Chapter Eight
Chapter Eight
Back at home I’m pacing the tiny kitchen area, the walls blurring as I scurry back and forth and back and forth like a drugged lab rat. I’m dizzy with panic. Since my failed high street hunt I’ve tried calling Noah seven times now, and each time the phone rings out. I glance at the bottle of his favourite white wine I bought on my way home from Clapham Common, thinking we would sit down, talk everything through. I am angry, yes, but the wine is a sign that I want to work this out and listen to his side. The bottle now taunts me from the kitchen counter.
I don’t drink very often. Never alone at home. I didn’t go to university, so those formative years spent getting drunk and playing messy drinking games evaded me. Occasionally I’ll have a glass of wine with Noah when he’s had a hard day, or at work events, but Sukhi doesn’t drink much either so usually I keep her company on softies. Deep down, drinking reminds me of Mother; of cleaning vomit from the carpet and the smell of bile.
But now my fingers are itching for something to do, and I find myself twisting off the bottle cap and pouring out a large glass, taking a gulp. It goes down easily, smooth and mellow. I swig more down, closing my eyes and letting the warmth hit my belly. I feel tears welling. I take another sip.
In what seems like no time at all, I’ve drunk half the bottle and decide to text Noah again. My concern about coming across as neurotic is long gone together with my sobriety.
Is this why Mother always argued with the men she dated?
WHERE ARE YOU NOAH? Call me, we need to talk, wtf is going on?
I hit send, and watch my words disappear into the cellular ether. A single tick blinks at me, mockingly, indicating that my message has been sent but not received. He’s switched his phone off.
Rage builds in me and I storm over to the bed, ripping the drawer out of his bedside cabinet and searching through it feverishly for clues as to where he’s been going every day, all day. My drunken forage turns up nothing of interest, nothing bizarre or odd or out of place. I move to the wardrobe, rifling through everything, pockets all probed. Nothing.
An hour later and the flat is a mess. I’ve torn the place upside down and can find no evidence of Noah being anything other than truthful. I sink into the dining chair and take another deep gulp of wine. The last drawer in the house to go unchecked is beneath my fingertips, a small side drawer in our kitchen table. I use it every day, so I know there is nothing of Noah’s in there. But still, I decide to torture myself and open it.