There’s a diagram of half a body with lots of arrows sticking out of it. I remember the doctor saying something about ‘sensory neurons’ and ‘motor neurons’. I glance at the text again, the words blurring on the page. It’s another language I don’t want to learn.
I should be cooking Isla’s tea.
I press my head into my hands, strength draining from my body. Please, dear God, let this be a dream. Then I sit up, knowing exactly what I have to do. I reach into my handbag, take out my mobile. I will track Dan down once and for all. I call his old office. Dan is a journalist. Well, he used to be. Who knows what he’s up to now? I’m determined not to hang up until I have some information. Somebody has to knowsomething. He can’t just vanish into thin air. ‘Hi, can I speak to someone who used to work with Dan Gregory?’
‘Who’s calling?’
‘A friend.’
She hesitates, before putting me through to his old boss.
‘Haven’t I spoken to you before?’ He sounds abrupt.
‘Yes, but does anyone have his contact details?’
‘Nope.’
‘It’s important…’ I say with a trembling voice. ‘I need to—’
‘He didn’t let us know,’ he interrupts. ‘As I told you before, Dan left pretty suddenly, packed his desk… I think he went abroad.’
Clearly I wasn’t the only one let down by him. ‘Do you know anyone who might know where he is?’
‘Sorry.’
‘It’s urgent.Please.’
‘Can’t help.’
I slam the mobile down on the table, anger coursing through my veins. Dan and I went out for such a short time that I didn’t meet his friends or his family. It’s as if he has erased his past, changed his mobile number, his address; he has completely reinvented himself.
I look through the glass doors and watch Isla picking up a piece of jigsaw puzzle, tapping it against her mouth, before throwing it across the room, giggling.
I gulp down some more wine before I call home. Granny picks up immediately. ‘What news?’
My silence says it all. ‘Oh, January.’
Just the sound of her voice makes me tearful. ‘I can’t do this, Granny. I’m scared.’ I tell her I tried to contact Dan again, that I’m desperate.
‘Come and stay with us,’ she pleads.
After I finish our call I don’t know how long I sit at the kitchen table, staring into space, until I feel a tug on my leg.
‘Mummy?’ Isla looks up at me and gives me one of her best smiles, as if to say ‘We’ll be all right.’ I pick her up and rock her in my arms.
‘It’s you and me, Isla, and we’re going to be fine,’ I say, my heart breaking inside.
3
Spring, 2014
I’m in the cocktail bar of the Royal Overseas League in central London, ordering a glass of champagne before Jeremy’s retirement party begins in… I glance at my watch… approximately half an hour. Jeremy is a member of this club, so it made sense to have his leaving party here. It’s an old-fashioned venue with rich red-and-gold carpets, chandeliers, a restaurant with white linen tablecloths and spacious rooms that members can hire for conferences and events. Nadine and I came early to help set things up. We’ve hired a room on the top floor, easily big enough for a hundred and fifty guests. Nadine is still up there, making sure everything is in order. ‘Chill, J,’ she’d said five minutes ago. ‘Have a drink and look out for Jeremy arriving.’
Virtually everyone from Sherwoods wanted to come tonight. We have some staff travelling all the way from the Hexham office in Northumberland. Jeremy touched people’s lives; his clients loved him because he cared.
Jeremy’s retirement has caused ripples of anxiety within the company. Nadine has been at Sherwoods for sixteen years and thinks of him as a favourite uncle. I may have only worked for him for three, but he has been a father figure to me. Sure, he has a few annoying habits, especially the breaking out into French mid-sentence. But, along with Grandad, he’s one of the kindest men I know and a real gentleman. When I think back to my first interview, I can’t believe he gave me the job given my tearful Oscar-winning performance. Most people would have shown me the door. They certainly would not have been handing me handkerchiefs as they listened to me talking about Isla’s diagnosis and how Dan was absent from our lives. I recall Jeremy asking if Isla went to a special needs school and I’d told him that she went to a mainstream one, describing how the ethos was about inclusion now, not exclusion. I confided that Isla was lucky in that she had no physical look of CP but people did stare when she was out and about because her legs were so thin and her walking unsteady.
A few months into my role, I was brave enough to ask Jeremy what had possessed him to give me the PA position in the first place. ‘I felt you needed a break,’ he’d said. ‘And besides, anyone who loves dogs…’
