‘Do you have someone you do this situationship with?’
She swallowed. ‘No. Not any more.’
‘But you have done this interaction before?’
‘It was a while ago.’
‘And how long do you do this messaging and not meeting for?’
‘Well, sometimes a few weeks.’ She swallowed. ‘Other times… a few months.’ She had talked to Henry for just short of five months.
‘Months! Of just typing? I do not understand this.’
‘Well, I don’t know what it’s like here in the wilderness of France, but in the UK it’s about the only thing people do when they want to find a connection.’ And sometimes she really missed it. Just having someone checking in on her every day, seeming to care, saying nice things, being part of her day. But now she had said it out loud to Jacques, it sounded all kinds of ludicrous. Perhaps it was time to change the subject. She didn’t even know where they were headed.
‘So, what are you taking me to see?’
‘It is a cave,’ he answered, upping his pace.
‘Oh,’ Orla said.
‘You do not like caves?’
‘I don’t dislike them. The last time I went in one was in Hungary with a colony of Alcathoe bats.’
‘Were they in a long-standing relationship or situationships?’
She smiled. ‘Very funny.’
‘Come on,’ Jacques encouraged. ‘It’s not far.’
23
By the time they had reached the cave, Orla wasn’t cold any more and she was slightly out of breath. As much as she thought she was quite fit in a cardiovascular kind of way, nothing prepared you for snowy mountainous terrain. The cave was nothing much more than a small fissure in the grey rock and she couldn’t help feeling a bit disappointed. On the plus side, there was sunlight coming through the clouds now, taking away the chill and making their surroundings look a tiny bit less barren and bleak.
‘Orla, come and sit here,’ Jacques called, beckoning her over.
‘Sit?’ she queried. It might be a few degrees less hostile out here but it wasn’t camping chairs and picnic blanket weather just yet.
‘Come on,’ he encouraged. ‘I have brought cheese.’
The moment the ‘c’ word was said, her stomach flexed in appreciation. She stepped towards where he had positioned himself, sitting on a rock that was free of snow. She lowered herself down next to him and looked out at the incredible view down the valley. She could just about see the top of Jacques’s house and then flowing down, through the forest, were the first signs of habitation and the spire of the Saint-Chambéry church.
‘OK,’ Jacques said. ‘So, when I pass this to you, you have to sit very still and quiet.’
‘You have to eat cheese in silence?’ Orla asked. ‘Is that a Saint-Chambéry tradition?’
‘Please, Orla, it is for your own safety.’
‘My ownsafety?’ She said it rather loudly and it echoed. She repeated it in a whisper. ‘My ownsafety?’
‘You are a reporter. You have travelled across the world and been in many situations. There is always some level of danger when you go to different places, right?’
‘And I usually always know what I’m going to be faced with before it happens.’
‘Still and quiet,’ Jacques repeated. He passed her a foil-wrapped parcel. ‘Take one piece out, hold it out away from you, and keep the rest covered.’
‘Hold it out how? At arm’s length?’
