And now I’m at the foot of the stairs. Staring upward, shouting after him.
“Dad? What the hell are you talking about?Dad!”
15.
Callie
A few nights after Halloween, Joel catches me in the hallway.
“Listen, I wanted to apologize.”
Without warning my face blooms as I wonder if he’s saying sorry for the sounds I heard drifting up through my floorboards, late into Thursday night.
I was in bed, watching a documentary about plastic in the ocean. At first I heard only a few thumps—enough to make me mute the laptop in puzzlement—but then, as the thumping became more rhythmical, overlaid with grunts and gasps, I switched the whole thing off and simply listened, motionless. I couldn’t help but picture Joel, wondering what he looked like, imagining how it might feel to be Melissa. I felt my skin creep with heat as my pulse began to thud, and then—just as I was shutting my eyes to let the picture fully unfold—there came a final, decisive exclamation before everything fell quiet. Guiltily, I fired up the laptop again and attempted to focus very hard on the grim footage of plastic being washed up on an Indonesian beach. But for the rest of the night and the next couple of days, the scene refused to loosen from my mind.
Between an unexpectedly busy weekend in the café and my barely being at home, we’ve only passed pleasantries since—and facing him now, I’m struggling to meet his eye. I hope he can’t tell that I didn’t find it shocking or offensive—quite the opposite, in fact. He looks a bit embarrassedtoo, and I can’t think what else he’d be saying sorry for, so I run with it. “You really don’t need to apologize.”
“We’d had a drink.”
“Absolutely.”
“She’s not like that all the time.”
“Right.”
“She gets a bit more forthright after—”
I hold up one hand. “Got it. Honestly.”
“And that costume was just—”
“There’s really no need—”
“Well. I just wanted to say she was only joking. But she shouldn’t have spoken to you like that.”
“Are you... talking about what Melissa said to me in the shop?”
“Yes... What areyoutalking about?”
I swallow. “Never mind. Crossed wires, I think.”
There’s no chance now, of course, to mention the shouting I heard much later the same night. It rang out like gunshots, shocked me awake. There was no female voice, so they can’t have been rowing—Joel must have been dreaming. But bringing it up now would feel odd and intrusive, like I’m some sort of voyeur, aka every neighbor’s worst nightmare.
Joel looks bemused but smiles like he doesn’t mind. “How’s Murphy with fireworks?” It’s Guy Fawkes this evening and already the sky is a disco, a nightclub of bass and neon.
“Ben offered to have him. His mum and dad live out in the sticks. No near neighbors for miles.”
“Good thinking.”
I rustle up a smile. “So do you have any Guy Fawkes plans?”
“Absolutely not,” he says, deadpan. “Can’t stand the bloke.”
I laugh. “Dot and her water-skiing lot are having a party at the country park.”
Possibility balloons between us. I want to invite him, I do, but surely he has a girlfriend?
I take a breath, search my stomach for daring. “So if you’re not doing anything...?”
