the menu, and doubtfully any museums or art galleries, though those would be on my list. There are lots of tacky souvenir shops and not much in the way of boutiques but I make sure to check every dark cave-like bar I pass, in case she’s decided on hair of the dog after waking up with a hangover like mine.
I wonder for a second if the e-bike tour she claimed to be enthusiastic about was actually not something she wanted to do and if she’s therefore run off for a few hours to ensure missing it. Maybe she didn’t hear the part about the bikes being electric and thought it involved actual pedalling. But that seems childish, and why would she lie to me? Kate’s blunt and to the point. She would tell me if she didn’t want to do something. She put the kibosh on us going to the monastery, laughing that it was valuable time when we could be eating or drinking or shopping; why waste it on monks?
On the corner of a small square beside a church I discover a little café selling coffee and pastries. Kate isn’t inside and I stop myself from going in and asking people if they’ve seen her and showing them a photo on my phone – taken at the airport yesterday of us grinning and drinking champagne. It feels over the top and hysterical to start asking strangers if they’ve seen my friend – the equivalent of putting up missing posters on lamp-posts. Because she isn’t missing. She’s just not in touch.
I’ve been trying her phone every five minutes or so and I try it again, though without much hope. It rings through to voicemail and I leave another message, perhaps my third or fourth, begging her to please call me back.
An hour into my search and I still haven’t found her, though what were the chances, really? We could have missed each other in passing easily enough. It’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack, and in a foreign city that I don’t know, it’s also like wearing a blindfold. I start to wish I had unspooled a red string as I walked, so it could help me find my way back to the Airbnb. Even using Google maps is difficult as the roads bend in the most frustrating ways.
Tired, I stop in a little bar with pavement tables, to have a coffee and a custard tart. The waiter takes forever to bring my order – something I realise might be the standard for Lisbon – and I eat the tart without even tasting it. I can’t focus on enjoying anything, even though I tell myself to. I may as well because otherwise when I get back to the apartment and find Kate sitting there among a pile of shopping bags, I’ll be annoyed that I spent the afternoon worrying and not making the most of it. But when I spill the coffee on the white linen tablecloth all I can think about is that red stain on the carpet in Kate’s room. Was it blood? Or was it wine? All sorts of images try to push through the meniscus of my mind, furnished by far too many true crime podcasts and documentaries, but I force them away, mentally refusing to go there.
My phone rings just then and, hope bursting, I dig it frantically out of my bag. Disappointment hits me when I see it’s Rob, video-calling. I answer.
‘Hi, wow, that looks nice,’ he comments, obviously meaning the blue sky and pavement café culture in view behind me, though possibly the remains of the custard tart I’m holding. ‘Did you find Kate?’
I shake my head. ‘No. I’ve been looking for her. I just stopped for a coffee.’ I pause. ‘I’m worried, Rob. She still hasn’t been in touch.’ I don’t tell him I already called the hospital – he’ll accuse me of over-reacting.
‘Did you get in a fight with her or something?’ Rob asks.
‘No, of course not,’ I tell him, though as soon as I say it, I pause. Could that be it? Is she annoyed with me for putting up a fight last night about those two guys coming back to the apartment for a hot tub soak? I rack my sinkhole of a mind, trying to dredge up some memories of last night. I do vaguely recall arguing with Kate outside that bar I can’t remember the name of – she ignored me, or at least