calls and five voicemails. She opened a text from Maureen, her supervisor, telling her not to come back again. There were several from Sadie with laughing emojis whooping her for making a stand against their non-existent pay rises. Maureen wouldn’t call her on the home phone, she’d never given them the number. For now, Christian would be none the wiser.
‘What you doing ’ere? You’ll catch a chill.’ Joe flung his back gate open further as he dragged his wheelie bin onto the path.
‘I was just—’ Just what? What should she say? I was just loitering here until my husband went into the house. Then I was going to drive my car from behind yours and park it on my drive because I’m weird like that. She stared at the rustling leaves, hoping that they’d cue her in, but nothing was coming to the front of her mind.
‘Are you okay, dear? Do you want to come in for a cup of tea?’ He hobbled to the kerb, dragging his bin as he awaited her answer. ‘I don’t charge for the tea.’
‘Thanks for the offer but I have to get home. Maybe another time.’ She left him standing and hurried to her car, unwilling to answer any more questions. She had to face home sooner or later and only being twenty minutes early would be fine.
She drove the car onto the drive and as luck would have it, Christian was looking out of the window with his hands poised to close the blind. If only she’d waited another minute.
As she entered, he was already there. ‘You haven’t just come home, have you?’
‘What do you mean?’ She knew what he meant but that silly question would give her a moment to think.
‘You know what I mean. You just pulled in from the wrong side of the road. The side that leads to dead ends.’
Throw it back at him. ‘Christian, you’re stifling me. Don’t do this now.’
‘Do what?’ He folded his arms, a frown appearing across his forehead.
‘You know.’
‘I don’t. Where have you been?’
Oh, I just walked out from my job. I’ve spent half of the day going to places I shouldn’t have gone to and the rest of it hiding out of the way so I don’t have to tell you about my dismissal.
‘I got let out of work a little early on the proviso that I deliver some leaflets about the upcoming fundraising raffle. We’re hoping for a few donations for the Christmas fundraiser, you know, for the work to the garden at the home next year. I parked down the road so it’d be easier. I started from the bottom. Sorry, I should have messaged.’ The lie had spilled out far too easily.
He turned and walked into the lounge. Bella and Oliver were sitting at the table at the far end, doing their homework. ‘You should have messaged. You could have picked the kids up. They could have helped and it would have taken the pressure off me to rush.’
‘I did think that but I looked at the weather and didn’t want them to get a cold.’
‘Dad, can you help me with my homework?’ Bella beckoned him over.
He grabbed his glasses from the table and sat next to her before muttering something about what metaphors were and how they were different to similes. Today, she was in the clear but next Monday was another day. She was meant to be at work and she had no job to go to. Where she’d hide out then, that was something she’d have to think hard about.
As she placed her bag on the table, she pulled her phone from her pocket. There had been no more messages from the nursing home and no calls from Penny. She opened Facebook and clicked onto the Warwickshire Herald’s page and her body stiffened. Breath quickening, she loosened her coat and leaned against the wall sucking in air. The more she inhaled the woozier she felt. She spotted the miniature in her bag, her fingers ever itching for a swig of its contents but she couldn’t, not with Christian being in the next room. She wouldn’t. She’d been a fool to buy it and an even bigger fool to take another sip. As soon as she had a moment, she’d hide it away. Out of sight, out of mind, like the other one she had as a backup.
Alex’s face stared back at her from the screen and she wondered if her dinner party buddies had seen or read