He stood with his hands on the counter, his back to me. I could feel him reconfiguring his argument, as if he knew he was being unreasonable, even within the template of unreasonability we lived by these days. ‘I just worry about you. You’re pregnant, and it’s such a long journey.’

‘You were the one who brought me here.’ I snatched up the rest of the groceries, a packet of noodles, a jar of chia seeds, which were supposed to be good for me, and shoved them into a cupboard. I knew that Nick would rearrange them later on, into an order he preferred.

He frowned. ‘Please don’t speak to me like that, Suzi.’ A warning. I’d gone too far. ‘And are we going to have any dinner, do you think? I’m starving, and I’m sure the baby is too.’

I waited a few seconds until I knew I could speak without screaming. Now was not the time to kick my life to pieces, not before I knew exactly what Nora was up to. ‘Of course. I was going to make bolognaise, but if you can’t wait there’s stuff for a stir-fry.’

‘Bolognaise would be good.’ He was mollified. Crisis averted again.

‘Coming right up. Why don’t you sit down with a beer?’ He’d switched to that from wine since I got pregnant, presumably to underline the point that I wasn’t allowed to so much as sniff alcohol, let alone taste a smidge from an open bottle.

‘Alright.’ In passing, he patted my stomach, the only part of me he ever touched now. ‘How’s Mum, by the way?’ I hated how he called her that. She was my mother, not his.

‘The usual. Up to her neck in village committees, looking forward to lots of improving lectures on her cruise.’

He pursed his lips. ‘I hope you told her we’re expecting some support when the bub comes. Granny needs to pitch in, along with Nana!’ I could just picture my mother’s face when I told her she was ‘Granny’. No grandfather in sight, of course, on either side. I wondered what it was about our mothers that sent men into early graves.

As I sliced veg and wrestled mince into the pan, mildly nauseated by the pink curls of it – like a brain – I looked across the lane and saw Nora’s cottage was still in darkness, the curtains open. She had gone. But where?

Nick padded into the kitchen behind me, rinsing his beer bottle to put in the recycling. Easily, as if it was no big deal at all, he said, ‘I meant to tell you, the police called again today. They still want to talk to you.’

Eleanor

Eleanor