‘Not that well,’ Scarlett interjects.
‘Yes, well, she’s not the type just to disappear, not to come home. And she has a baby, you know.’
There’s a brief pause at the other end of the line. Then, ‘No. I didn’t know that.’
Kim gives her head a small shake, tries to imagine how Zach and Tallulah could have spent a whole night with this girl without once mentioning Noah. ‘Well, yes. She and Zach are parents. They have a son, he’s twelve months old. So not coming home is kind of a big deal.’
There’s another silence at the end of the line and then Scarlett says, ‘Right, well, yeah.’
Kim says, ‘Call me, please, if you hear anything.’
‘Yeah,’ says Scarlett. ‘Sure. Bye.’
And then she ends the call.
Kim stares at her phone for a moment. Then she looks up at Ryan who has been watching the phone call curiously.
‘Weird,’ says Kim. She relays the detail of the call to her son.
‘Shall we drive over there?’ he suggests. ‘To her house?’
‘Scarlett’s?’
‘Yeah,’ says Ryan. ‘Let’s go to Dark Place.’
4
August 2018
Shaun heads into work early the following morning. Sophie stands at the door of the cottage and watches as he disappears up the glass passageway, towards the main school building. He turns at the double doors and waves at her and then he is gone.
The grounds of the school are full of people wheeling small cases behind them, heading towards the car park at the front of the school. The residentialGleecourse is over, summer is coming to an end, from tomorrow the boarding-school students will start returning. Cleaners wait in the shadows to enter their vacated rooms and prepare them for the new term.
She heads back into the cottage now. It’s a pleasant house, functional. The air inside is clammy and cool with small windows grown over with ivy and wisteria branches that don’t let in muchlight. It still smells of other people and there’s that odd, damp bonfire smell in the hallway which seems to emanate from between the floorboards. She’s covered the floorboards over with a runner and placed a reed diffuser on the sideboard, but it still lingers. It’s going to take a while to make the cottage feel like home, but it will, she knows it will. Shaun’s children are coming the weekend after next: that will bring it to life.
Sophie turns to a box that she is halfway through unpacking when there is a knock at the door.
‘Hello?’
‘Oh, hi! It’s Kerryanne! The matron!’
Sophie opens the door and sees a woman with thick golden hair held back with sunglasses, bright blue eyes and a sun-burnished cleavage. She’s wearing a maxi dress and bejewelled flip-flops. She does not look like a matron.
‘Hi!’ says Sophie, reaching out to shake her hand. ‘Lovely to meet you!’
‘You, too. You must be Sophie?’
‘Correct!’
Kerryanne has a huge set of keys hanging from her hand. ‘How are you settling in?’ she says, passing the keys from one hand to the other. ‘Got everything you need?’
‘Yes!’ says Sophie. ‘Yes. Everything’s just fine. Shaun’s first day. He headed into work about ten minutes ago.’
‘Yes, I just saw him. We exchanged pleasantries! Anyway, I wanted you to take my number, in case you need anything. Obviously, my primary function is student welfare, but I’ll be keeping my eye out for you as well, I know how weird and new everything must be feeling, so please consider me to be yourmatron too. And if you’re missing home and need a shoulder to cry on …’
Sophie blinks, not sure if she’s being serious or not, but Kerryanne beams at her and says, ‘Just joking. But honestly, anything you need – advice about the village, about the staff, the kids,whatever. Please just text me. And I’m on the second floor of Alpha block, just …’ She crouches slightly to peer beneath an overhanging tree on the periphery of Shaun and Sophie’s garden. ‘… that window there. With the balcony. Room number 205.’ She passes Sophie a piece of paper with her details written on it in neat, schoolteachery script.
‘Is it just you?’