‘What do you think?’ She’d twitched, her eyes following me as I rushed to get the room ready. Her focus was in the wrong place and it had irritated me – it was a busy day and she should have been upstairs on reception, doing her job.
‘We’re young,’ she’d said. ‘Now is the time to travel, to explore, to find ourselves. Do you really want to stay in the same city for the rest of your life? Why don’t we just try it, go on an adventure. Six months, even. Or a year.’
‘Where has this idea come from?’ I’d asked, straightening the towels on the patient chair, assuming she was going to tell me she’d just read an article about moving to Turkey, that this sudden spontaneity was being driven by something she’d have forgotten about by this time tomorrow.
‘I’ve been thinking about it for a while,’ she’d replied, able to read my mind, knowing exactly what I was thinking.
The phone rang, cutting our conversation short, and I’d picked up. Caroline, the owner of Pure You, was on the other end, slightly flustered, telling me my patient was on her way down, and to send Tabby back up to reception. What is she doing down there? Why am I having to check patients in? What on earth do I pay her for?
Looking back, I wish I’d taken a breath and been kinder, calmer. Tabby’s invitation, tied with a metaphorical pink bow, hung by a thread. I’d sharpened my scissors.
‘Tabby, what do we know about setting up a business, much less running a business? What do we know about the Turkish tax system? About working visas, about marketing our business in the UK, about the new qualifications we might need to get before heading out there, about buying or renting a house for us to live in, about leasing office space, about—’
She’d stopped me there. She’d called me cautious and pessimistic, too desperate to iron out every detail, to plan our relocation in its entirety before we’d even had an initial conversation about it.
‘Please,’ she’d pleaded, wounded by my realism. ‘Just think about it. We can figure out marketing and running a business and everything else together. All I need to know is if you’re at least open to the idea. That’s all.’
‘What about Rick?’ I’d asked quickly, keen to nip this in the bud, trying to make Tabby see sense, wanting this delusion to end. ‘Would he come too?’
She’d tucked her lips defensively, just as I’d heard the smack of a footstep on the stairs. Patient coming down. ‘No,’ she’d replied. ‘Just me and you.’
And, with that, the motivation behind Tabby’s drastic plan stepped into the light. Rick and Tabby. The switch on their relationship set to off again.
‘Rick and I, we’ve been through so much together.’ She’d looked away. ‘But we need some time apart.’
‘Does he know that?’
‘I think he’s cheating on me,’ she’d said, footsteps approaching the door. ‘He keeps meeting this woman, he says she’s a friend but—’
A knock at the door, conversation over. As I’d greeted my patient, Tabby had slunk out and retreated to the reception desk upstairs. She’d left work earlier than me, probably annoyed by my reaction and, when I’d messaged her later that night to tell her I was sorry and that I couldn’t leave, she’d ignored me.
It was the last conversation we ever had.
*
On the other side of the shutters, it’s not quite morning but the beginning of the thawing of the night, imperceptible brushstrokes painting the sky from black to indigo to blue. Thoughts of Tabby, and all the guilt and sadness that come with her memory, swirl.
It’s been almost five years since she disappeared and, to this day, no one has any idea what happened to her. The police led the initial search, pointed a few fingers and shackled a few wrists, then, once the public interest died down, explained to her close friends and family that the hunt for Tabby would be more ‘reactive’ than ‘proactive’ from now on. What it meant was that they were downing tools completely, moving swiftly on to the next missing person, the latest woman lighting up the news agenda. Tabby’s whereabouts were shelved, gathering dust. As soon as the police bowed out, her foster parents scuffed their shoes and shrugged their shoulders, desperate for the whole thing to be over and done with. It was clear to me then that if I didn’t do something, no one would. I went to visit her foster mum, pulled up outside the semi-detached house Tabby had grown up in, hoping for something. Limp-eyed and drunk-she’d sniffled at me to leave it alone, ‘Everything happens for a reason. We just weren’t meant to find her.’
That explanation might have been good enough for her, but it hadn’t been good enough for me.
After the police had scaled back their investigation, a private investigator contacted me, offering to dig deeper into the case. At first I wasn’t convinced – he was a sly-eyed, gel-haired American, promising the world in exchange for, basically, all of my savings – but though I was sceptical, it’s fair to say that Chad has delivered some good intel since he picked things up from the police. Today he’s called a meeting, and, as ever, I’m hoping for a breakthrough.
I swing my legs out from the covers and force myself into loose jeans and a jumper. I strip my covers and pillowcase, ready for the wash, and dust down the bedside tables, anxiety dissipating as I perform these rituals. By the time I pace into the kitchen, I’m ready to fire the coffee machine into action, but I take the time to clean the container with careful cloth-strokes first. As it spouts black water into my cup, I lean against the countertop, breathing in the earthy smell of beans. Today could be a big day.
The coffee machine bleats behind me and I pull the cup from its position, bringing it to my lips, steam rising. It occurs to me, as I drink, that my optimism shows I probably put too much faith in law and order, in the police, in people like Chad. I want to believe that the system is careful and ordered, that the people in it will do the right thing, act in good faith in any given situation. I swallow, not allowing the thought to go any further. All is not lost. Chad will prove my faith was not in vain. He has to.
*
Chad and I always meet in the same dark pub. He sits in the corner with a pint of real ale he doesn’t drink – which, in my opinion, rather draws more attention than it deflects – and gives me the latest. I never ask him anything about his personal life, I don’t care to know, but I’m polite and civil, and, if he ever makes a real breakthrough in the case, perhaps I’ll throw him a bone and ask him if he irons the collars of his Ralph Lauren polos himself or if his long-suffering partner does it for him.
Feeling hopeful, I make for the bus stop on the corner. My new-build apartment sits just off a major road into the city, a thick artery of tarmac that pumps people into London all day and all night, and the familiar rumble of traffic rises as I walk. The numbers will begin in earnest at the turn of 5 p.m. but, for now, the road is relatively calm and the bus pulls in a few minutes later. I slap my card against the reader and watch my flat shrink into the distance as the bus heaves forward. I wonder if I’ll ever be the kind of person who will own a car. I’m not sure I will – anything above fifty miles per hour and my mind wanders to how easy it would be to kill someone with a careless swerve of my steering wheel, schoolchildren squashed thanks to my split-second distraction at a zebra crossing. Yes, I think. Better to stick to the bus.