The Missing Wife. Sam Carrington

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       3

       THE TEXT

       Wednesday a.m.

      ‘What are you doing?’ Brian asked, his words slurred from tiredness. He threw the duvet off and sat on the edge of the bed, his head resting in his hands. The room was dark bar the illumination of the digital alarm clock’s blue glow.

      ‘Getting dressed.’ Louisa zipped her jeans and, using her phone light to see, pulled at the soft-pink jumper under the mountain of discarded clothes on the tub chair in the corner of their bedroom, sending the rest tumbling.

      ‘But it’s five past five, Louisa?’

      ‘Oh, is it? It feels later. I’ve been up half the night with Noah.’ She tutted as she absently piled the clothes back up on the chair. She banged her hip against the dressing table as she stumbled towards the door. ‘Sorry, I’m a bit on the clumsy side this morning, didn’t mean to disturb you. You’ve got another hour yet, so go back to sleep.’

      ‘You’re clumsy every morning lately,’ Brian mumbled as he sank back into the pillow.

      Despite the strong urge to tell him he would be too if he’d been the one up every night for the last three months, Louisa said nothing and just closed the door quietly behind her.

      Noah was sleeping now. Louisa crept past his nursery, barely daring to breathe in case she woke him. Emily’s room, with a poster of P!NK adorning the door, was silent too. She seemed to sleep through Noah’s cries. Just as well – she was moody enough without lack of sleep impacting on her. Her schoolwork was suffering. It had been prior to Noah’s arrival but Louisa didn’t want her daughter, who was as bright as a button, to go downhill further because an unexpected baby had disrupted the equilibrium. Louisa trod carefully on each stair, avoiding the edge of the squeaky middle one.

      In the kitchen, she took her handbag from where it hung on the inside of the larder door and retrieved the packet of Marlboro and a disposable lighter. Standing at the open back door, Louisa dragged on the cigarette. Her head swam for a moment, a light airiness consuming it. After a few more puffs, she relaxed.

      She had limited opportunities to smoke without being noticed. Early mornings were the best. As far as Brian was concerned, she gave up long ago. She had given up for four years. But yesterday triggered something. The compulsion to start again overtook her and she was relieved to find her secret packet was still in its original hiding place in the bottom drawer of her mother’s old sideboard in the garage. When Brian was otherwise engaged on his mobile, she’d got them and popped them in her handbag. It wasn’t as if Brian would ever go looking in that. He wasn’t nosy, didn’t check up on her; he’d never think to search through any of her things. He wasn’t like that.

      Louisa reached around to the outside and scraped the cigarette along the wall to extinguish it; then she hid the butt in one of Emily’s discarded Coke cans. That girl was drinking far too much fizzy rubbish. She washed her hands in the kitchen sink, spread a liberal spray of Oust around and then closed and locked the back door.

      Brian’s mobile was charging on the worktop near the bread bin. He never took it to bed, always fearing he’d get a late-night call from his sister Alison, who lived in Yorkshire with his mother, taking care of her following the death of Brian’s dad. She’d phoned several times in the middle of the night, worrying about their mother’s behaviour and her health. It’s not that Brian didn’t care – he did. He was a good son on the whole. But his sister was needy and felt it was her responsibility to tell Brian every little detail of what was going on up there, while he ‘lived life’ at the opposite end of the country. She’d been bitter ever since Brian chose to move to Devon, where Louisa had always lived. And when they’d married, her bitterness intensified. For some reason, Brian felt Alison had always wanted to punish him for that choice.

      Louisa took the phone, pressing the button to bring up the home screen. It was password-protected, but she could see the first part of each of the last few notifications and texts. Her breath caught. Tiff’s message was the last one. She could only see the first line.

       All good for meeting Friday still? I assume you’ve managed to keep it from

      Louisa’s face grew hot. She tapped the screen even though she knew she wouldn’t be able to access the full message. She placed it back on the worktop in the same position she’d found it in. Her heart beat wildly; she could feel pressure in her chest. Friday was when he was supposedly going out with the lads; Louisa distinctly remembered him arranging it. To her knowledge, Brian had never lied to her.

      She wondered why he would start now.