‘Send her my best.’
The woman rides off. As we climb the steps, Cody bites into his sandwich. His daughter looked to be about the age that Jess would be now. A shiver runs through me as I see the back of the girl I now know to be Daisy taking a left in the distance. Cody sees me looking and for a moment, I see something I haven’t seen in him before – worry.
‘Is that your daughter?’
He nods as he zips up his bag, then he checks his phone. Damien grips the girls’ hands as they stand near the edge; too close to the sea for comfort. Behind him is Jess’s bench but Damien wouldn’t know that. He hasn’t asked for the intricate details of what happened and I haven’t told him. I know that my dad and my sister were on that bench the day she disappeared. When we came back, my dad was alone. Cody sees me and he too looks at the bench. He knows the story as he too was here on that day.
In an instant, I’m back there as a little girl. We’ve just stepped off the boat and I’m whinging already. I glance back and see that the man in the pirate hat that I now know was Mr P is telling me I should be good for my mother but that makes me scowl. There is another face, one in the next boat, peering out of the window and that man has a stark stare. He’s about Cody’s age now.
My heart begins to pound. I saw Cody’s dad that day. He watched us getting off the boat. I have to see him.
‘Kate.’
Damien shrugs as I stand there motionless.
‘Sorry, I was in a world of my own.’ Rosie is crying for ice cream, just like I was back then and I see what my mother was going through. She had a crying child and a baby. ‘Rosie, that’s enough. If you don’t stop this, there will be no ice cream.’
My child is shaking and only now do I realise how loud I shouted that.
Damien shakes his head and grips her hand. ‘Right, let’s go and get a hot drink and maybe Mummy will snap out of her bad mood. Shall we try the café on the seafront by the lifeboat station?’
Rosie stops crying and nods her head. Millie has her knuckle in her mouth and a frown.
Cody clears his throat. ‘I’d recommend the full English.’ With that, he strides off in the direction of the ice-cream shop and down a narrow street.
‘Nice bloke. Did we have a good day, girls?’ Damien unzips his jacket as the sun begins to beam down. The further we move away from the harbour’s edge, the warmer it feels. Now that Cody has gone, all I want to do is call The Brambles but it’ll have to wait. Daisy was heading in this direction on her bike. I wonder if she’ll be in the same café that we’re going too.
‘Yay,’ the girls shout.
‘Mummy looked sick though. Maybe that’s why she’s not happy,’ Rosie said.
‘I am happy and I shouldn’t have shouted.’ I force a smile. ‘I felt a bit poorly. Sorry that I wasn’t much fun.’
Damien places an arm around my shoulders and Rosie grabs my hand. I hope he’s forgiven me. The walk to the café is pleasant and I’m thrilled that my nausea is subsiding now we’re off the boat.
‘Shall we sit out here?’ I see Daisy and Rachel on the next table beside Daisy’s bike.
‘Yay, we can look at the beach,’ Millie yells.
We sit and a teenage girl comes out to take our late breakfast orders and for the first time that morning, I’m ravenous. I lean back a little so that I can listen into the conversation going on behind me but I can barely hear a word. Daisy knows who I am. I can tell by the way she looks at me then whispers across at Rachel. They wave and another young woman runs across, apologising about being late.
‘Ooh, Bethany. Got home late from a date.’ Daisy points as she teases her friend.
‘Oh, shut up. If you must know, yes.’ The three young women huddle. ‘How’s the little angel.’
I glance around briefly and see that Rachel has her baby in a sling and a wash of sadness comes over me. I’d like to reach over and hold the little one just for a minute and pretend that I’d found Jess. Rachel’s pink hair has fallen from her clip and dangles on the baby’s face. I long to go over and move it so that Jess isn’t aggravated. I stop and shiver. That baby isn’t Jess. How could I even think that?
‘Kate.’ I glance up. Damien is waiting for an answer to a question I obviously didn’t hear.
‘Sorry, come again.’
He shakes his head. ‘Girls, you can go and have a look through the lifeboat shop window. Stay where I can see you both.’
Millie grins and is soon off her seat and Rosie grabs her hand. I can’t take my eyes off them. ‘I’ll go with them.’
‘No, they’re barely five feet away, I can still hear everything they’re saying. I’m capable of watching them while we talk.’
‘Please don’t be like this.’ I don’t need this right now. There’s already too much on my mind.
