But I couldn’t do that, not this morning. For one thing, unlike most mornings, I was completely naked under the duvet, and the one eye I could open was so blurry and achey that I couldn’t see any of my clothes. Which, given the mortifying likelihood of bumping into whoever was about to jump out of the shower, meant wrapping myself in a king-size quilt and stumbling around trying to figure out the layout of this house, which, I dimly realised, wasn’t mine.
And now the ringing had stopped, and the light shafting through the thin blind was a dagger to my skull, and then the shower was abruptly silent and my heart began to thump against my ribs and all I could think to do was pull the covers over my head and pretend I didn’t exist.
I don’t know how long I waited. I heard footsteps on the landing, the creaking of stairs; assorted kitchen clangs and clunks and tinkles. My phone again. Damn it. And then the footsteps coming back up the stairs, and the ringing getting louder, and oh God, it was coming into the room.
‘Hmm.’
I froze.
‘Well I’m sure she was in here a few minutes ago.’ A woman’s voice, faintly familiar. ‘Where on earth could she be?’
Dazed now, utterly confused. The phone still ringing. A clunk above my head – a mug on the table? A weight beside me, the edge of the bed sagging beneath it, pulling me towards it.
‘Are you alive under there?’
I took three breaths, and nodded.
‘Are you nodding?’
I shook my head, and heard a giggle.
‘There’s coffee here. And your phone’s ringing.’
‘I know,’ I croaked. ‘Thank you.’
‘I’ll just leave it here for you. Are you hungry?’
I wasn’t sure. Horror kind of feels like hunger, right? ‘Probably.’
‘Bathroom’s free,’ she said, and patted my hip through the duvet. ‘I’ll let you answer that.’ Then she stood up and was gone.
I unscrewed my eyes and eased the duvet aside. Blinked the blinding light out of them. There was a plain green mug steaming on the bedside table, face cream and biscuits and tissues and a library book shoved aside to make room. And on the floor beside the bed, my bag, jangling incessantly.
I reached down, hissing away a twinge in my back, and dug out my phone. I begged it to stop ringing, but someone was unshakeably determined to speak to me. Kevin, as it turned out. I answered. ‘Kevin,’ I sighed.
‘Ali,’ said Kevin, ‘it’s Kevin.’ Which I knew. ‘Where are you?’
I have no fucking idea. ‘What do you mean, where am I? I’m in bed. It’s fuck-off o’clock in the morning. What do you want?’
‘It’s six eighteen,’ he said, ‘the sun’s been up for over an hour and you need to be here twenty minutes ago.’
From the gentle mooing in the background, I deduced that he was most likely overdramatising. ‘I can hear cows,’ I yawned, and peeked inside the little drawer of the bedside table. It was full of hair ties and old sweets, pastel-coloured biros and Blu Tack and various kinds of charger.
‘I’m standing in a field.’
‘Sounds thrilling,’ I said, ‘but you’ve got the wrong Monday. I’m not back until next week.’ I picked up the library book; The Good Girl, it was called. I cringed.
‘Not any more.’
‘I think you’ll find I am,’ I laughed. Laughing made my forehead throb. My mouth tasted like a badger’s arse. ‘I only saw Occy Health on Friday. I’m still off sick, I’m in bed, I’ve got another headache which you’ve just given me, I’ve got a million and one things to do today, none of which involve farm animals, I’m desperate for a wee, and unless the next thing you say to me is “I’m sorry, Ali, pret—” no, “Sarge. I’m sorry, Sarge, pretend I never rang, take care of yourself, have a good weekend,” I swear to God I’m going to hunt you down and beat you savagely about the face and neck. In a week.’ She was using her library card as a bookmark. It said Edith Macfarlane on it. Christ on a bike, I knew her.
‘I am sorry,’ he sniggered as my heart sank further into my bottom. ‘DCI says otherwise. I thought you’d had a call already, but I guess I’m not surprised. Whatever, this one’s kind of got your name on it.’ He waited for what seemed like days for me to ask him what he meant, but it was quite obviously nothing I wanted to hear, so I didn’t. Also, I was holding my breath in an effort not to wet the bed. Finally, he said, ‘We’ve found John Fairey.’
And I exhaled.
The bathroom was still warm, the window and the mirror still steamed over from Edith’s tenure. The dregs of her bathwater lingered in the bottom of the tub, sending my feet aslither as I cranked open the shower. I braced myself against the tile, gritted my teeth through the cycle of polar-cold and scar-hot until the water settled on a comfortable shade of warm. I scrubbed myself with Edith’s soap until the knot of panic began to unravel. Lathered with Edith’s shampoo. I rinsed the strands of Edith’s hair from my fingers as they attracted to me from Edith’s conditioner bottle. I would have used Edith’s facial scrub, but there was only a small squeeze left in the tube. Instead, barely five minutes after I got in, I shut off the water and, in spite of it still being damp, dried myself with Edith’s towel.
Thankfully, I did have my own clothes, although they were crumpled and smelled of pub and my knickers were a bit the worse for wear. Hearing Edith still downstairs, I eased open the top drawer of her dresser, avoiding my own eye contact in the mirror as I rooted around in the tangle of loosely balled briefs at the back, behind all the neatly folded silky arrangements. I tugged a pair free and shook them out. Hello Kitty. Fine, whatever.
Everything else would have to do. My bra was on its third outing, the cropped black denims maybe their sixth. I had a bright yellow off-the-shoulder top that was okay under the arms but reeked of booze and perfume everywhere else, although deodorant and fresh air would sort that, probably. And I had at least had the accidental foresight to wear shoes I could run in, inclined as I was to duck my head and sprint straight out the door.
But to where?
I gingerly opened the blind, shielding my eyes with my spare hand and squinting through my fingers at the view. There wasn’t much of one; just a row of boxy houses on the other side of the street, driveways lined with German and Swedish cars in various shades of black and grey, including the one directly below the window. Mine is bright red, so it was immediately apparent that it wasn’t there. God, where the hell was it? And, more to the point, where the hell was I?
Edith was easier to locate. She was at the breakfast table, and she greeted me with a ‘Hey’ and a smile. Nothing between the lines; just your usual good-morning pleasantry. She’d clearly been listening out for me; she’d poured me a fresh cup of coffee and a bowl of Rice Krispies and the latter were still popping and cracking, or whatever it is they do. ‘Made you breakfast.’
I sat across from her, silently giving thanks for my complexion; the Middle-Eastern half of me is all on the outside, so I don’t burn in the sun and, more importantly, I blush very, very quietly. ‘Morning,’ I said, my deliberate effort to keep a steady voice naturally achieving the opposite. ‘Thanks.’
‘Sleep well?’
My insides recoiled in horror. Was it a trick question? Could she tell that I had no recollection of the night before? ‘Like a baby,’ I said. ‘You?’
Another neutral smile. ‘As well as can be expected. Did you find your towel?’
Oh. ‘Yes,’ I lied, giving it away by shaking my head at the same time. ‘Thank you.’
I watched her read the Independent as I crunched a mouthful of cereal,