The Girl I Used to Be(35)

She sat at my desk with me and I went through the viewing requests. I talked her through the order in which we should work, then suggested who should take which lead. She photocopied the documents and made quick notes.

“Okay, everyone,” I said, when all of my staff were gathered around the table. “Apologies for the late start. From now on Rachel’s going to be in charge of these meetings. Rachel, it’s over to you.”

I sat back and drank my bottle of water. I could hear Rachel reviewing activities from the day before and setting targets for the day with the staff, but all I could think about was the messages I’d received.

I’ve never, ever had a photo taken like that before. I’ve always thought that women who send men intimate photos of themselves were crazy; those pictures could appear anywhere, long after the relationship finished. I couldn’t imagine how drunk I must have been to let someone do that. My stomach curled up in fear at the thought of it appearing on Facebook. I was so glad I’d deactivated my account, even though I knew some of my friends would question why. I’d have to think of some reason; I’d been on there for years.

I don’t know how I did it, but I kept my face expressionless throughout the meeting, and all the while I was thinking, I need to tell the police.

As soon as the meeting ended, I thanked Rachel and quickly went back to my desk. I took my phone out of my desk drawer and looked at it again. The contents of both messages had gone. Disappeared into thin air. All that remained was the name WatchingYou and the notification for each: Photo Unavailable.

And then I realized, of course, I could send a message back. I hadn’t thought of that before, because the actual messages had disappeared. I clicked on the Message button and typed, What is it you want?

I turned the sound on my phone up high and put it into my desk drawer. My heart still racing, I tried to work, though I was alert for the ringtone all morning.

There was no reply.





TWENTY-FIVE


JOE CALLED LATER on in the afternoon. I was in the middle of speaking to a couple of first-time buyers and had to ignore his call. He didn’t leave a voice mail, just a text that said All OK; he knew how I panicked if he called and I couldn’t get to the phone, in case something was wrong with Rory. When I left the office I sat in my car and thought I’d call him then instead of waiting until I got home.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he said, and my heart softened.

“I’ve really missed you.” I could hear my voice wobble.

He laughed. “I’ve missed you, too. It’s been great seeing Brendan, though. And hey, guess what? He’s planning to move back over here.”

“To Ireland? Really? With Sarah?”

“Of course with Sarah! All of them. They want to come back to the old country.”

“Sarah’s not Irish.”

“I know, but since her mum and dad emigrated to Spain when they retired, she’s not got the ties in England anymore.”

My heart sank. I knew the pressure would be on me now.

“So, I’ve been okay,” I said, in a passive-aggressive attempt to stave off the inevitable discussion about moving to Ireland.

“Sorry, Gem! It isn’t that I’d forgotten you. I just wanted to tell you the news about Brendan. So what have you been up to? How are you feeling?”

“Oh, okay. It’s been busy here.”

“You poor thing. Make sure you get an early night.”

My mind flashed to the night before when I’d woken at midnight to remember the lamps in the hotel room. I’d hardly slept afterward, my mind racing about what was going on. “I will,” I said.

“Anything interesting happen?”

I was silent for a moment. How on earth could I begin to tell him I thought I was being blackmailed? “Oh, not much,” I said instead, and scrabbled around for something I’d done that I could tell him about. There wasn’t anything. “Just sorting out the house.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, sweetie. It was a bit of a mess before I left, wasn’t it? We were in a rush.”

I knew it was grossly unfair but there was no way I was going to admit to the cleaning service. Not yet at any rate. I reckoned that was worth a good few months of ammunition.

“So you’ll be back in a couple of days?” I asked.

“We will. What is it now, Saturday? We’ll be back on Wednesday.”

“Okay. I’ll miss you.” I could hear someone saying something in the background, and then Joe said, “My mum says why aren’t you on Facebook? She wanted to send you a message there but you’d disappeared.”

“Oh,” I said, frantically trying to think up an excuse. “I was reading an article about how social media uses up too much of our time and I thought I’d get rid of it for a few weeks.”

“Good idea. I know it’s easy to waste hours on there. I’d better go, sweetheart.”

“Call me tonight, will you, if you get the chance? And is Rory there?”

“He is. Hold on; I’ll call him. I love you.”

I heard him call Rory’s name, and then my boy was on the phone to me, breathless with excitement about a game he was playing with his cousins that involved chasing and water and Nanny’s dog.

I sat in the car for a few minutes after the call ended. I wanted to feel happy for them—I did feel happy for them—but I really missed them. I wanted to be the one running around the garden with Rory, or drinking beer and flipping burgers with my family. I started the car, feeling really sorry for myself.