injury, strain or trauma stored deep within your muscle and sinew, no matter how well it might be hidden), she’d heard everything in that very first appointment and it hadn’t phased her one bit. It was as though the whole doctor–patient thing somehow legitimised my telling her my entire medical and personal history straight off the bat, as though it had demanded it. And so, what began as a series of professional questions on an assessment form was able to develop into something more, something real. After six sessions on her table, I had a fixed back and a good friend.
I thought again about the boy from the off-licence. If there was anyone I could confide in about this whole crazy situation, it was Carla. I could trust her. She would tell me what I should do.
I pushed myself up onto the kitchen counter and let my legs dangle against the cupboards below.
‘If you really want to know, the last week has been stressful in more ways than one.’
‘Go on.’
I cleared my throat.
‘What would you say if I told you that I thought I’d seen Barney?’
‘What now?’ She cocked her head. ‘Seriously?’
I nodded.
She blinked hard and backed away from me slightly.
‘I’d say you should call the police.’
‘But what if it wasn’t as simple as that?’
As I recounted what had happened and how Jason had been unable to recognise the child in the shop as his son, Carla’s face grew serious.
‘How did he seem? I mean, who was the boy with? If you think he’s being hurt then, whoever this kid is, you need to do something.’
‘He seemed OK. I couldn’t really tell – it was all so quick.’
She absorbed this for a moment.
‘How long ago was it that you saw him?’
‘A little over a week.’
‘And you still feel the same?’
‘The way I reacted to this kid, Carla, honestly, I’m finding it hard to ignore.’
She went to interject, but I held out my hand, stopping her.
‘I realise that when I saw him it was under very bizarre circumstances. We were still reeling from the Istanbul sighting. Maybe I saw what I wanted to see?’
Frustrated at being cut off, Carla had puffed out her cheeks, but now, as I acknowledged my doubts, she let them deflate.
‘On top of all that,’ I went on, ‘how likely is it Barney would turn up less than fifty miles from where he first went missing?’ I put my head in my hands. ‘I keep going round in circles. I think I’m losing it.’
‘And you can’t ask the police for help? On the quiet, I mean.’
‘Jason would be furious. I gave him my word.’
Taking the end of a purple curl between her fingers she pulled it away from her head until it was stretched to twice its usual length. Holding it taut for a few seconds, she let it spring back to shape and clapped her hands, her cheeks the high rouge they turned whenever she drank.
‘This is the way I see it. Hearing you talk,’ she gestured at how worked up I’d become, ‘you simply trying to forget this kid is not going to happen. But I also get where Jason’s coming from. Barney is his son and so even now you’d expect him to spot him in a crowd.’ She went to reach for the bottle but thought better of it. ‘That means the only thing you can do is go back to him with something concrete, something he can’t ignore.’
I thought of the database search I’d carried out on the man and the off-licence. ‘Like what?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe there’s some connection between this man or this shop and Barney’s disappearance. Jason created his own case files, didn’t he?’
I nodded. I’d pored over them with him many times when we first got together.
‘Why not go through his files again and see if there’s anything in there, some detail that was overlooked at the time because it seemed meaningless.’
I could tell she was sceptical, but then so was I. I appreciated her advice all the more for it.
‘You’re right,’ I said, tipping the last of the champagne down my throat. ‘Something concrete. That’s what I need.’
Chapter Six
Carla spent the rest of the evening feeding me pitta bread and hummus and insisting I help her alphabetise three boxes’ worth of yoga and Pilates DVDs. I made my excuses around ten and arrived home to discover Jason had gone out. He hadn’t mentioned having plans. Figuring he’d nipped to the pub for an impromptu pint, I decided