Later in the relationship, I was to think back to his silence after I told him my story: Star Road, the small terraced house with the peeling paint on the windowsills, the woman in the window on a summer’s day and her wide-eyed look as our gazes connected. I was to fill this silence with his thoughts at that moment, and with regret for my own honesty. By the end I would regret every occasion when I had been honest with Matty, along with my own foolishness for not realising that honesty was stored up by him, secreted, in the same way that a cat might dive beneath a bed to hide the garden bird it has between its jaws.

11

Matty’s text arrived at ten o’clock on a Saturday morning. He was working that day but we were due to see each other in the evening – we had been dating for six weeks. I had already learned what it was like dating a junior doctor. ‘I’ll be at your place by seven p.m.’ meant ‘If I’m lucky, I’ll get there by ten.’ And ‘I’ll call you right back’ could mean ‘We won’t speak for two days.’ I didn’t mind, back then. When he finally arrived, he would fall upon me like a starving man upon a roast chicken. It was always worth the wait.

Where you now?

I texted back. At home, running a bath, why? Thought you were working today?

I got all excited, imagining he was about to turn up at my flat. I brushed my hair, put a little light make-up on, even though I was about to get into a bath. I looked at my pyjamas, a top and shorts, blue with white piping. I judged them acceptably cute to be wearing to answer the door. I brushed my teeth.

He never replied.

*

That evening, we had an arrangement to meet in town. He hated it when I was late, and I was keen enough to be early, eight minutes early to be precise, leaning up against the wall outside Burger King where the bright yellow light shone out over the hurrying shoppers on Long Causeway. We were going to Spaghettini, which was where we had been on our first date: Matty called it ‘our’ restaurant. When he had called up to ask me out he had wanted to know my favourite type of food. I had hesitated before owning up to pasta – it wasn’t very cool, or modern, and in the back of my mind was the feeling he might disapprove of carbohydrates. He had replied, ‘Thank God, I love pasta.’