at the bottom, under all the junk, but unharmed. The old notebook. The tricks of the trade as it were. It’s thin – I tore the last few pages out years ago because some things should stay secret – but it’s held together. I’m holding my breath as I open it, and the remaining pages are cool and warped slightly from years in the dark and damp, giving them a crisp, autumn leafy texture. The writing on the first page is careful – neat and underlined. Instructions from another life.
Pinch myself and say I AM AWAKE once an hour.
As I look at them it feels as if those words were written only moments ago, and I can see us sitting under the tree, and the breeze is wonderful and the lake ripples. It’s vivid and present, not a memory from a decade ago, and a strange sharp pain stabs in my stomach. I take a deep breath and suppress it.
I replace the boxes exactly as I found them and take the notebook upstairs, holding it like some fragile ancient text that might crumble in my hands when light hits it, rather than a cheap exercise book scavenged from Westlands all those years ago. I hide it in the zipped-up outer section of my gym bag where it won’t be seen.
It’s what Louise needs. I can’t wait to share it with her. She is my secret, and soon we’ll have our secret.
He isn’t too late home after all, coming through the door at five past seven. With the kitchen filled with cooking smells – I’ve spent my time waiting for him making a delicious Thai curry – I drag him upstairs to look at the colours in the bedroom.
‘What do you think?’ I ask. ‘I can’t decide between the Summer Leaf Green on the left or the Forest Haze on the right.’ Neither of them are the real names, but he’ll never know. I’ve made them up on the spur of the moment. Perhaps it’s overkill or over-excitement. I’m not even sure he hears me anyway. He’s staring at the strips that shine in the dying sunlight. He can see everything in them that I saw.
‘Why these colours?’ he asks. His voice is flat. Level. Dead. He turns to look at me, and I see it all in his cold eyes. Everything that sits between us.
Good, I think, steeling myself against the rage or silence to come, preparing bitter barbs to battle with.
And now it begins.
LOUISE
David is in his office before I even get to work, and as I go to hang my coat up, Sue raises her eyebrows and shakes her head. ‘Someone got out of bed the wrong side this morning.’ For a moment I think she means me, because I must look tired and grumpy. My night terrors woke me, and then I lay in bed thinking of Lisa’s pregnancy – I can’t think of it as Ian’s new baby yet – and Adam’s month away, and by the time seven a.m. rolled around I’d had three coffees and two cigarettes and was moody as hell. Somehow this pregnancy of Lisa’s has brought back all those terrible emotions I went through when Ian left me, and his happiness feels like a fresh betrayal, which I know is stupid, but I still feel it. Sue doesn’t mean me, though, she means David.
‘He didn’t even say good morning,’ she continues, pouring me a tea. ‘And I thought he was quite charming until now.’
‘We all have off days,’ I say. ‘Maybe he’s not a morning person.’
‘Then he shouldn’t get here so early. He seems to have taken your place as the early bird.’
She has a point. I shrug and smile, but my heart is racing. Has Adele told him about her coffee with me? Is he sitting in there diagnosing me as some obsessive stalker and getting ready to fire me? I’m almost squirming with guilt. Regardless of whether she’s told him or not, I should. I’ve got too much other shit going on in my life to keep a secret for his wife. It’s not like I really know her, and he is my boss. And, I didn’t really have any choice but to go for coffee with her. She asked me. What was I supposed to say? I remember her face, worried and awkward, asking me not to mention anything about our meeting, and I have a moment of doubt. She was so vulnerable. But I have to tell him. I have to. He’ll understand. Of course he will.
I need to face the music and get it off my chest, so rather than scan Maria’s notes left from yesterday, neatly typed and printed as always, I go and knock on his door, my heart in my mouth. I open it without waiting for a reply and breeze in. Confidence. That’s the way to tackle this.
‘There’s something I need to …’
‘Shit!’ he barks, cutting me off. He’s tugging the thick foil lid from a can of expensive coffee – not the clinic standard but brought in from home – and as he turns, a spray of brown hits the surface of the coffee cabinet.
‘Jesus fucking hell, couldn’t you knock?’
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen someone glower before, but I have now. I feel like I’ve been slapped with the aggression and anger in his tone.
‘I did,’ I mutter. ‘Sorry. I’ll get a cloth.’
‘I’ll do it,’ he snaps at me, pulling some tissues from the box on his desk. ‘A wet cloth will make it worse.’
‘At least it didn’t get on the carpet.’ I try to sound cheery. ‘No use crying over spilt coffee.’
‘Did you want something?’ He stares at me then, and he’s like a stranger. Cold. Distant. None of that natural charm and warmth of before. My nerves jangle and my throat tightens. There’s no way I’m telling him about the coffee with Adele now. Not while he’s in this mood. I can’t remember the last time I made someone so angry by doing nothing at all. Is this another side to him? A worm of a thought slithers into my brain. Is this why Adele keeps her friends secret?
‘I was going to see if you wanted me to put the coffee on,’ I say, trying to stand tall. ‘But I see you’ve got that all under control.’ I turn and walk stiffly out, closing the door quietly behind me. It’s as close to storming out on him as I can do and keep my job, but by the time I sit down I’m trembling with anger. I haven’t done anything wrong. How dare he talk to me like that? Intimidate me like that?
Whatever guilt I’ve felt over having had coffee with Adele fades as I fume. What really went on with David anyway? A stupid kiss? That was all, and with each day it becomes more like a dream of something that never happened. A fantasy. And Adele and I would probably meet at some point. At the Christmas party or something. So what does it matter if I’ve accidentally met her already?
‘I told you,’ Sue says, as she comes past my desk and puts my forgotten tea down. ‘Don’t take it personally. You know what men are like. They’re all grumpy babies at heart.’ She leans in. ‘Especially the posh spoilt ones.’ I laugh, although I’m still hurt at his treatment of me.
Head down, Louise, I tell myself as I fire up the computer and start the day. And get on with your job. You’re never going to hear from Adele again anyway, and David is just your boss.
The Hawkins family arrives in the afternoon, and it’s obvious that the patient, twenty-one-year-old Anthony Hawkins, doesn’t want to be here. His parents are stoic middle to upper class, in their mid to late fifties, a cloud of scents accompanying them in; expensive face powder, cologne, perfume. They are well-dressed; he’s in a suit, and she’s wearing pearls with her designer blouse and skirt, but I can see the tiredness around her eyes. I take them into the waiting room, which is like the drawing room of an exclusive club, and she sits in a wing-backed chair, perching on the edge. Her husband stands, his hands in his pockets, and thanks me loudly. For all his over-confident geniality, he doesn’t want to be here any more than his son.
Anthony Hawkins is thin, too thin, and he twitches and tics, and his eyes, full of some primal defensive anger, seem unsteady in his head. They’re like those jiggly eyes you get on some children’s toys, shaking slightly while not