me, but when I thought of Harry now, it was almost as though he hadn’t been real, as though I’d conjured him up so that I could leave home. What was more real was his rejection of me. Memories of him being lovely to me faded as I thought of how he’d let me go home to end my marriage, knowing full well he wouldn’t be doing the same.
We sat in silence for a few minutes and then I said, “Did Harry read my letter? Did he say anything?”
She laughed. “I thought you weren’t bothered about him?”
“Just tell me whether he read it, will you?”
“I put it in his top drawer. He didn’t say anything to me about it.” She poured us another drink. “You need to stop obsessing about him, Ruby. He’s history now. Move on.”
I’ve always hated that expression. It always seems to be used to shut people up. But I didn’t have the courage to say anything to Sarah; I needed her friendship. So I drank some wine and said, “You’re right,” and she clinked her glass against mine, happy at her success.
CHAPTER 45
Ruby
We had a great night in the end. We bumped into some people she knew and the night flew by without any further mention of Harry or Emma or that baby of theirs. For a while I was able to forget everything that had happened, though I know the wine helped that along.
At the end of the night we flooded out into the street. Our little town doesn’t have Uber yet and a few black cabs were waiting at the end of the street. There was a rush toward them. Sarah lived in the opposite direction from me; one of her friends was going her way and bagged the last cab.
“Will you be okay?” she asked as she stumbled into the taxi.
“I’ll be fine,” I said. “Speak soon.”
“I’ll call you.”
Pretty soon it became obvious that no more taxis were coming back. The few of us who were left called around the local taxi firms, but we weren’t getting any luck. It was late Friday night, the busiest night for pubs and clubs, and it became obvious I’d have a long wait. People started to walk off, deciding to go to taxi ranks in town. I looked around, still half-drunk, and thought I didn’t fancy just hanging around waiting there, so I started to walk home.
The route home was along a long road with shops and very few houses. Of course the shops were shut by then and the road was pretty empty. The only people I saw were groups of lads walking in the direction of town, while I was heading away from it. I walked pretty unsteadily along, cursing my shoes. I’d taken a taxi to McCullough’s, not thinking I’d be walking home. My heels seemed to catch every gap in the paving stones and I had to watch every step I took so that I didn’t twist my ankle. The night was chilly and I pulled my jacket tightly around my chest.
I could see a man coming toward me and moved closer to the edge of the sidewalk to let him pass. He looked up at me and grinned, then said, “Hello.” I didn’t respond, but kept my head down and hurried on and I heard his footsteps recede, then the sound of him kicking a plastic bottle from the sidewalk onto the road.
Then the road was quiet, the streetlights dimmer and more infrequent. There were few houses along this stretch. On one side was a park, quiet now, of course, and pitch-black beyond its railings. On the other were shops and offices, all of them closed. Few had left a light on so I hurried from lamppost to lamppost, realizing it had been years since I’d walked home down a dark road on my own. I tried to remember the rules I’d learned as a girl: I didn’t walk too close to the buildings, in case someone dragged me down an alley. I didn’t walk too close to the parked cars alongside the road in case someone was lurking there. I didn’t put my headphones in. I was on high alert. My house key almost scarred the palm of