Girl from Nowhere - Tiffany Rosenhan Page 0,114

Panama, she was smitten.”

She continues gently, looking at me. “I always wanted children. My whole life I hoped to have children. But I chose a career that wasn’t exactly made out for that. I told myself it didn’t matter. That maybe it wasn’t meant to happen for me … for us …”

She pauses. Swallows. “I was forty-four when you were born, Sophia. You came into our lives in the most unexpected, extraordinary, and tragic of circumstances. I’ve never questioned the choice we made that night.”

“All those years, I never considered we were running because of me,” I confess.

“Sophia, it doesn’t matter—”

“It does,” I say. “Because you would have been safer without me. Abramovich said if you had turned me over from the beginning, none of this would have happened and—”

“Sophia, neither your father nor I have regretted, for one second, the life we chose with you. Yes, we’ve been running for sixteen years, but we would do it all over again if it meant raising you. I’ll run, and I’ll fight, until I die, Sophia, if it means I can be your mother.”

I finally stop wiping the wetness from my cheeks. I can’t stop looking at her.

“In your face, Sophia, I see your courageous mother, Katarina. Her blood runs in you, and I see so much of her in you. But I also see myself in you, Sophia. And I like to think that somehow, in another way, I am a part of you too.”

I fight back tears as my mother finishes in a whisper, “You are my daughter, and I love you. I love you with the passion of not one parent, but four. Your mother gave us a gift, you see. And I know it’s not fair that they died the way they did, but, Sophia, through you … they live.”

CHAPTER 66

Our footsteps echo in the spacious hallway—white sneakers meeting tan linoleum. We pass a door with a glass window in the center. I stand on my tiptoes to see through it. Two dozen heads are bent forward, pencils scribbling feverishly across papers.

I catch a glimpse of glossy, chestnut hair, freshly curled, and flowing over a plaid flannel shirt—Charlotte. Beside her is a girl with a thick braid of auburn hair, still wet from morning swim practice—Emma.

I watch them both until a hand tugs mine and a deep voice says, “We should hurry.”

We walk down the main corridor, past the floor-to-ceiling windows, and up a flight of stairs until we reach the second floor, fourth classroom west of the staircase.

We pause outside the door. He puts a hand on the knob, lowering his eyes to look at me. His green eyes glint in the fluorescent hall lights. “Ready?” Aksel asks bracingly.

My heart thuds beneath my jacket.

Finally, I know.

I no longer measure my life in two spheres: before Bekami, and after.

I measure my life in two worlds: the world within Waterford, and the world beyond.

For the first time, I know where I belong. Like the equator bisecting two hemispheres, I straddle two worlds. Maybe it can last forever, or maybe one day, I will have to choose. But in this moment, I am content to lie fallow.

I want to be nowhere other than where I am—my family watching over me, my mother looking after me, and Aksel standing beside me.

I am home.

Nodding, I grin. “Ready.”

The door creaks as I push it open. The final exam has already started. The only sound is the clicking of calculators and the soft rustling of fabric as bodies turn toward the doorway.

His long hair is gray and coarse and still resembles wool; his dingy tweed jacket hasn’t changed since the beginning of December.

Krenshaw looks at us gruffly and barks, “You’re late.”

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Perhaps I should have written Sophia as a ghost, because she’s been haunting me forever.

I disagree with the general consensus that teenage girls are ditzy, crazy, annoying, obnoxious, needy, dumb, melodramatic, or manipulative. Sure, their actions might occasionally be explained this way, but these are not characteristics. The teenage girls I know are bold, intelligent, hard-working, empathetic, driven, athletic, courteous, creative, loyal, and disciplined.

There is something beautiful and raw about a teenage girl’s experience and visceral emotions. Our feminine passion is a gift, not a curse. It enables us to become brave women.

I’m often asked: What do you hope readers feel when they finish reading your book?

Simply, I hope readers see in Sophia the best in themselves: their own resilience, compassion, and self-worth. I hope they feel empowered to magnify their skills and talents, not shirk them.

Thank you to the real women who inspired my fictional female warriors: to my glamorous longtime friend, whose own experience helped shape Sophia’s, thank you for inviting me to visit CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia—you are living the life we always imagined. And to my great-grandmother, Mary Astor, who began making movies as a teenager and, after being threatened by Hollywood’s most powerful studio executives that if she didn’t give up her child she would never work again, proceeded to win an Academy Award.

For the book itself, thank you to Claire Stetzer. I no longer wonder why authors profess their editor’s brilliance—it is true. How you managed to navigate the storm of mismatched words I threw at you, I will never know. Somehow you led me, guided me, and cheered me on to a better story. Without you, Girl from Nowhere would be adrift somewhere.

Thank you to Cindy Loh, for taking a chance on me and for your brilliant command of the Bloomsbury crew. To each of you at Bloomsbury who influenced this book: thank you.

And thanks to my agent, Webster Stone, for believing a stay-at-home mother of four from suburban Utah with no professional writing experience could become an author.

To my selfless, adventurous mother: thank you for always reading aloud to us, even when I was in kindergarten and we frequently finished after midnight. I forgive you for wearing an oversized Beastie Boys T-shirt when my date picked me up for prom.

To my father: I hope to never be as smart as you. Mostly because I think my brain would explode. While the choice remains slightly befuddling, I am nonetheless appreciative that you considered subscriptions to National Geographic and The Economist proper birthday gifts.

To my husband: remember when you saw me for the first time from afar—but really it was my identical twin sister? No? I do. And now it’s in print. Thank you for discreetly switching my name tag before I knew who you were so that we could sit side by side. The moment of truth has come: yes, you inspired Aksel. Mostly, your muscles.

To my sisters and my best friends: I love each one of you. Branden might be my eternal companion, but you are my soulmates. To my identical twin sister, Danielle: I have no idea what it’s like to be a “single person” and I don’t care to—I thoroughly enjoy being half a person. And we all know you are the better half. Which is why if someone tells me they don’t like my book, I’ll simply say you wrote it.

To my daughters: you are each more kind, clever, and fearless than I. To quote a wise adolescent, “You can become anyone you want to become, but no one else can be you.” Our community needs intelligent, creative, compassionate girls to lead. So make those beds, feed those chickens, read those books, and ride those bikes. Learn to learn. Learn to lead.

Just don’t become women too quickly.

You only get one chance to be a teenage girl. Cherish it.

BLOOMSBURY YA

Bloomsbury Publishing Inc., part of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018

BLOOMSBURY and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

First published in the United States of America in July 2020 by Bloomsbury YA

Text copyright © 2020 by Tiffany Rosenhan

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Rosenhan, Tiffany, author.

Title: Girl from nowhere / by Tiffany Rosenhan.

Description: New York: Bloomsbury Children’s Books, 2020.

Summary: For Sophia Hepworth, the terrors of living in dangerous places with her diplomat parents are nothing compared to facing American high school, but friendships and romance bloom just before her past catches up with her.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020002040 (print) | LCCN 2020002041 (e-book)

ISBN 978-1-5476-0303-9 (hardcover) • ISBN 978-1-5476-0304-6 (e-book)

Subjects: CYAC: Fear—Fiction. | High schools—Fiction. | Schools—Fiction. | Love—Fiction. | Family life—Montana—Fiction. | Montana—Fiction.

Classification: LCC PZ7.1.R67245 Gir 2020 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.R67245 (e-book) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020002040

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