Page 62 of The Housewarming

No, everything is not OK. My thumb hovers. I am so tired, but I know I won’t sleep until I’ve spoken to Neil, and I have to do that face to face so I can watch him, watch him react. And so, I text.

Can you meet me? Now?

I wait. The clock in the kitchen ticks. Twenty past twelve. The fridge hums. My phone buzzes.

OK. Where?

Outside – 5 mins?

OK.

Neil marches towards me, head down, hands pushed deep into his coat pockets. His white legs are bare but for a fringe of gingham pyjama short around the bottom of his jacket. On his feet are white Nike sliders.

‘Hey.’ He stops and shivers. ‘You OK?’

I meet his blue eyes. I have no idea how to start. What I have to say might ruin our friendship forever. It is a betrayal of all of us, really, but what I have to know is bigger than friendship, bigger than marriage, bigger than any other thing in my life.

‘Can we walk?’ I suggest.

He shrugs. ‘Sure.’

We pass the Lovegoods’ and head towards the end of the road.

‘I haven’t slept since the party,’ I begin. ‘I mean, I didn’t sleep last night and I couldn’t get to sleep tonight.’

‘How come?’

We turn left, into Thameside Lane. We have reached the tennis courts before I realise he is waiting for me to speak.

‘Matt and I are separating,’ I say.

‘Oh, mate.’ He stops. ‘No way! Mate, I’m sure you feel like that now, but—’

I hold up my hand. ‘I know what you’re going to say and I know you mean well, but this is between me and Matt. I can’t be with someone I don’t trust, not after everything we’ve been through. I need someone solid or no one at all.’ I continue walking, forcing him to walk too. ‘I’m thinking of moving up north. I haven’t spoken to my mum yet, but I imagine I’ll move in with her in the short term. I can’t stay here.’

‘I suppose you know best what you have to do,’ he says after a moment, though I don’t think for one second he’s accepted what I’ve said, more that he’s realised it’s pointless arguing with me in my current state, which is infuriating and depressing in equal measure. ‘Is that what you wanted to talk about?’

We cross the road by the leisure centre.

‘I’ve been thinking about that day.’ I begin again. ‘The day Abi… To be honest, I never think about anything else. It just goes round and round and round, you know? I don’t know what I’m expecting. Maybe that if I go round enough times, I’ll get a different outcome. Abi won’t go missing, or she’ll be found by a neighbour, or she won’t reach the river, I don’t know.’ I am aware of myself gabbling. But he shows no sign of impatience.

We reach the Fisherman’s Arms. The river is around the corner, an invisible force pulling us towards it. I wonder if he is aware of it too. If he is, he says nothing.

‘I’m sorry to wake you up like this,’ I say eventually. Something I should have said at the start.

‘That’s OK. I don’t sleep well either, to be honest.’

He says it naturally. He has no idea how I might interpret his sleeplessness, with its undertones of a guilty conscience.

‘I just need you to answer a couple of questions.’

We round the corner. The chandlery comes into shadowy view, the dip at the end of the lane where Abi purportedly wandered towards the ducks and to her death. At the dip, we sit on the little wall next to the footpath and stare at the shallows.

This is where my daughter died, I think.

‘Come on,’ he prompts. ‘You can ask me anything – you know that.’

I take a deep breath. ‘That morning. You were at home when I came to your house. How come?’

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