Though he left his scarf in Dr Salmon’s office, he cannot return for it. He cannot risk re-exposing himself to her influence, being diverted from his path. The scarf was a dull thing in any case; a practical present from Jules. He texts Dr Salmon from the cafeteria. Safer than a phone call, for he knows she can work her voodoo on him with her voice alone. I’ve decided the process isn’t for me, he types. Off home now. I’ll be in touch. That last sentence – the casual reassurance of future contact – is to stop her running after him with the scarf. He already knows it’s a lie.
Clinical
Within a week of starting his prescription, Logan feels able to Skype Jules in Dubai. Even Prissy’s hovering presence doesn’t faze him. He shakes the small brown bottle at the screen.
Got these, he says. They’re working.
His wife looks drawn. Middle Eastern sunshine is too harsh for her to go out in. Perhaps the sister is a little wearing, too. Too hasty a leap from pan to fire.
What is that? she says. Turn it around.
He holds it up to the webcam. As she leans in to scrutinize the label he can see high-definition crinkles in the neck he used to nuzzle.
Ah, she says. Okay.
They sit staring at each other. The inset picture of him looks dark and green-tinted in the study’s low light; a glow-worm in a wine bottle. Her backdrop is clinical white, as though Prissy has her contained in some high-class correctional facility.
So will you come home? he asks.
She looks down at her fingernails.
Maybe.
He waits for her to say something else, but nothing else is coming.
I’m really feeling better now, he says.
Good, she says.
He is waiting for her as she emerges from Customs into Arrivals. There is an awkwardness about them, neither sure if they are on hugging terms. The hug attempt is confused in any case by who should put down, or pick up, or hand over, this or that item of luggage. They settle on a half-missed kiss on the cheek, and Logan piling everything onto a nearby trolley.
The drive home feels like an extension of their call: stilted, halting, each of them editing a tangle of thoughts into silence for fear of stepping upon some terrible wound. What little conversation passes between them is the safe sort: the flight, the weather. Even these trifles are soon rubbed out by the motorway’s numbing miles. The silence is heavy with the unsaid, so Logan clicks on the radio, but every station the unit locates is out of tune with them. Music that jars with its youth and vigour, or with its optimism, or whose failed-romance soundtrack risks scripting them into a tragedy. Talk shows and phone-ins are no better, flaming from irritation into antagonism. Logan returns them to the hush of passing miles.