Never Let Me Go

Front 1

Madame and dance

Back 1

I opened my eyes to see Madame standing in the doorway

Oh baby, baby, never let me go

the odd thing was she was crying

Front 2

The end of book

Back 2

I just waited for a bit, then turned back to the car, to drive off to wherever it was I was supposed to be

Front 3

Fight with Ruth and Tommy over animals

Back 3

But I didn't say or do anything

I remember a huge tiredness coming over me

something in me just gave up

Front 4

Becoming a donor

Back 4

I'll welcome the chance to rest - to stop and think and remember

Front 5

Memories

Back 5

I lost Ruth, then I lost Tommy, but I won't lose my memories of them

Front 6

Ruth - moving on

Back 6

I never appreciated in those days the sheer effort Ruth was making to move on, to grow up and leave Hailsham behind

Front 7

Letting go

Back 7

a part of us stayed like that : fearful of the world around us, and no matter how much we despised ourselves for it- unable quite to let each other go

Front 8

Golden time

Back 8

tend to blur into each other as a kind of golden time

Front 9

Remembering wrong

Back 9

Or maybe I'm remembering it wrong

Front 10

Driving

Back 10

Driving around the country now, I still see things that will remains me of Hailsham.

even a particular arrangement of popular trees up on a hillside, and I'll think "Maybe that's it! I've found it! This actually is Hailsham!"

Front 11

Art and souls

Back 11

We took away your art because we thought it would reveal your souls. Or to put it more finely, we did it to prove you had souls at all.

Front 12

Soul

Back 12

She said they revealed your soul

Front 13

Alone in car

Back 13

But I do like the feeling of getting into my little car, knowing for the next couple of hours I'll have only the roads the big grey sky and my dreams for company

Front 14

Cottages

Back 14

we rarely stepped beyond the confines of the cottages

I don't think we were afraid exactly

Front 15

Intro

Back 15

My name is Kathy H. I'm thirty one years old, and I've been a cater now for over eleven years.

Front 16

Through madames eyes

Back 16

The first time you glimpse yourself through the eyes of a person like that, it's a cold moment. It's like walking past a mirror you've walked past every day of your life, and suddenly it shows you something else, something troubling and strange

Front 17

Seeing possible

Back 17

you'd get some insight into who you were deep down, and maybe too, you'd see something of what your life held in store

Front 18

Madame spider

Back 18

She decided in a second what we were, because you could see her stiffen as if a pair of large black spiders was set to crawl towards her

Front 19

America

Back 19

None of you will go to America, none of you will be film stars. And none of you will be working in supermarkets as I heard some of you planning the other day. Your lives are set out for you

Front 20

Defer

Back 20

But this dream of yours, this dream of being able to defer. Such a thing would always have been beyond us to grant

Front 21

Shirt

Back 21

Tommys got his shirt on. His favourite polo shirt.

Front 22

Hit

Back 22

It didn't hurt did it? when I hit you

Front 23

Grow up

Back 23

I felt like saying Tommy why don't you grow up? But I stopped myself and said instead Tommy you're holding everyone up and so am I

Front 24

Madame dread

Back 24

the real dread that one of us would accidentally brush up against her

Front 25

Woods

Back 25

I certainly wasn't the only one of my age to feel their presence day and night

Front 26

Norfolk

Back 26

the spot where everything Id ever ever lost since my childhood had washed up

The fantasy never got beyond that - I didn't let it

Front 27

Ruth monologue

Back 27

We're modelled from trash. Junkies, prostitutes, Vinod, tramps. Convicts, maybe, just so long as they aren't psychos.

Front 28

Time

Back 28

Well, I suppose we've got time. None of us are in any particular hurry

Front 29

Smoke

Back 29

But what you must understand is that for you, all of you, it's much, much worse to smoke than it ever was for me.

Front 30

Miss Lucy speech

Back 30

The problem as I see it, is that you've been told and not told.

Front 31

Ruth - what were supposed to be doing

Back 31

I was like you Tommy. I was pretty much ready when I became a donor. It felt right. After all, it's what we're supposed to be doing, isn't it?

Front 32

Tommys rage

Back 32

I caught a glimpse of his face in the moonlight, caked in mud and distorted with fury, then I reached for his flailing arms and held on tight. He tried to shake me off, but I kept holding on, until he stopped shouting and I felt the fight go out of him

Front 33

Miss Emily - pawns

Back 33

it might look as though you were simply pawns in a game

You were lucky pawns

Front 34

Ruth and job

Back 34

How could I have tried

It's just something I once dreamt about. That's all

Front 35

River

Back 35

They've got to let go, drift apart.

But in the end we can't stay together forever

Front 36

Reunite with Ruth

Back 36

But in the end I managed it and the instant I saw her again at the recovery centre in Dover, all our differences - while they didn't exactly vanish- seemed not nearly as important as all the other things

Front 37

Hailsham and balloons

Back 37

I thought about Hailsham closing, and how it was like someone coming along with a pair of shears and snipping the balloon strings just where they entwined with the mans fist.

Once that had happened, there'd be no real sense in which those balloons belonged with each other any more.

Front 38

Kept away from horrors

Back 38

you were kept away from the worst of the horrors