Chapter 10
‘Eve?’ he repeats. ‘Eve Park?’
She narrows her eyes. ‘Jack… Demerell?’
He nods, and they stare at each other. ‘Well,’ he manages. ‘Of all the people I didn’t expect to see…’
She smiles, taking him in. The worn clothes, the scruffy haircut and watchful brown eyes. The quiet but unmistakeable air of toughness.
‘So are you back living here? Or visiting. Or…?’
‘Just visiting,’ Eve says.
He nods. ‘I guess it’s a place people come back to.’
‘I guess it is. So what are you doing, Jack?’
He looks away, his eyes far-focused. ‘The short version is that I joined the army after sixth form, and they sent me to university. I became an officer, did a couple of tours in Afghanistan, and left three years ago.’
‘A lifetime.’
‘Certainly felt like one.’
‘How long’s it been? I mean, since we—’
‘Since you disappeared? Fifteen years.’
She nods, not seeing him. The wheatfields are the colour of Oxana’s hair.
‘One day you were here,’ he says. ‘The next you were gone.’
‘I know. I—’
‘It’s OK. You don’t owe me an explanation.’
‘I think… maybe I do?’
He shrugs. ‘Tell me.’
‘My father was a scientist. He worked at the government research station at Semley, which is why I grew up here in Cranborne.’
‘Only child?’
‘Only child. I went to school here and stayed on for sixth form, which is where we met, right?’
‘Umm… my memory is that we met before that, at the High School, but—’
‘God, I’m sorry. It’s kind of a blur, that time.’
‘I definitely knew who you were at the High School. You had a red coat.’
‘I did. I loved that coat. My mother bought it for me in London.’
‘Well, my fifteen-year-old self worshipped you from afar. In your red coat.’
‘I had no idea, truly.’
‘And then, in sixth form, I plucked up the courage…’
She smiles. ‘That I do remember.’
‘Do you remember which film we went to?’
‘Yes. She’s the Man?’
‘Starring?’
‘Amanda Bynes.’
‘What else do you remember about that evening?’
‘Honestly, nothing. Sorry.’
‘I obviously made a big impression.’
Eve bites her lip. ‘What can I say. Seventeen-year-old girls don’t have fully functioning brains.’
‘And then you disappeared.’
‘What happened was that my dad was offered a senior research position in the US, in Washington State. My mum wanted to stay in Cranborne but I was desperate to go. I’d read Twilight, and I thought I was Bella. And in the end we did go.’
‘And was it like Twilight?’
‘Yes. Heavy rain. Long winters.’
‘Sexy vampires?’
‘Didn’t meet any. Big disappointment. My parents ended up loving the place and I came back to the UK alone, to read criminology at university. I’m still here, they… They stayed there. And in the end, died there.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
She nods. ‘Thank you. It was a few years ago.’
He shakes his head. ‘So here we are.’
‘Here we are. Are you married, Jack?’
‘Used to be. Claire divorced me. After the second tour of Afghanistan, I went off the rails pretty badly. Shut myself off, drank a lot, got into fights… After a few months she couldn’t take any more, and I don’t blame her. I’d have left me.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be. I got help, eventually, and got through it. And now I run a charity organising young people’s adventure trips. Camping, climbing, hillwalking, that sort of thing. Getting them away from their screens, basically.’
‘How’s that going?’
He shrugs. ‘It was a bumpy start; there was literally no money at all. But now we have social events, fundraising evenings, fun runs, raffles, all that sort of thing, and it’s beginning to pay for itself.’
‘Nice kids?’
‘Brilliant, for the most part, and some of them have had very hard starts in life. But I can relate to that, and they usually end up having a pretty good time out on the hills, so hopefully I’m making a bit of a difference. What about you? What did you do with that criminology degree?’
‘Joined the security services.’
‘Wow. I’d never have had you marked down as a secret squirrel.’
‘It was actually pretty boring. I was stuck in an office most of the time.’
‘Did you get married?’
‘I did.’
‘And are you still?’
‘Nope. I married a decent, hard-working guy, got involved with someone else, and left him.’
Jack smiles and looks away.
‘It’s not funny, believe me. I behaved horribly.’
‘And now?’
‘Now I’m on my own.’
‘Since?’
‘Yesterday.’
‘Yesterday?’ He regards her intently. ‘My God. Are you… OK?’
‘I’m not sure. I’m kind of in shock. Running on empty.’
‘I’m not surprised. Is that why you came back here?’
‘To be honest, I really don’t know why I’m here. I’ve no connection with the place any more. It just seemed… safe.’
‘You grew up in Cranborne, Eve. Amongst these hills. They’re part of you. Are you staying in the town?’
‘Yes, with a witch called Philippa.’
He laughs.
‘What’s funny?’
‘Nothing, really. Philippa Penrose is a bit of a local celebrity. Finding missing cats, curing migraines, cursing river polluters, that sort of thing. And the odd bit of glamour work too, from what I’ve heard.’
‘Glamour work?’
‘Photographic modelling. I think more saucy than actually pornographic.’
‘A girl’s got to live,’ Eve murmurs.
‘I couldn’t agree more. I’m not judging her; in fact, I think she’s a thoroughly good sort. Her boy Tom’s a bit of a liability, though. He’s got in with some fairly scuzzy types.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Drug dealers. I’d be worried if I was his mum. He’s a vulnerable kid.’
‘What was your wife’s name?’
‘Claire. Claire Bowden.’
‘She did sixth form too, didn’t she?’
‘Yes. Do you remember her?’
‘I think so. If she’s the person I think she is, she had a Tamagotchi which she starved to death.’
Jack laughs. ‘I didn’t know that. Perhaps it’s lucky she and I didn’t have children.’
Eve feels a sharp, unexpected pang of hunger, and glances towards the town. When she looks back, Jack’s hands are thrust purposefully into his pockets, and he’s staring in the opposite direction with the air of one keen to move on. ‘I should go,’ she murmurs.
He grins. ‘If you’re here for a bit, it’d be nice to see you again.’
‘I don’t have a phone. But you know where to find me.’
Well, there’s a surprise. Jack Demerell, of all people.
He really is very different from how I remember him.
And that date, details of which are coming back to me.
The film was a riff on Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, a fact which sailed way over my head at the time.
And then there was the bus ride home from the cinema.
When we sat down Jack put an arm round my shoulders, or more precisely laid it along the back of the seat, and then leaned in for a kiss at the exact moment that I rose to my feet to get off the bus.
I could have ducked back down. He’d been nice, and we hadn’t quite reached my stop.
But I didn’t. I just gave him a wave and a tight smile, and that was it.
I saw him around the school a couple of times before I left for the US, and we exchanged awkward how-are-yous, but that failed kiss was always hanging in the air between us.
Why did I come back to Cranborne? It certainly wasn’t to get back in touch with anyone I used to know here.
I could’ve done that any time in the last decade, and I never did.
It’s beautiful round here, but it’s also the place I grew up, the place where I was a bored child and an awkward, sulky teenager, and this gives it a weird time-frozen air.
Why was I always so cranky and difficult?
I can’t, for the life of me, remember. But then my entire pre-Oxana self is hazy and indistinct.
Oxana changed everything. She likes to say that she created me, and for all her bullshit, that’s kind of true.
Am I here in search of an earlier version of myself?
Yesterday, I felt so sure that coming to Cranborne was the right thing to do.
But do I really want to go back in time?
Is it too late to cut open the Oxana snakebite and suck out the poison?
Or is it already, irreversibly, racing through my bloodstream?