Rain lashes the window of Leonardo’s Trattoria. I sit opposite my friend Sally at a small table that overlooks the Theatre Royal. Three or four white-haired Italian waiters efficiently work the room, slapping down giant pizzas or bowls of pasta and full glasses of house wine – the popular lunchtime special. I’ve always wondered why the Italians choose Newcastle to open their restaurants. Surely there are warmer parts of England that might remind them more of home? A young and voluptuous Newcastle girl is waiting on our table, looking frenzied.
Despite being determined to not utter a word of any of this, the minute I see my friend’s face, it is impossible.
I don’t think Sally moves, or breathes, even. Then her lips part. I am aware of astonished green eyes staring back at me among a mass of freckles, and of myself being oddly fascinated by her reaction.
‘You are not being serious,’ she says, when she can speak. ‘My God! The bastard! Alice!’ She covers her nose and mouth with her hands and gasps into them.
I catch the slight tremor of my head, and realise my hand is tightly gripping the end of the flimsy cotton tablecloth by my leg.
Bastard. It’s what my single friends would call the host of dysfunctional boyfriends they’ve all encountered. It seems absurd applying it to Justin – like a case of mistaken identity.
Sally is still looking stunned as the waitress returns, and we order the same thing we always do, without needing to look at the menu. The girl goes away, then returns and sets down some fresh focaccia and oil, her slender arm sneaking in between our faces, as though her female antenna has picked up on the seriousness of our conversation.
‘Why would he do that? Have you any idea?’ Sally asks, once the waitress has left us again.
I can’t believe that I can talk about it, yet feel so removed from it. It’s as though it’s happening to a mutual, absent, third friend, whom I like, but whose happiness and well-being I’m not inextricably invested in. For want of a better reaction, I just shrug.
‘You literally have no idea?’
‘No,’ I say. ‘None.’ I stare at her lovely hair that falls to just above her shoulders – not quite brown and not quite auburn – at the freckles on her chest and the gold locket that sits centrally in the V of her blouse, unable to bring her into proper focus. Then I have to look away to try to right my eyes. I gaze across the room, suddenly aware of things I don’t believe I’ve noticed before: a revolving display cabinet containing slices of tired cheesecake, chocolate cake and a plate of slightly more promising tiramisu; and a pleasingly large and colourful print of the Amalfi Coast, that makes me think distantly of my honeymoon, or perhaps more of a sense of everything being truly idyllic.
‘How are you feeling?’ she asks. Her question pulls me back from wherever the print has transported me. ‘What are you thinking? Have you any idea what you’re going to do?’
‘I don’t know.’ I frown, unsure which question to answer first. ‘I mean, what can I do? I suppose I’m doing all I can. I’m just putting one foot in front of the other, trying to keep my sanity, and get through my day.’
The words everyone’s sake come back, filling my head and my vision.
No. Justin doesn’t have someone else. It was a turn of phrase. How many times have I said it myself? I feel fractionally better now I’ve formed that conclusion.
‘I’ve tried ringing him, texting, emailing. I know he got on his flight because the airline confirmed it.’ The police had checked. ‘His car’s gone, so I know he must have come back to the flat at some point, but he hasn’t picked up any of his clothes – not that I can tell, anyway. I’ve rung every hotel in the area. Even the ones he used to stay in when he travelled for work . . .’ I shrug again.
‘But there must be something else you can do! There has to be! You can’t just . . . just sit and wait and be entirely at his mercy.’ She is shaking her head, mouth gaping in amazement again.
I know she means well, but it puts me on the defensive. In fact, I feel a little breathless with it. Sally is nothing if not direct. I’ve always appreciated that. She’s the one person whose opinion can make me second-guess my own. But I don’t want to be told what to do. ‘Is there? Like what? I can’t exactly put him on the regional news. He’s not missing. He managed to ring his secretary and say he was going to be working from home!’ It sounds ridiculous, but it’s real. ‘Clearly, if he needs to be away from me so badly that he’d abandon me halfway across the world, what’s the point of even trying to find him? He mustn’t want that. Maybe when he wants to talk to me, he’ll talk to me. In his own time.’
I glance out of the window, at the rain coming down; the abject colourlessness of this city on a dark day has never got to me before. The waitress sets down my plate of pasta and makes some excuse to Sally about the wood-burning oven being backed up.
‘You seem so . . . calm or something. So rational,’ Sally says, after a moment or two. ‘I’m surprised you’re not angrier, I must admit.’ Her eyes roam over my face, my hair, my upper body.