His Other Life. Beth Thomas

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His Other Life - Beth  Thomas

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‘I’m not pissed off, Grace. Not really. I don’t like the bloke, we fell out at school and I wasn’t expecting ever to hear from him again. That’s all.’

      ‘I thought you said you used to work with him?’

      He puts his arm back down and puts his hand into his pocket. ‘Yeah, that’s right, I did, we worked together for a while after we left school, but we didn’t really have much to do with each other.’ The hand in his pocket reappears holding the car keys, and he jingles them a bit, distractedly. ‘He’s a bit of a prick, to be honest.’

      ‘Oh.’

      ‘Yeah. World-class knobhead.’ He looks at his watch then back at me, and smiles fondly. ‘OK, well, I’m off to get the food.’ He leans towards me, one hand round the back of my neck, and kisses me. As we break apart, he stays close, his thumb gently stroking my neck. ‘Don’t worry about him, Gracie. He’s nothing.’

      I nod. ‘OK.’

      He stares into my eyes for a few moments, kisses me again, then draws away and moves to the door. ‘Warm the plates up, sweetheart, I’ll be back in a few minutes.’

      He wasn’t.

      TWO

      Twenty minutes after Adam left finds me pacing the living room. I’ve put plates in the oven, got some wine ready and selected a few DVDs for him to choose from, but that only took a minute or two. Now I’m walking from the back window to the front, lifting up the curtain, peering out at the street then turning and walking to the back again. There must be a long queue in the Indian. And of course we never actually got round to ordering the food so he will have to wait while it’s prepared and cooked. It could take, ooh, at least, I don’t know, half an hour. But it’s already been … Never mind, never mind, if there’s a queue he could wait fifty minutes, easily. An hour, even. It’s possible. Maybe he’s had to try a few different places. Maybe he’s bumped into someone he knows and has lost all track of time. Maybe he’s bumped into Leon.

      After about two hours, I’ve stopped pacing and am now sitting on the edge of the sofa, rocking backwards and forwards and occasionally biting the hard skin around my fingernails. I’ve got my own mobile phone loose in my hand but it’s as good as useless when the one, the only person I want to contact has apparently switched his phone off. That sodding phone of his, full of mysteries and unknowns, always always with him, constantly lighting up and vibrating all over the place; but now, when I really need to use it, when it will be of more use than it ever has been before – to me, anyway – it’s in his pocket in complete darkness. Oh my God, why would he do that? Why would anyone? What’s the arsing point of having an arsing mobile if it’s arsing switched off, for arse’s sake?

      I did wonder whether it’s not switched off at all, maybe he simply hit a black spot or whatever it’s called, so I’ve texted, Facebooked and WhatsApped him too. That way, if he does happen to get a fraction of a second of signal, he’ll see my messages. At least then he could try to call me from a phone box, to put my mind at ease.

      But he’s called me before from the East of India. Or rather, I’ve called him there before. I know I have, I remember it. He forgot to ask me what I wanted, so I rang to tell him, to make sure he didn’t come back with a vindaloo for me like the first time, when he didn’t know I don’t like spicy food. Which means I know there’s no black spot there. Which means he’s turned his phone off.

      Unless he didn’t go to the East of India …

      I jump up out of frustration, wanting to shout angrily at Adam, wanting to shriek at him, wanting to throw my head back and scream at the ceiling. But I don’t. Of course I don’t. I turn down the bubbling volcano of fury that’s threatening to erupt and try to think clearly. Why would he be taking so long? Did he go somewhere else? Or has something happened to him? Something … bad?

      I walk over to the answer phone and listen to Leon again. I don’t know why, the message isn’t going to tell me where Adam is. But I have to keep hearing it. It seems connected to his prolonged absence somehow. Or is it simply a pleasant message from an old friend, wanting to catch up? It doesn’t sound like it to me, but then my opinion is not really objective. I have my own feelings about Adam that colour every interaction he has with anyone else.

      I press play yet again. ‘Hello Adam, it’s Leon …

      Something about that unknown point he’s making when he says their names now sounds a bit menacing. Or am I imagining things, bearing in mind Adam went out for food over two hours ago and still hasn’t come back?

      I start suddenly. A car. There’s a car pulling onto the driveway. Oh, thank God. He’s safe. A giant flame of rage roars into life in me suddenly, along with my almost forgotten hunger. But why the fuck did it take him so long? I clench my jaw, my fists, and every other muscle in my body. Even my eyelids go rigid. Ooh you secretive sod, do you have some explaining to do. I charge over to the window and yank back the curtain. It’s almost completely dark by now and I have to press my face to the glass to see out. My own face, distorted by a vicious snarl, lunges at me in the blackness. Where’s the car? Where’s that prickish little car? There’s nothing on the driveway yet so I look at the road, to see the silver Corsa with its reversing lights on. But it’s not there. There’s only one car there and it’s an ordinary blue car, simply driving past. It doesn’t stop. It doesn’t discharge my husband, rescued after a cam belt disaster. It doesn’t yield anything.

      I drop the curtain and drop my hands and a small sound comes out of me. The hunger disappears, forgotten again, but the anger doesn’t. In fact, the anger starts to swell again and turn white, blinding white, expanding inside me until I feel I can’t contain it any more and I put my hands on my head and shout ‘AAARRRSE!’ as loudly as I can. It comes out a bit screamy – ‘AAAAAAAHHHHHSE!’

      When I stop, the house falls instantly silent. Supernaturally so. Like all the things that usually make a noise also suddenly stop. The fridge isn’t humming, no pipes are clunking, there’s no creaking, clicking, ticking or cracking. Everything is completely and utterly still. The house feels like it’s waiting.

      That’s it, I’m calling Ginger. I’ve wanted to for over an hour already but managed to convince myself not to; managed to convince myself I was over-reacting. But she’s my best friend in the whole world, she’ll know whether I’m over-reacting or not. I spend the next few minutes rooting through my handbag, then frantically running from room to room looking for my phone, before remembering that it’s already in my hand. I close my eyes. I growl a bit at myself. Come on, focus.

      Ginger isn’t ginger, actually. She has gorgeous, shiny brown hair, and her name is in fact Louise, but because her baby brother Matthew once painted her whole head red with poster paint when they were tots, she’s been Ginger, or Ginge, ever since. She answers on the second ring.

      ‘Hey, Gee, how’s you?’

      I open my mouth and a kind of whimpering sound comes out.

      ‘Grace?’

      ‘Ginge …’ It comes out as a breathy sob.

      ‘On my way,’ she says simply.

      There’s a sharp pain in the side of my head and I realise suddenly that I’m pressing the phone too hard into my ear. I ease it away and my ear throbs with the rush of blood.

      So

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