The Book of You. Claire Kendal

       Monday

       Monday, 2 February, 7.45 a.m.

      It is you. Of course it is you. Always it is you. Someone is catching up to me and I turn and see you. I’d known it would be you, but still I lose my footing on the frozen snow. I stagger up. There are patches of wet on the knees of my stockings. My mittens are soaked through.

      Any sensible person would be at home on such an icy morning if he had a choice in the matter, but not you. You are out, taking a little stroll. You are reaching to steady me, asking if I’m okay, but I step away, managing not to unbalance myself again.

      I know you must have been watching me since I left my house. I can’t stop myself from asking you what you’re doing here, though I know your answer won’t be the true one.

      Your eyelids are doing that flickering thing again. It happens when you’re nervous. ‘I was just walking, Clarissa.’ Never mind that you live in a village five miles away. Your lips blanch. You bite them, as if you guess they’ve lost what little colour they normally have and you’re trying to force blood back into them. ‘You behaved strangely at work on Friday, Clarissa, walking out of that talk. Everyone said so.’

      It makes me want to scream, the way you say my name all the time. Yours has become ugly to me. I try to keep it out of my head, as if to do so will somehow keep you out of my life. But still it creeps in. Barges in. Just like you. Again and again.

      Second person present. That’s what you are. In every way.

      My silence doesn’t deter you. ‘You haven’t answered your phone all weekend. You only replied to one of my texts and it wasn’t friendly. Why are you out on a morning like this, Clarissa?’

      The short term is all I can see. I have to get rid of you. I have to stop you trailing me to the station and figuring out where I’m going. Ignoring you won’t get me the outcome I need now; the advice in the leaflets doesn’t work in real life. I doubt anything will work with you.

      ‘I’m ill.’ This is a lie. ‘That’s why I left on Friday. I’ve got to be at the doctor’s by eight.’

      ‘You’re the only woman I’ve ever seen who looks beautiful even when she’s ill.’

      I really am beginning to feel sick. ‘I have a fever. I was vomiting all night.’

      You

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