monday, july 22, 2013

morning

tom woke me up early with a kiss and a cheekygrin. he has a late meeting this morning, so hesuggested we take evie around the corner forbreakfast. it’s a place where we used to meet whenwe first started seeing each other. we’d sit in thewindow—she was at work in london so there wasno danger of her walking past and noticing us. butthere was that thrill, even so—perhaps she’d comehome early for some reason: perhaps she’d befeeling ill or have forgotten some vital papers. idreamed of it. i willed her to come along one day, tosee him with me, to know in an instant that he wasno longer hers. it’s hard to believe now that therewas once a time when i wanted her to appear.

since megan went missing i’ve avoided walking thisway whenever possible—it gives me the creepspassing that house—but to get to the café it’s theonly route. tom walks a little way ahead of me,pushing the buggy; he’s singing something to evie,making her laugh. i love it when we’re out like this,the three of us. i can see the way people look at us;i can see them thinking, what a beautiful family. itmakes me proud—prouder than i’ve ever been ofanything in my life.

so i’m sailing along in my bubble of happiness, andwe’re almost at number fifteen when the door opens.

for a moment i think i’m hallucinating, because shewalks out. rachel. she comes out of the front doorand stands there for a second, sees us and stopsdead. it’s horrible. she gives us the strangest smile, agrimace almost, and i can’t help myself, i lungeforward and grab evie out of her buggy, startling herin the process. she starts to cry.

rachel walks quickly away from us.

tom calls after her, “rachel! what are you doinghere? rachel!” but she keeps going, faster and fasteruntil she’s almost running, and the two of us juststand there, then tom turns to me and with oneglance at the expression on my face says, “come on.

let’s just go home.”

evening

we found out that afternoon that they’ve arrestedsomeone in connection with megan hipwell’sdisappearance. some guy i’d never heard of, atherapist she’d been seeing. it was a relief, i suppose,because i’d been imagining all sorts of awful things.

“i told you it wouldn’t be a stranger,” tom said. “itnever is, is it? in any case, we don’t even knowwhat’s happened. she’s probably fine. she’s probablyrun off with someone.”

“so why have they arrested that man, then?”

he shrugged. he was distracted, pulling on hisjacket, straightening his tie, getting ready to go toand meet the day’s last client.

“what are we going to do?” i asked him.

“do?” he looked at me blankly.

“about her. rachel. why was she here? why wasshe at the hipwells’ house? do you think?.?.?. do youthink she was trying to get into our garden—youknow, going through the neighbours’ gardens?”

tom gave a grim laugh. “i doubt it. come on, thisis rachel we’re talking about. she wouldn’t be able tohaul her fat arse over all those fences. i’ve no ideawhat she was doing there. maybe she was pissed,went to the wrong door?”

“in other words, she meant to come round here?”

he shook his head. “i don’t know. look, don’tworry about it, ok? keep the doors locked. i’ll giveher a ring and find out what she’s up to.”

“i think we should call the police.”

“and say what? she hasn’t actually done anything—”

“she hasn’t done anything lately—unless you countthe fact that she was here the night megan hipwelldisappeared,” i said. “we should have told the policeabout her ages ago.”

“anna, come on.” he slipped his arms around mywaist. “i hardly think rachel has anything to do withmegan hipwell’s going missing. but i’ll talk to her,ok?”

“but you said after last time—”

“i know,” he said softly. “i know what i said.” hekissed me, slipped his hand into the waistband of myjeans. “let’s not get the police involved unless wereally need to.”

i think we do need to. i can’t stop thinking aboutthat smile she gave us, that sneer. it was almosttriumphant. we need to get away from here. weneed to get away from her.