The Perfect Girl

SAM

I try Tess’s landline because I feel I have to. I don’t want her to feel abandoned.

It rings and rings, and I’m about to give up when Richard answers.

I’m tempted to hang up, but that would be childish, and this is not a day for infantile behaviour.

‘Hello,’ I say. ‘It’s Sam Locke, Zoe’s solicitor, returning your call.’

I say that because I suspect he doesn’t know that Tess and I have spoken since he left his message.

He says, ‘Thank you, Sam, but we don’t need you any longer, the police have made an arrest.’

‘Yes, I saw that on the news. I’m so sorry. Is everybody all right? It must have been a terrible shock.’

‘It is a great shock, yes.’

He draws out his words as if there’s something else he’s thinking of saying and I’m suddenly alert to the fact that he might know about Tess and I.

‘Well, I won’t keep bothering you any longer, but if there’s anything I can do please just phone me.’

‘I think you’ve done enough, don’t you?’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Don’t contact my family again. Don’t contact Zoe and, most importantly, don’t contact my wife.’

‘What?’

‘I think you understand me very well.’

‘I…’

‘Leave us alone.’

‘Sorry, I…’ But my words fall into the ether because he’s hung up.

I sit with my phone in my hand and wonder if Tessa has told him about us, if she had to tell him. I’m still sitting there many minutes later, speculating, and shocked at the ferocity of his tone, when my phone rings.

Tess, I think at first, but it’s not. It’s my parents, and I can’t ignore them. Not today. My mother cries when I tell her that my diagnosis is one step nearer to being confirmed.

‘How will you manage, love?’ she asks. ‘Will you move back home?’

‘I don’t know, Mum, we’ll have to see.’

I’ve had no intention of doing that, but after I hang up I drink another beer and watch the river some more and feel the beginnings of what feels like mourning for Tessa, and then I’m tempted by my mother’s suggestion. I’m tempted to walk away from this city and this life and this relationship that’s brought me the greatest feelings of joy but also the most profound feelings of guilt. I’m tempted to nurse my sorrows elsewhere, to rethink my life.

If I take myself back to Devon where I’ll still be in pain, and my condition will inevitably degenerate, and I’ll miss Tess every day, there will at least be sea air, and beautiful countryside and people who know me and love me. It’ll be a return, sure, but also another chance.

Because what is there for me here, now?

And these thoughts circulate as I watch the reflection of the setting sun burning brightly in the windows of the boat-yard opposite my flat, until it sinks down far enough that it disappears.

After that, the city lights, and their reflections on the water, have to work hard to pierce the darkness.