Page 17 of Cuckoo

‘Stop waiting for me and stop fucking calling me!’ he tells me.

I freeze, my chest tightening at the shock of being cursed at by him. ‘What?’

‘Go home and just drop this,’ he says to me. His voice is low, he’s obviously embarrassed by our audience, but beneath the pleading tone there’s a hint of… anger. And the idea thathecould dare be the one who is angry in this scenario snaps something within me, my control of myself and any fear of embarrassment torn away with it.

‘You’reangry atme?’ I say, dumbfounded. ‘What haveIdone?’ I am getting louder. ‘Oh, am Iembarrassingyou?’I say, hearing Mother’s mocking tone in my voice, and Noah flinches. He’s still walking backwards.

‘Go home and stop waiting for me,’ he finally hisses, before he turns andruns,like an actual child, away from me and back into his office. I go to follow him, but don’t get very far. Both doormen are frowning at me and have stepped in front of the entry, blocking my way.

‘Ma’am, we are going to have to ask you to leave. You are not allowed inside these premises.’

‘Noah!’ I roar, holding out both arms and spinning away from them, seeing stars in front of my eyes as anger almost suffocates me.

Beside me, some teenagers are laughing, watching me. I think of Mother, of Sukhi, of their fierce bravery, and throw up my middle finger. They laugh even harder.

I am shaking the entire journey home, but one thought calms me. This is not over because I have walked away with new, confirmed information:

Noah works at Alliance & Gordon, and the Facebook page we found is definitely his.

Noah knows he has been caught out in his lies, and is afraid of something. Afraid of me finding out something else?

I am not able to confront him properly at his workplace and need to find a new way of speaking with him in person.

Noah seems to be trying to leave me, permanently. And before I uncovered all of these lies, everything was fine. So whatever it is he is trying to hide, it’s big enough to leave me for. And I’m going to find out what it is.

Chapter Fifteen

30 October 2024

Dear Diary,

I’m not sure whether I’ve ever received a proper big bouquet of flowers before, but I DEFINITELY have never received Hallowe’en flowers. I didn’t even realise it was a thing, but Noah continues to surprise me.

He sent them to my office, and they arrived first thing in the morning. Big black and white roses with little orange pipe cleaner spirals and black glittered paper bats in between. They were ridiculous and over-the-top and I loved them.

With them was a little note:Sorry about last night. And sorry we can’t dress up together. Next year!

We’ve been spending more and more time together and I’d floated the idea of us going to a Hallowe’en party dressed as Mario and Luigi. I thought it would be so funny. But he’s away all weekend for some business trip apparently.

He’s away quite a lot, which is annoying as we haven’t been able to spend much weekend time together. Mostly just the evenings after work.

And sometimes not even then, because he works so late. Idon’t really understand his job properly. He tries to explain it but my eyes glaze over and I can feel that none of what he’s saying is sticking because it’s just full of figures and numbers and complicated phrases like ‘investment portfolio’ and ‘high-stake low-risk’ and ‘top-line budget versus net profit’, which literally mean nothing to me. I just know that it’s very full on, and that he sometimes needs to travel or work late nights.

‘It’s like being a lawyer, Claire. It’s just one of the downsides to a shitty City job that pays really well.’

I’d understood, but still felt rejected by his refusal even to consider going to a party with me. We’d ended up having a bit of an argument about it, and afterwards I’d felt incredibly needy. I’d never considered myself a high-maintenance girl, but perhaps I require a little more quality time together and memory-building than I’d initially thought. Perhaps Noah is more of a take-it-slow guy, and the idea that I could potentially have made him feel claustrophobic or been too intense with that party suggestion sent a bolt of humiliation through me. I’d apologised for overreacting and told him that of course his work came before silly consumerist holidays, and he’d shrugged it off and said it wasn’t a big deal. And then I guess he found these flowers! A lovely surprise. And he’s right– there’s always next year.

Claire

Chapter Sixteen

‘What an arsehole.’ Sukhi has visited late after work again, and I’m filling her in on what happened when I went to the Alliance & Gordon offices. Her reaction is, I think, justified. I let the validation wash over me in a warm glow. It’s like she said to me when she walked in on my messy flat: it’s okay for me to react in the way I feel is right for me. In the same way that Noah always told me the emotions I feel aren’t wrong or right, they’re just… me.

My truth.

Before, there was only ever Mother’s way, Mother’s truth.

What is Noah’s truth?

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