Page 33 of The Spark

It’s hard to know when the stress-cleaning kicked in. I definitely wasn’t this way before Jamie’s accident. But in the aftermath, I think I used it as a way to distract myself from the pain of losing him.

After a couple of hours, I crawl back onto the sofa, exhausted. Just as I used to do round Mum’s, when Jamie first died. Even though they’d never really bonded, she was there for me then. For once, she was quiet and calm, her presence placid as snowfall.

I suffered with insomnia, right after it happened. It was vigilance, I see that now, stemming from the idea that Jamie’s dying was a mistake. That his vanishing was only temporary. That he would come back to get me somehow.

And now – impossibly – maybe he has.

The next thing I know, the room is billowing with morning light. I start my Saturday with a shiver, incredulous and unnerved.

Chapter 16.

Later that afternoon, I call in at Mum’s.

Ralph is in the kitchen, heating soup on the Aga. He doesn’t have a family of his own. He does have a cat called Maisie, and a small group of acquaintances. But no kids, or spouse, or even ex-spouse, as far as I know.

‘Hello,’ I say. I always make the effort to be pleasant to Ralph, because he is only occasionally afforded the same courtesy from my mother. ‘Where’s Mum?’

‘A little worse for wear,’ he says, enunciating delicately, as if he’s the one with the hangover. He tilts his head towards the ceiling. ‘Having a lie-down.’

‘Pub?’

He shakes his head. ‘Wedding. Open bar.’

‘Ah.’ Mum always gets emotional at weddings, I assume because her own marriage didn’t work out. ‘Hence the soup?’

‘Oh, no, this is for me. Late lunch. She still can’t keep anything down, bless her.’

I wonder why Ralph’s treating Mum like she’s been struck down with norovirus, rather than a hangover that’s entirely self-inflicted.

He decants the soup into a chipped bowl and takes it to the table, sits down and begins to eat. He’s a creature of habit, Ralph. I’d wager he’s had soup for lunch every Saturday of his life.

I survey the kitchen. It looks like it’s lived in by students who’ve already written off their deposit. The tap drips non-stop. Empty bottles, plastic cartons and ashtrays litter every surface. One pane of the sash window has been replaced by cardboard, and I know for a fact that none of these lightbulbs are working. There are three dead plants by the sideboard, their leaves virtually dust. A few floor tiles are cracked, too – no doubt from when Mum’s been drunk and dropped or dislodged something – and are patched together with duct tape. I know Ralph would sort it all out if he could, but Mum gets snippy with him whenever he tries to help.

There is a small bunch of wild flowers stuffed into a jam jar in the middle of the table. My mum doesn’t do things like pick her own sweet peas from the jungle that is her back garden, so either they’ve been thoughtfully collected by Ralph, or Duke’s reduced his budget for bouquets since I was last here.

I take a seat at the table opposite Ralph, rubbing at an old red wine stain in the woodgrain with my thumb. ‘Can I ask you something?’

I’ve been thinking all morning about sharing what I know – or think I know – about Ash. My first inclination, still, is to call Lara, because she had that gift of making even my most outrageous confessions seem tame. With her, the lack of judgement always felt permissive and comforting.

I sometimes wonder who relies on her friendship these days, who enjoys the pleasure of simply knowing she’s in the world. But Lara’s not my wing-woman any more, and she won’t ever be again. Some clocks you can’t turn back.

There’s no point talking to my mother about the idea of walk-ins – I’d probably get more sense out of that murdered cheese plant than I would from her – but Ralph has always been a good listener, thoughtful, and pragmatic. He is a tug boat of a man, always trying to guide everyone around him to where they need to be.

It does feel slightly strange, to be about to confide something so objectively odd. But if I can trust anyone not to laugh, or ridicule me, or be dismissive, it is Ralph.

And maybe a tiny part of me is testing the water, too. Seeing how my fledgling theory sounds, once it’s out of my brain, and into open air.

‘Of course.’ Ralph nods, sets down his spoon and wipes his mouth. He is slight, with greying hair and kind, steady eyes. Looks-wise, I suppose he is fairly unremarkable. So different to my father, who is the kind of guy women would stare at when he walked into a room.

‘I . . . I’ve started seeing someone,’ I begin.

‘Ah. Well, good for you.’

Ralph met Jamie a couple of times. He knows the basics of what happened to him, courtesy of my mum. But we’ve never directly discussed him, just the two of us.

‘The thing is . . . I can’t help wondering if . . . Jamie’s come back.’

Ralph blinks twice, then reaches for his soup spoon again. ‘Come back?’

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