Then She Vanishes(66)

Despite my self-enforced rule not to drink during the week I’d been so freaked out by discovering someone had been outside my front door that I opened a bottle of wine and drank the lot. I must have staggered in here and collapsed in a heap on the bed. I’d wanted to blot everything out: the fear, the loneliness, the fact someone’s watching me.

I get up and go into the kitchen, hoping that maybe Rory fell asleep on the sofa. But it’s all just as I left it yesterday.

I check my phone, but nothing from Rory. What if something’s happened to him?

I click the kettle on, then stand in the kitchen and call Rory on my mobile. Eventually I hear a raspy ‘Hello?’

‘Rory. It’s me. Where are you? Are you okay?’

There’s a rustling sound, as though he’s getting out of bed. ‘Yeah. Sorry. Ian said I could stay at his so that I could have a few drinks.’

My stomach lurches. We’ve been together for nearly three years and he’s never stayed out without letting me know. ‘Why didn’t you ring me?’ It’s not like Rory to play games.

He sighs. ‘I thought you’d be busy. We never see each other much anyway. You’re always out.’

‘That’s not true,’ I say, hurt. My mobile feels hot against my ear.

‘You’re in Tilby a lot …’ The words ‘with Margot’ are left unsaid but I know he’s thinking them. He clears his throat. ‘Look, I’m sorry. I should have called. I’m angry with you and I’m trying to punish you.’

Typical Rory, telling me how it is. Despite myself I can’t help a small sad smile. I nod, even though he can’t see me.

‘But that’s not going to get us anywhere, is it?’ His voice is tinged with regret.

‘No,’ I say quietly.

‘I’m teaching all week in Hanham. But I’ll be home at six. Okay. Then we can talk. Properly.’ This is more like the Rory I know and love. The Rory who always has to find a solution, who hates going to bed on an argument, who prefers to clear the air. He’s not the type to mooch about for a week in a mood, refusing to discuss our problems. Unlike me.

‘Okay, that would be good,’ I say, closing my eyes, relief flooding through me. ‘I’ll see you tonight.’ The phone goes dead, but I leave it pressed to my ear for a couple of seconds anyway, listening to nothing.

I met Rory at a party in Hammersmith. I had just turned twenty-nine and was still reeling from the breakdown of my first serious long-term relationship. I hadn’t planned on meeting anyone that night. I had sworn off men.

I’d been sitting on the sticky threadbare carpet, my back against the woodchip wallpaper, nursing a beer and wondering why I’d bothered to come. My friend and colleague Anita, from the Standard – where I was working at the time – was dancing in the middle of the room with a group of people I’d never seen before, jumping up and down to the Strokes with an abandon I wish I’d felt.

‘You look like you need cheering up,’ a voice said, and a guy with floppy dark hair, striking navy-blue eyes and an impish grin sat down next to me. He had on flares and a retro 1970s shirt with a swirly orange print. Even though it was hideous he managed to carry it off. He must have noticed me staring at it because he’d blushed a little and glanced down at his clothes. ‘Yeah. Sorry about the get-up. I’ve just come from a seventies party. It was shite.’

I’d laughed then. ‘This party’s even worse.’

He watched the dancers throwing themselves around the floor and cocked an eyebrow, his eyes twinkling mischievously when ‘Jump Around’ by House of Pain came on. ‘It is. But they look like they’re having fun. Come on.’ He got to his feet and pulled me up, my beer sloshing over my chipped mug. ‘Give me that,’ he said, taking it from me and shoving it on the mantelpiece next to a plant with cigarette butts covering the soil. I was mortified. I wasn’t a dancer and I didn’t even know this man. But he didn’t give me much choice as he started throwing me around and performing outrageous moves, trying to make me laugh. And because he was sexy and handsome, I allowed myself to go along with it, before long even beginning to enjoy it. When the song had finished we flopped into a faded old armchair, breathless.

And that was when we started talking, and when we found we couldn’t stop. I could have listened to him for ever, the soft Irish lilt in his voice, the way he talked about his brothers and sisters and parents. He told me he was a teacher and that he loved kids. And, as I sat practically on his lap, enraptured by this funny, gorgeous, off-the-wall man in the hideous 1970s shirt, I realized I needed to see him again. His optimism and love for his family were infectious. Even then, I was desperate to be part of it, and it wasn’t long before I was. His family welcomed me with open arms and the same wry sense of humour as Rory. I loved them almost as much as I loved him.

As time passed, I fell deeper in love with him, this man who was so straight. So good. All my other partners had played games, had agendas, but not Rory. He was honest about his feelings right from the beginning, and he listened to how I felt. He’d never pressured me into anything. We talked about the future, of course, in the abstract way you do when you don’t really believe you’ll become thirty, then thirty-one in the blink of an eye, and have to make grown-up decisions, like whether to get married and have children.