The Day I Lost You: A heartfelt, emotion-packed, twist-filled read. Fionnuala Kearney

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       3. Theo

      Theo Pope could recall the exact moment he knew his marriage was over. It was the night that Leah had phoned him with the news that Anna and a friend of hers were missing after an avalanche and two people from the ski party had already been confirmed dead. Harriet, his wife of twelve years, had been beside him, folding linen. Shock had registered on her face and she had made the right noises at the news, sympathetic sounds for Jess and her family. The pillowcases were folded into four, their creases pressed down with her palm; all the while, one eye had lingered on her BlackBerry. Theo had thought it odd; remote and detached from the unfolding tragedy.

      Johnny Mathis was singing about a child being born on the television. The Christmas tree lights that Theo had been fixing on his lap had fallen to the floor, some twinkling as expected, some stubbornly refusing. He had gone to Jess’s immediately, and when he got back after seeing her and her ex, Doug – both devastated beyond words, both readying to drive through the night to the tiny village in the Queyras area of the French Alps – he had heard Harriet on her phone. She was in the den at the back of the house, oblivious to the fact that he’d come home. He heard her whispered tone, her soft giggle. He imagined her on the other side of the door that he rested his forehead on. She would be sitting back, cross-legged, on the leather sofa. The phone would be in her left hand and she would be playing with her hair with her right; her forefinger rolling some strands of straight auburn hair, round and round itself.

      He had opened the oak-panelled door that Harriet had insisted on having two years earlier – a refurbishment plan in their home that he now knew was papering over the cracks. He hadn’t gone in, just stood there under the lintel, and she had looked up, her face frozen.

      ‘Enough,’ he had said. ‘No more of this. Go. Go be with him. I’m tired of all the subterfuge.’

      And she had. Two days later. Two weeks before Christmas. She had gone. To be with him.

      Ten weeks later, with February pelting biblical rain against the surgery windows, he gathered the papers he had been reading from his desk and slid them into his briefcase. The first patient of the Saturday morning surgery was due any moment, and he just had time to sit in his desk chair when a knock sounded on the door.

      ‘Come in,’ he said.

      Jess’s head peered around. ‘No, I’m not the scheduled Sarah Talbot. Sorry – I persuaded Sam in reception to let me in first. Perks of being an ex-employee. I’ll be quick, promise.’

      He beckoned her in, stood and kissed both her cheeks.

      ‘You’re soaked,’ he said.

      ‘Just from the car to the building, it’s fine.’ She sighed aloud. ‘I won’t beat around the bush,’ she said. ‘I need more of those tablets you gave me when … you know. I can’t sleep. And please, don’t lecture me on how addictive they might be. I have bad dreams, Theo. The snow comes to get her and then the sea comes to get me and—’

      ‘Slow down. Sit down, Jess.’ He pointed to the chair next to his desk.

      She sat. ‘I was going to say something yesterday but …’

      He nodded as he pulled her records up on his screen. ‘Jess, I’ll give you a scrip for seven days. That’s it. Make an appointment, come in and see me properly. If you don’t want it to be me, see Jane instead?’

      Jess nodded. ‘I will.’

      Theo looked at his friend: her eyes dark and tired; her hair, which yesterday had been tamed into a thick ponytail, a mass of unkempt wet waves today. He remembered she had refused food. ‘Are you even eating?’ he asked.

      ‘When I feed Rose. I eat. Really.’ She pointed at her wrist. ‘Mrs Talbot’s waiting. You’ll be late for everyone this morning.’

      ‘Yeah, СКАЧАТЬ