Woman Last Seen(14)
Mark is talking to a group of friends. He’s laughing along with whatever it is they are saying, but I sense that while chatting with them, he’s also hunting me out. Checking I’m okay, that I’m not alone, that my mother hasn’t upset me, that the wedding logistics haven’t overwhelmed me. Things I’ve admitted to worrying about on the run-up to the wedding. We catch one another’s gaze; he smiles at me. It’s a warm, honest, open smile that completes me. I smile back, he blows me a kiss. I pretend to catch it. We both laugh. Then we each look about us again. Eyes scanning like a beam from a lighthouse. We simultaneously spot the boys, sitting under the cupcake table, faces smeared with cream and delight. We are all having a perfect day. We’re going to make our way as a family and it’s going to be lovely.
6
Mark
Thursday 19th March 2020
“Where’s Mum?”
“Don’t know.”
Seb stares at his father, his dissatisfaction with that answer radiating. “Why hasn’t she rung this week?”
“She’s probably been too busy.” It’s a low move. A dig at his wife that pinches at the child, but Mark is furious with her, so he doesn’t care.
“She’s normally home by now,” Seb points out. He sounds churlish and concerned. It’s clear he doesn’t know which way to go. “I need her to check my French homework.”
“I’ll have a look at it.”
Seb looks unimpressed. They are both aware that Mark knows little about conjugating irregular verbs, probably less than Seb himself and Seb is in the bottom set for languages. “You’re all right,” he mutters and then slowly makes his way out of the kitchen. He hasn’t finished his breakfast, but Mark can’t be bothered to shout at him, insist that he should return to the table. He hasn’t got much fight in him, or at least what he has he’s keeping to vent on Leigh.
Oli does not ask where his mother is, but he keeps glancing at the kitchen clock. It’s twenty-five past eight. Both boys need to be getting to school. They are going to be late. Normally Leigh is back just before eight, sometimes if the tubes play up, she bounds through the door at five past. The sleeper train gets in at 7:07 a.m. Leigh is always off the train the moment in arrives into Euston. Keen to get back home and see the boys before they go to school, even if it’s only for a few minutes. She always calls if the train is running late. Always. She’s a stickler for planning and time-tabling. She’s forever telling them that her success as a management consultant comes from the fact she is in control of her time, doesn’t allow a dead moment, maximizes all the time she has, etc., etc. They often tease her about her slightly uncompromising approach but they all reluctantly accept that the structure she places on their lives is largely helpful.
It’s definitely odd her not being here. Her not calling all week. Mark should have known the boys weren’t going to be forever fobbed off with his unconvincing excuses that she probably had back-to-back meetings, that her phone was most likely out of charge, that maybe she’d even lost it.
“Why hasn’t she just used the hotel telephone then?” Seb asked.
“She might have forgotten our numbers.”
“What, all of them? Even the house number.” Seb had looked contemptuous. He was twelve, not six.
None of them have heard from her since Monday morning. She always works away Monday to Thursday, but normally she calls them a couple of times a day, messages on a more or less continuous basis. Messages to remind them what she has left for them in the freezer, what order to eat the organic, homemade meals and how long they take to heat up. She might message to say what time football practice starts or whether there is a permission slip for something or other that needs responding to. Oli in particular is often saying her remote micromanagement is annoying. Mark suspects that, like the time management, Leigh’s concern is secretly appreciated. Often her messages are simply Hi, hope you’ve had a good day. Hi, how was the maths test?!! Hi, just thinking of you.
This week, no one has received a single message.
“I’m not going to school, Dad,” says Oli. “I think you should call the police.”
The doorbell chimes through the house, it seems to everyone that it is louder than it has ever been before. It shakes the walls, thumps the silence that they are stewing in.
“Is that her?” Oli yells down the stairs.
“I don’t think it is. Why would she ring the bell? She has a key.” Yet Mark’s heart quickens a fraction because he wants it to be. He really does. Deep down somewhere, he feels something more powerful than reason; yearning and regret combined. He longs for it to be her; at the same time, he knows it won’t be. It can’t be. It would be a miracle. He wants the miracle; the problem is he doesn’t believe in them.
Oli, as a sometimes-surly almost sixteen-year-old, who spends a lot of time trying to convince his mum and dad that he cares about nothing other than video games and getting his hands on illicit alcohol—and that he cares about his parents least of all—is obviously agitated, no doubt very worried. No amount of shrugging or hair flicking can disguise the fact. Both the boys had refused to go to school. Seb had burst into tears and said if his dad didn’t call the police then he would.
“Let’s just see, shall we?”
“See what?” Seb demanded. “She’s not here to see! That’s the point!”