Chapter 21

CHAPTER 21

"Hey," he says, "where are you? The app says you're in London?"

Of course the fucking app tells him where she is.

"The box," she says. "Sorry, this is important. Was anyone else at the house when you went to look for it?"

Two minutes, perhaps, from the corner of her street. Her fingers feel slippery where they touch the phone.

"What? Wait, let me check," and she hears a rustle, then Felix again, more clearly, switching from speakerphone maybe. "No, I mean I sent an intern, but he didn't mention seeing anyone, have you checked the cameras?"

It takes her a moment to absorb the sentence, to understand the situation.

She is turning the corner as she decodes it, and sees the house come into view with one all-encompassing realisation: the attic is still working .

"Hey," she says, "I'll call you back."

The man on the camera wasn't a husband. Of course Felix didn't get a train or a taxi or a company car and spend an hour coming to her old house. Of course he just sent an employee. Of course.

She has to stop in the street to bathe in her relief, to close her eyes, to feel it engulf her like the waters of the swimming pool.

She has had enough of this. She is done. She wants her new life.

And the thing is, as long as she's happy to leave this life, it doesn't matter how much of a fuss she makes on the way out.

So she picks up her stride and unlocks the front door—the codes in her Airbnb messages, one for the outer door and one for the flat—and she walks up her old familiar stairs.

The house is still the strange empty thing it was when she left a week ago. She looks in the cupboards in the kitchen for a phone charger, but finds only four half-empty jars of grey-green herbs and a row of untouched recipe books.

The cleaner, presumably, has set out a welcome package on the table in the hall, another of the folded-over bags. She opens it. There is tea, and some shortbread chocolate-chip biscuits. The bottle of red wine sitting next to it is worth (she looks it up) ￡5.49. It's a screw top, and much easier to open than most of the hundred-pound bottles she's been drinking during the week, so she takes a sip. It tastes fine, but she has to grudgingly admit that the very expensive wines were mostly nicer.

I am at home , she texts Felix. My old home. I am not leaving.

Her phone rings right away. She declines the call.

It rings again. She declines again, and texts I am at the flat and I will not leave until you are here. I will explain later , then she turns it to aeroplane mode to conserve battery and arguments.

Next: time to check the attic's still working. She pulls the ladder down, jerking to the left at the halfway point like always; in no world have she and the husband had it fixed. Two steps up, far enough that she can reach her hand in. There it is; the warm light. A crackle in the air. The attic, still doing its weird thing.

She doesn't want to go into the living room, under the gaze of the camera. Instead she takes a recipe book from the kitchen so that she has something to read while she waits, and heads into the bedroom, flops down on what she is pretty sure was her original bed. Brilliant Biscuits. Clever Cakes. Perfect Puddings.

She is looking through Scrumptious Scones when she hears the beep of someone unlocking the front door, and footsteps coming up. It can't be Felix, can it? Not already. No: it's a woman in a suit. "Lauren?" the woman says in the hallway, switching the light on; it's been getting dark.

"Hello," Lauren says from the bedroom doorway. "I don't suppose you have a phone charger?"

The woman checks her bag. "No," she says. "Sorry."

"That's fine," Lauren says. "Are you here from Felix?"

"Yeah, I'm—I'm Siobhan, we met at the summer party."

"So we did," Lauren says with a grandiose gesture. "Welcome. I don't have much battery left so I can't call Felix directly, but I'd love it if you could tell him I'm okay, I'm just planning to stay here until he comes to see me."

"Is there anything—are you all right?"

"I'm well, thank you. How about you?"

"I'm good." Siobhan is young, surely not more than a couple of years into her position. It's unkind of Felix, Lauren thinks, to send her to chase down his wife.

Siobhan's still talking: "Would you like me to call someone? Do you definitely want Felix to come? Or is there something…I looked up a couple of organisations?"

It takes Lauren a moment. "Oh," she says, "god, no. I don't think so? No, I'm sure not." She looks at Siobhan. Imagine being, what, twenty-two? Sent by your boss to tend his wife's nervous breakdown, and having the moral fortitude to check if the wife is being abused. This isn't what Lauren wanted, some low-ranking employee forced to come to her flat long after work hours have ended. But: no repercussions , she reminds herself. Siobhan will be returned to her normal evening when Felix arrives.

"Would you like some wine?" she says. "Or some shortbread biscuits?"

"No," Siobhan says, "I'm good. Maybe some water?"

"Of course." Lauren goes into the kitchen and opens cupboards, looking for glasses. "Do take a seat," she adds, and Siobhan perches on a stool.

Then the doorbell rings.

Siobhan stands up.

"Don't be silly," Lauren says, "sit down, this isn't your job. I'm not impressed that Felix made you come here to sort out his problems.I hope you get paid overtime." She is momentarily inflamed with the desire for justice.

"I don't mind."

"Actually," Lauren says, "maybe if you could get it after all?" It's occurred to her that although this can't be Felix, who would use the code, it's not impossible that he's called some sort of rich-person emergency crew. Maybe a private ambulance that men can send to collect their recalcitrant wives, to take them to some sort of luxury treatment centre? She picks up the bottle of wine and the biscuits, heads back into the bedroom and closes the door. She has learned from that first night that a chair under the handle doesn't do anything so instead she drags the chest of drawers over to block the door completely. Ooof .

She hears someone on the landing with Siobhan: ah. Not luxury paramedics. Toby.

"Oh, hey," she says through the door.

"Uh, hi," he says. "Are you okay? I got a call from Felix."

Felix should learn to deal with his own problems. "I'm fine," she says. "I'm just not leaving till he comes. I've been very clear."

"Okay," he says after a moment; she hears Siobhan murmur something but can't make it out. "Can I come in?"

"I'd rather you didn't," she calls back. Last time she was in this bedroom with him it was extremely weird. "Tell you what, how about you make me a cup of tea?" She doesn't want one and isn't going to move the drawers to let him in, but it'll keep him busy.

She is trying so hard to do the right thing.

All she needs is for Felix to play his part.

A few minutes later, a knock on the door. "It's me," Toby says, and the doorknob twists, and the door opens quietly outwards. Ah.

He looks at the drawers, puts a mug on them. "Uh, here's your tea."

"I'm sorry about the noisy guests," she says. "Please tell Maryam too. I'm going to put a stop to it."

"Okay," he says. "The important thing is that you're all right. Are you sure I can't come in?"

"Yes," she says, standing behind the chest of drawers like it's a shop counter.

He waits.

"Could you shut the door?" she says. And he hesitates a moment, then closes it gently.

She looks up Carter. Three per cent battery and it's ridiculous to use it on this, but there's a new photo of him and the woman. He can't really be as happy as he looks, can he? He can't have put up tents and chased chickens for her, and then stepped sideways into another life he loves just as much.

Her battery ebbs lower; her phone turns itself off politely and she is left alone on the bed. She hears the front door again: Toby leaving, perhaps.

And then: more hubbub on the landing. And this time, at last, it's Felix.

"Thanks," she hears him say to Siobhan; then he knocks at the door and opens it a crack.

"Hey," he says.

"Hey," she replies. "I really thought the door opened inwards," she adds, gesturing at the drawers.

A moment of silence. "Siobhan," he says, "thanks, I can take it from here."

Siobhan gathers her bag. "No problem," she says, almost convincing. "Happy to help."

Lauren watches Felix, who waits until he hears the door close.

"So, what's up?" She was expecting him to sound either worried or angry, but he's something else, carefully neutral, assessing.

"Well," she says. "If you go into the attic I'll explain. There's something up there I want you to see." The ladder is still pulled down behind him.

"I…don't think I feel comfortable with that," he says. "Unless you can explain a little bit more. You've got to see this is really odd, right?"

"I promise you won't regret it," she says, "it's nothing dangerous, it's nothing disgusting. I can't explain it properly. But I'm asking you to trust me. As your wife."

A moment, then: "I'm just going to need more than that," he says.

Okay.

"I don't like to have to do this," she says, "but you'll understand once you see it. I'm going to ask you one more time to climb into the attic. This simple thing, to oblige me, because you love me and you trust me."

Felix looks up at the ladder, and back at her.

"And if you don't," she says, "then I'm afraid I'm going to have to tell everyone your secret."

Like Jason with his favourite dinner, she thinks: presumably he has one.

His eyes widen, just a little. "My…"

"You know the one," she says. He is a multi-millionaire, he is chief financial officer for a definitely evil company, he has been divorced twice and married three times, he lets his son use an air rifle and has a room full of dead birds, and she doesn't know what his secret is but there's bound to be something . "I didn't want to have to bring it up," she adds.

And his face suddenly changes, and she wonders for a moment if she's made a mistake, if Siobhan knew something she doesn't, if she shouldn't in fact threaten a rich and powerful man while they're alone, and she thinks about yelling for Toby or vaulting over the drawers and into the living room towards the watchful eye of the house camera, but then he says, "Lauren," and, "I don't know what you're talking about," but it's clear he does, and she still doesn't know or care what the secret is, but she says, "It's okay, it's okay, I won't tell anyone, I love you, it's not a big deal, I just need you to look in the attic, just for ten seconds. Five. I promise you'll understand once you're up there."

And she feels bad, she isn't used to seeing him with strong emotions, but he'll feel better soon.

He climbs, a step and then another. His head disappearing into the dark, his torso. She sees the flickering light, and hears the buzz.

And the first thing she notices is that the tension of holding her bladder, which she had barely realised she was doing, has vanished in this new world. The easing of her whole body as she enters a life where she has not been hiding out in the bedroom.

The attic worked.

She steps forward into the doorway that just moments ago had been blocked by drawers and waits for the next husband to descend. Everything is new again; everything is back to normal and everything is different.