'I don't know. To run away, to get attention. Whatever.'
'But why! Why didn't they believe you?' she persisted.
'Because there's no evidence,' I said flatly.
'None at all?'
'No. Not a shred.'
'Oh.' We sat there in silence for a few seconds. 'So, what on earth are you going to do now?'
'I don't know that either. I don't know where to begin, Sadie. I mean, I literally don't know what to do next. When I get up tomorrow morning, I don't have a clue where I should go, who I should see, who I should be even. It's like I'm starting from zero. A blank. I can't tell you how odd it feels. How truly horrible. It's like an experiment designed to drive me insane.'
'You must be furious with them.'
'Yes, I am.'
'And scared.'
'Right.' The warm room suddenly felt chilly.
'Because,' said Sadie, following her thoughts, 'because if what you say is really true then he is still out there. He may still be after you.'
'Yes,' I said. 'Exactly.' But we'd both heard her say it. If. If what I said was true, if I hadn't made the whole thing up. I looked at her and she dropped her eyes and started talking to Pippa again in her baby voice, though Pippa had fallen asleep by now, her head tipped back like a drunkard's and her small mouth half open, a milk blister on her top lip.
'What do you fancy for supper?' she asked. 'You must be famished.'
I wasn't going to let it drop. 'You don't know whether to believe me, do you?'
'Don't be ridiculous, Abbie. Of course I believe you. Of course. One hundred per cent.'
'Thanks.' But I knew, and she knew I knew, that she was unsure.
Doubt had been planted, and it would grow and flourish. And who could blame her? It was my hysterical Gothic tale against everyone else's measured, everyday sanity. If I was her, I'd doubt me.
I made supper while Sadie put Pippa to bed. Bacon sandwiches, with fat white slices of bread that I dipped in the fat first, chewy and salty, and big mugs of tea. Being here should have felt like a refuge from all that had happened and might again, but that night on Sadie's lumpy sofa I slept fitfully and several times I lurched awake from dreams of running, tripping, falling, with my heart racing and sweat pouring off my forehead. Pippa woke often, too, howling angrily. The walls in the flat were thin and it was as if we were in the same room. In the morning I'd leave. I couldn't stay here another night.
'That's what you said last time,' remarked Sadie cheerily, when I told her at six the next morning. She seemed remarkably fresh. Her face was rosy under her mess of soft brown hair.
'I don't know how you manage. I need at least eight hours, preferably ten, twelve on Sundays. I'll go to Sheila and Guy's; they've got room. Just till I work out what to do.'
'And you said that too.'
'So it must be a good idea.'
I made my way to Sheila and Guy's in the dawn. It had snowed some more in the night, and everything even the dustbins, even the burnt-out cars looked eerily beautiful in the soft light. I walked, but I stopped at a baker's on the way to buy three croissants as a peace-offering, so I now had exactly 5.20 left. Today I'd phone my bank. What was my account number? I had a flash of panic that I wouldn't be able to remember it, and that lots of bits of my life were disappearing now, as if there was a delete cursor randomly at work in my brain.
It wasn't even seven o'clock when I rapped at their door. The curtains upstairs were all drawn. I waited for a decent interval, then rapped again, longer and louder. I stood back from the door and looked up. A curtain twitched. A face and bare shoulders appeared in the window.
Sheila and Sadie and I have known each other for more than half our lives. We were a quarrelsome threesome at school, breaking up and re-forming. But we went through our teenage years together: exams, periods, boyfriends, hopes. Now Sadie has a baby and Sheila has a husband, and I ... well, I don't seem to have much right now, except a story. I waved furiously at the window and Sheila's face changed from scowling grumpiness to surprise and concern. It disappeared, and a few moments later, Sheila was standing at the door in a voluminous white to welling robe, her dark hair in rats' tails round her bleary face. I thrust the bag of croissants into her hands.
'Sorry,' I said. 'It was too early to ring in advance. Can I come in?'
'You look like a ghost,' she said. 'What's happened to your face?'
I edited the story down this time, just the highlights. I was vague about the police. I think Sheila and Guy were obviously confused, but they were effusively supportive and welcoming, fussing over me with coffee and offers of a bath, a shower, money, clothes, the use of their phone, of their car, of their spare bedroom for as long as I liked.
'We'll be at work, of course. Just treat the place like your own.'
'Did I leave any of my things here?'
'Here? No. There might be odds and ends floating around.'
'How long did I stay then? Just one night?'
'No. Well, kind of, I suppose.'
'What do you mean, 'kind of'?'
'You stayed here Sunday and then you didn't come back on Monday. You phoned to say you were staying somewhere else. And then you picked up your stuff on Tuesday. You left us a note. And two very expensive bottles of wine.'
'Where did I go after that, then?'
They didn't know. All they could tell me was that I had been rather hyped-up, had kept them up till the early hours of Monday, talking and drinking and making fine plans for the rest of my life, and then had left the next day. They glanced at each other surreptitiously as they were telling me this and I wondered what they weren't telling me. Had I behaved disgracefully, thrown up on the carpet? At one point, I came back into the kitchen just as they were getting ready to leave for work. They were talking urgently in low voices, their heads close together, and when they saw me they stopped and smiled at me and pretended they'd simply been making arrangements for the evening.
Them too, I thought, and I looked away as if I hadn't noticed anything. It was going to be like this, especially after Sheila and Guy had talked to Sadie, and they'd all talked to Robin, and then to Carla and Joey and Sam. I could imagine them all ringing each other up. Have you heard? Isn't it terrible? What do you think, I mean, really think, just between us?
The trouble is, friendships are all about tact. You don't want to know what friends say about you to other friends or to partners. You don't want to know what they really think or how far their loyalty goes. You want to be very careful before you test it. You might not like what you find.
Four
I had no embarrassment. I was down to about five pounds and I just had to borrow money from Sheila and Guy. They were very nice about it. Of course, being 'very nice' meant a lot of huffing and puffing and gritting of teeth and rummaging in purse and wallet and saying that they would be able to get to the bank later. At first I felt like saying it didn't matter and I could manage without the money, but it did matter and I couldn't manage without it. So fifty-two pounds in assorted notes and coins was dropped into my open hands. Then I borrowed a pair of knickers from Sheila and a T-shirt and threw mine into her dirty-washing basket. She asked if she could give me anything else and I asked if she had an old sweater that I could take for a day or two. She said, 'Of course', and went and found me a lovely one that didn't look old at all. Sheila was rather larger than me, especially now, but I was able to roll up the sleeves and didn't look too ridiculous. Even so, she couldn't keep an entirely straight face.
'I'm sorry,' she said. 'You look great but.. .'
'Like someone living rough,' I said.
'No, no,' she insisted. 'I'm used to you seeming, I don't know, more grown-up, maybe.'
As they left for work, I thought they looked a little concerned about the idea of leaving me alone in their house. I don't know whether they thought I would raid the drinks cabinet or the fridge or make international calls.
