“It absolutely was not. Honestly, I never even think about it. I love my job.”
She didn’t take her eyes away from mine, and I realized that she had prepared a speech, something she needed to get off her chest. I let her speak.
“I shouldn’t have run away like that. I should have told you what was going on. I’m honestly so sorry.”
I paused, feeling as if I were stepping around some hole half hidden in the ground, “I felt truly terrible when I heard about your dad. It must have been an awful time for all of you. How are they doing?”
It took her a moment to answer.
“You never met my parents, did you?” Her eyes moved somewhere else, somewhere distant and pensive. She chewed a moment on her lip. “Dad’s away a lot now. He goes away for weeks, sometimes months at a time. We never know when he’s going to reappear. Mum’s—” She glanced at the other customers dotted at tables around the café. “Can we get out of here?” She drained the last of the cold flat white. “I could do with some fresh air. Let’s walk.”
It was a late-spring day, almost summer, the lawns of the park a deep emerald green, the cobalt sky and cords of willows mirrored deep within the lake. We walked in the direction of the Japanese Garden, side by side, not touching.
I thought, I’ll tell her about Cat. In a bit.
“You heard about Mum’s restraining order, then?” she asked. I hadn’t expected her to mention that. “It’s okay, Robyn. It was in the papers. There’s nothing the tabloids like more than reporting the antics of some bat-shit crazy woman, and, believe me, that’s something I’m qualified to know. She’s not allowed to enter the street where Cox lives at all, nor any of the surrounding streets. Nor is she allowed within thirty meters of his van, or to call his home, that of any of his relatives, or go to the homes of anyone he does work for. Here, let’s sit.”
We sat together on a bench overlooking a small wooden bridge hung with trails of lilac wistaria. Her hair moved lightly in the breeze. She was so beautiful, and so totally oblivious to the fact. The man on the bench opposite couldn’t keep his eyes off her.
“Is it possible?”
“The police don’t think so. They reckon it could have been a hit-and-run and the driver took the body as a cover-up. Either that or someone else took her. But as far as they’re concerned it’s not Cox. A whole bunch of people have sworn he was with them. The problem is, Mum just won’t accept that. If she keeps on harassing him they could put her inside.”
“Your poor mum.”
“It’s driven her mad. I don’t mean mad, that’s unfair. I mean she carries this quiet suffering with her all the time. She hides it, though.” Willa briefly chewed on her lip, staring vacantly, somewhere far off. Then, slowly, she added, “She’s always been good at hiding things, Mum.” She turned to look at me. “I’d love for you to meet her. You’d like her, really, she’s lovely. She’s kind, thoughtful, decent. She’s funny too, even now, after everything. She loves cooking and gardening and the X-Files and Jilly Cooper, and, okay, get this—she’s a massive George Michael fan. What I mean is, she’s normal. But after Laika went missing, the press made her look completely deranged. Which is hardly surprising, given the sorts of headlines the tabloids were printing: psychic says jungle-loving laika killed by jaguar in paraguay. Remember that one? It’s cruel, that’s what it is. They just made things up.”
“Your poor, poor mum.”
“Even now they do it, the tabloids, I mean. Laika was on the cover of the Mail last week. It’s like a bone they keep picking, a useful fallback for a slow news day. And it’s not like it’s proper investigative journalism or they’re doing anything that’s actually going to find her; it’s just repackaging her story again and again in different ways, feeding the public’s appetite for sensation. None of it helps.”
I paused. “And what about you? How are you doing?”
“Me?” She opened her mouth, then shut it again. I waited. Eventually, she dropped her voice. “I still think I see her sometimes. I’m always doing double takes, but it’s never, ever her. And then I dream about her too—dreams where I see her and I know it’s her but I never can get to her.” She shakes her head. “And it’s awful because it’s like I’m the one who’s the problem, not her, because I’m the one who can’t move or speak.” She put a hand on my arm. “But also that means she’s alive, Rob, I know it. She’s somewhere. It’s just that I can’t reach her.”
A group of pigeons startled and rose chaotically into the deep blue of the sky as the man sitting across from us approached our bench, his eyes still fixed on my friend. We both looked up, and Willa promptly set her own face into a friendly, expectant look. Looking directly at her, he said,
“Do you want to watch me wank off?”
“Thank you,” Willa said, “but I honestly can’t think of anything worse.”
***
“You okay?” I said as we walked toward the tube, so close our shoulders brushed.
“I’m fine,” Willa said. “Poor man. He’s obviously not well. You never know what’s going on in another person’s life, do you? We should probably tell someone, though. There’s kids about, and anyway he needs help.” We walked a few more paces. “Though on the subject of odd sexual practices, I had a date last night with a dentist, Greg. He seemed nice enough and we’d been out a few times, so, long story short, I ended up going home with him. Well, everything was going okay, I thought, but then he burst into tears the moment he came. Wept for a good ten minutes. Completely inconsolable.” She stopped walking and turned to face me, her expression somewhere between baffled and amused. “I mean, is that normal?”
I blinked. “Wow,” I said, “I honestly wouldn’t know.” I grinned. “Though you are very lovely. It was probably that.”
“Though, now I think about it, he also thought the Booker Prize was something to do with gambling. I don’t think I’ll be seeing him again.”
At the entrance to Great Portland Street tube, Willa hugged me close.
“I feel bad,” she said, “like we’ve only spoken about me. Can we do this again? I really, really want to see more of you.”
“Me too,” I said.
“And will you do something for me?”
“Of course.”
“I want you to meet my mum. I want you to see what she’s really like, that she’s not the total fruitcake the media made out. Promise me, Rob. It would mean so much.”
“Sure—”
“Come and stay for the weekend, then. We’ll make a date.”
She reached into her bag for her travel pass. She kissed me on the cheek and I felt my face pulling into a strange smile. Then she was gone, and I hadn’t told her about Cat.
But she’d told me about Greg. As I walked away from the underground, I folded my arms around my chest. Over my ribs. Above my battered, broken heart.
***
We next met in a bar near St. Paul’s. I came straight from work and was a bit late, aware the smell of the ward was probably still clinging to my skin. I spotted Willa at the bar, talking to a woman with long dark hair, and she looked so involved I almost didn’t want to pull her away. I stood by the entrance, looking at them there. Then I reminded myself not to be stupid. Willa wasn’t gay. She’d told me that herself. She didn’t like girls. And I had news too, I knew that. A promise to keep: something I had to be honest about. Something she had to know.
“I’ve met someone,” I said, the moment we sat down, “actually we’re moving in together. We’re going to see some possible flats this weekend.” I grinned wildly in her direction. Willa grinned back.
“That’s wonderful,” she said. “You look unbelievably happy. Your eyes—”
