Chapter 35
Eve
I walk away from Adam’s house feeling unsettled. My legs feel strange, and my balance is off; as I reach the end of the front path I stumble and grab onto the gatepost to stop myself from falling.
I feel unnervingly self-conscious, like I’m on a catwalk and an audience is reviewing the way I move. My arms swing awkwardly by my sides as I make the short journey down the street. I am hotly aware of the glare of Adam’s windows behind me, that he might be watching.
I don’t know why I went over. I don’t feel right, my head isn’t functioning properly after everything that’s happened. I messaged Adam as a distraction, and when he suggested going over I jumped at the chance to step outside the house and get my mind on a task — a mission, Will would probably call it — and refocus myself.
Thinking of Will brings a fresh wave of discomfort: was he right? How can I claim to be content with alone time if I happily forego it to pursue a hopeless cat-rehoming mission with a neighbour I barely know?
As if she’s read my mind from afar, Old Sausage is sitting on my doorstep, and I scoop her up and carry her inside. I briefly wonder whether her owner might be watching — one of the neighbours, maybe — but then I remember that Adam knows everyone around here, and he hadn’t seen her around until recently.
‘Right, come on then.’ I shut the front door behind me and place her on the floor. ‘We can be alone together, can’t we?’
Something uncomfortable throbs somewhere in the back of my mind. Am I this desperate? Now that I don’t have work, the day feels slow and endless, and it seems I’ve resorted to coaxing stray cats into my house to fill the void.
I think about our plan to take her to the vet, and my mood buoys. That’s what I’ll do — I’ll sit for a minute, maybe two, feel what it is to be quiet or whatever and then call a taxi and go. Old Sausage follows me through to the kitchen, where I spend a long time making a cup of tea and wiping down the sides. When I can put it off no longer, I sit down on one of the dining chairs and stare at the fridge. Within three seconds, my fingers are reaching for my phone, and I catch myself just in time. I can do this. I can sit here in silence.
I tap my foot against the floor. My mind is suddenly a flood of thoughts: Kirsty, work, cleaning, Mum and Dad, Dev, exercise, Graham, the cat, Will, Jess, food deliveries, flowers, marketing, Adam.
Old Sausage sits at my feet and stares at me. I notice a smear on the door of the oven, and the handle of a carrier bag poking out of the cupboard. I push it all away, hard.
Without physical distraction, my mind begins making plans — what I’ll do about work, what I’ll say to Kirsty next time I see her, what evidence I can gather to fix my predicament. And then, afterwards, problem-solving — when I was in Adam’s kitchen earlier, I recognised him from somewhere. It was the same sense of familiarity I felt the first time I went over. I mentally filter through potential connections: friends, colleagues, dates. I can find no link to a maths tutor.
I realise that planning and problem-solving are along the same vein. I’m trying to focus, to find a purpose and something to latch onto. This is what Will says is wrong with me, but when I push this away too, new, unfamiliar thoughts creep in. Hurt, at how Kirsty has treated me. Shame, for how I behaved. Guilt, for how I let Will down. Embarrassment, for the things he and Jess think about me.
My phone vibrates on the table and I snatch it up, my breath catching in my throat. Kirsty’s name flashes on the screen. The temptation to answer it is strong. Let me have it out with her, let me have something to work on, some kind of purpose...
I let it ring out.
In the silence, the thoughts crowd back in, like tiny needles stabbing at my self-image. The way I behaved at Adam’s house, rudely letting him note it might inconvenience me to take Old Sausage to the vet, without giving a second thought to whether it would affect him to do the same. Walking straight into his kitchen, as if I owned the place.
Humiliation washes over me, and the feeling is so unfamiliar, and so consuming, that I’m on my feet before I know it, heading to grab an old cardboard box from the boiler cupboard, scoop Old Sausage up and set off for the vet.
But my sudden movement causes her to leap three feet in the air, and before I can blink she has scarpered, up onto the counter top and then out of the open kitchen window.
Shit.