know: It is Easter holiday and I am out of school. My mother is working all week in Holland and I cannot stay at home alone. My father lives inside his head and it is better for him to have company when he travels, to keep him on track. The tickets were bought two months ago.

  We will both still go.

  I enjoy my father’s company and we make a good pair. Like my namesake, Mila the dog, I have a keen awareness of where I am and what I’m doing at all times. I am not given to dreaminess, have something of a terrier’s determination. If there is something to notice, I will notice it first.

  I am good at solving puzzles.

  My packing is nearly finished when Marieka comes to say that she and Gil have decided I should still go. I am already arranging clues in my head, thinking through the possibilities, looking for a theory.

  I have met my father’s friend sometime in the distant past but I don’t remember him. He is a legend in our family for once saving Gil’s life. Without Matthew there would be no me. For this, I would like to thank him, though I never really get the chance.

  It seems so long ago that we left London. Back then I was a child.

  I am still, technically speaking, a child.

  two

  I know very little about Mila the dog. She belonged to my grandfather when he was a boy growing up in Lancashire. Dogs like Mila were kept for ratting, not pets.

  I found a dusty old photo of her in an album my father kept from childhood. Mostly it contains pictures of people I don’t know. In the photo, the dog has a crouchy stance, as if she’d rather be running flat out. The person on the other side of the camera interests me greatly. Perhaps it is my grandfather, a boy who took enough pride in his ratting dog to keep a photo of her. Lots of people take pictures of their dogs now, but did they then? The dog is looking straight ahead. If it were his dog, wouldn’t it turn to look?

  This picture fills me with a deep sense of longing. Saudade, Gil would say. Portuguese. The longing for something loved and lost, something gone or unattainable.

  I cannot explain the feeling of sadness I have looking at this picture. Mila the dog has been dead for eighty year
s.

  Everyone calls my father Gil. Gil’s childhood friend has walked out of the house he shared with his wife and baby. No one knows where he went or why. Matthew’s wife phoned Gil, in case he wanted to change our plans. In case he’d heard something.

  He hadn’t. Not then.

  We will take the train to the airport and it is important to remember our passports. Marieka tells me to take good care of myself and kisses me. She smiles and asks if I will be OK and I nod, because I will. She looks in Gil’s direction and says, Take care of your father, too. She knows I will take care of him as best I can. Age is not always the best measure of competence.

  The train doors close and we wave good-bye. I settle down against my father and breathe the smell of his jacket. He smells of books, ink, old coffee pushed to the back of the desk and wool, plus a hint of the cologne Marieka used to buy him; one he hasn’t worn in years. The smell of his skin is too familiar to describe. It surprised me to discover that not everyone can identify people by their smell. Marieka says this makes me half dog at least.

  I’ve seen the way dogs sniff people and other dogs on the street or when they return from another place. They want to put a picture together based on clues: Where have you been? Were there cats there? Did you eat meat? So. A wood fire. Mud. Stew.

  If I were a dog and smelled books, coffee and ink in a slightly tweedy wool jacket, I don’t know whether I’d think, That man translates books. But that is what he does.

  I’ve always wondered why humans developed so many languages. It complicates things. Makes things interesting, says Gil.

  Today, we are going to America, where we won’t need any extra languages. Gil ruffles my hair but doesn’t actually notice that I’m sitting beside him. He is deep in a book translated by a colleague. Occasionally he nods.

  My mother plays the violin in an orchestra. Scrape scrape scrape, she says when it’s time to practice, and closes the door. Tomorrow she will set off to Holland.

  I narrow my eyes and focus on a point in the distance. I am subtle, quick and loyal. I would have made a good ratter.

  Saudade. I wonder if Gil is feeling that now for his lost friend. If he is, he is not showing any sign of it.

  three

  Marieka is from Sweden. Gil’s mother was Portuguese-French. I need diagrams to keep track of all the nationalities in my family but I don’t mind. Mongrels are wily and healthy and don’t suffer displaced hips or premature madness.

  My parents were over forty when they had me but I don’t think of them as old, any more than they think of me as young. We are just us.

  The fact that Gil’s friend left home exactly when we were coming to visit is hard to understand. The police don’t believe he’s been murdered or kidnapped. I can imagine Gil wandering out the door and forgetting for a while to come back, but ties to Marieka and me would draw him home. Perhaps Matthew’s ties are looser.

  Despite being best friends, Gil and Matthew haven’t seen each other in eight years. This makes the timing of his disappearance quite strange. Impolite, at the very least.

  I look forward to seeing his wife and starting to understand what happened. Perhaps that’s why Gil decided to take me along. Did I mention that I’m good at puzzles?

  There is no need to double-check the passports; they are zipped into the inner pocket of my bag, safe, ready to be presented at check-in. Gil has put his book down and is gazing at something inside his head.

  Where do you think Matthew went? I ask him.

  It takes him a few seconds to return to me. He sighs and places his hand on my knee. I don’t know, sweetheart.

  Do you think we’ll find him?

  He looks thoughtful and says, Matthew was a wanderer, even as a child.

  I wait to hear what he says next about his friend, but he says nothing. Inside his head he is still talking. Whole sentences flash across his eyes. I can’t read them.

  What? I say.

  What, what? But he smiles.

  What are you thinking?

  Nothing important. About my childhood. I knew Matthew as well as I knew myself. When I think of him he still looks like a boy, even though he’s quite old.

  He’s the same age as you I say, a little huffily.

  Yes. He laughs, and pulls me close.

  Here is the story from Gil’s past:

  He and Matthew are twenty-two, hitchhiking to France in the back of a truck with hardly any money. Then across France to Switzerland, to climb the Lauteraarhorn. Of the two, Matthew is the serious climber. It all goes according to plan until, on the second day, the temperature begins to rise. Avalanche weather. They watch the snow and ice thunder down around them. Mist descends toward evening, wrapping the mountain like a cloak. They burrow in, hoping the weather will change. Around midnight, the wind picks up and the rain turns to snow.

  I’ve tried to imagine the scene hundreds of times. The first problem—exposure; the second—altitude. In the dead of night, in the dark and cold and wind and snow, Matthew notices the first signs of sickness in his friend and insists they descend. Gil refuses. Time passes. Head pounding, dizzy and irrational, Gil shouts, pushes Matthew off him. When at last he slumps, exhausted by the effort and the thin air, all he wants is to sit down and sleep in the snow. To die.

  Over the next eleven hours, Matthew cajoles and drags and walks and talks him down the mountain. Over and over he tells Gil that you don’t lie down in the snow. You keep going, no matter what.

  They reach safety and Gil swears never to climb again.

  And Matthew?

  He was in love with it, says Gil.

  He saved your life.

  Gil nods.

  We both fall silent, and I think, And yet.

  And yet. Gil’s life would not have needed saving if it hadn’t been for Matthew.

  The risk-taker and his riskee.

  When I think of the way this trip has turned out, I wonder if we’ve been summoned for some sort of cosmic leveling, to help Matthew this time, the one who has never before required saving.

  Perhaps we have been called in to balance out the flow of energy in the universe.

  We reach the airport. Gil picks up my bag and his, and we leave the train. As the escalator carries us up, a text pings on to his phone.

  My father is no good at texts, so he hands it to me and I show him: Still nothing it says, and is signed Suzanne. Matthew’s wife.

  We look at each other.

  Come on, he says, piling our bags onto a cart, and off we trot for what feels like miles to the terminal. At the check-in I ask for a window seat. Gil isn’t fussy. We answer the questions about bombs and sharp objects, rummage through our carry-on bags for liquids, take our boarding passes and join the long snake through international departures. I pass the time watching other people, guessing their nationalities and relationships. American faces, I note, look unguarded. Does this make them more, or less approachable? I don’t know yet.

  Gil buys a newspaper and a bottle of whisky from duty-free and we go to the gate. As we board the plane I’m still thinking about that night on the mountain. What does it take to half drag, half carry a disorientated man the size of Gil, hour after hour, through freezing snow and darkness?

  He may have other faults, this friend of Gil’s, but he is not short of determination.

  four

  Suzanne meets us at international arrivals in New York. We are tired and crumpled. She spots Gil while he is trying to get his phone to work, and I nudge him and point. She’s not old but looks pinched, as if someone has forgotten to water her. There is a buggy beside her and in it a child sleeps, despite all the bustle and noise. His arms stick out sideways in his padded suit. He wears a blue striped hat.

  Gil kisses her and says, It’s been too long. He peers down at the child. Hello, he says.

  This is Gabriel, says Suzanne.

  Hello, Gabriel, Gil says.

  Gabriel squeezes his eyes together but doesn’t wake up.

  And Mila, says Su
zanne. You’ve changed so much.

  She means that I’ve changed since I was four years old, when we last came to visit. That’s when I met Gabriel’s older brother, Owen. He was seven and I don’t remember much about him, though we are holding hands in the one photo Gil has of us.

  I touch the side of my finger to Gabriel’s fist and he opens it and grabs on to me, still asleep. His grip is strong.

  I’m sorry it’s turned out like this, she says, and shakes her head. Not much fun for you. She turns to Gil. Come on. We can talk in the car.

  The car is noisy and they speak in low voices so I can’t catch most of what they’re saying. Gabriel’s in the back with me, fast asleep in his car seat. Occasionally he opens his eyes or stretches out a hand or kicks his feet, but he doesn’t wake up. I make him grab on to my finger again and hear Suzanne say, Well, I hope you’ve made the right decision. She says it in a way that suggests he hasn’t made the right decision at all, and I’m sure she’s talking about bringing me along.

  It has started to rain.

  I fall asleep in the car to the rhythmic whoosh of windscreen wipers and the low buzz of Gil and Suzanne talking. Normally I’d be tuning in to hear what they’re saying, but I’m too tired to care. Gabriel still hangs on to my finger.

  When I awake it’s dark. The road is narrow and quiet, nearly deserted; the rain has stopped. I say nothing at all, just look out of the window at the woods hoping to see a deer or a bear peering at me. Gil and Suzanne have stopped talking and the car is filled with private thoughts. Suzanne’s are surprisingly clear; Gil’s muffled and soft. Gil will be thinking about Matthew. It’s a puzzle in his head and Suzanne’s and mine. Where has Matthew gone? And why?

  Suzanne’s thoughts sound like a CD skipping. Damn damn damn damn damn.

  What I know already is that Matthew and Suzanne both teach at the university in town. Matthew disappeared five days ago, eight months into the academic year, fourteen months after Gabriel was born. He took nothing with him, not a change of clothing or a passport or any money. Just left for work in the morning, said good-bye as usual and never showed up to teach his class.