‘Sorry you had to hear it that way,’ Solomon says softly, thinking of how Jimmy had blurted it out.
‘Tom used to bring the shopping on Thursdays. When he didn’t come, I knew something was wrong, but I had no one to ask. I thought Joe was Tom today in the forest. I’ve never seen him before. They’re identical. But he was so angry. I’d never seen Tom so angry.’
‘You’ve lived there for ten years and you’ve never seen Joe?’
She shakes her head. ‘Tom wouldn’t allow it.’
He’s about to ask why, but stops himself. ‘Joe’s grieving, he’s usually more accommodating. Give him time.’
She sips her water, concerned.
‘So you haven’t eaten anything since Thursday,’ Solomon suddenly realises.
‘I have the fruit-and-veg patch, the eggs. I bake my own bread. I have enough but Tom likes … liked … to supply some extras. I was foraging when I saw you.’ She smiles shyly at him as she remembers how they met. He smiles too and then laughs at himself for his schoolboy feelings.
‘Jesus, let me get you some food. What do you want, burger and chips? I’ll get some for me too.’ He stands and looks across the road to the chipper. ‘It’s been a whole two hours since I ate.’
She smiles.
He expects her to mill into her food, but she doesn’t. Everything about her is calm and slow. She delicately picks at the chips with her long elegant fingers, occasionally studying one before she takes a bite.
‘You don’t like them?’
‘I don’t think there’s any potato in it,’ she says, dropping it to the greasy paper and giving up. ‘I don’t eat this kind of food.’
‘Unlike Tom.’
Her eyes widen. ‘I always told him to fix his diet. He wouldn’t listen.’ She looks sad again as the news of his death and her loss sinks in further.
‘Joe and Tom aren’t the types to listen to anybody,’ Solomon senses her blaming herself.
‘He once told me he had a ham sandwich for dinner and I gave him such a lecture about it when he came back the next week he was so proud to tell me he’d had a banana sandwich that day instead. He thought the fruit would be healthier.’
They both laugh.
‘Perhaps I was wrong,’ Solomon says gently, ‘he did listen to somebody.’
‘Thanks,’ she says.
‘How did your grandmother know Tom?’ Solomon asks.
‘You ask a lot of questions.’
He thinks about it. ‘I do. It’s how I make conversation. How do you make conversation?’ he asks and they both laugh.
‘I don’t. Apart from Tom I never have anybody to talk to. Not people, anyway.’ Somebody at the table around the corner stands, pushing aside the bench, which screeches against the ground. She imitates the sound. Once, twice, until she gets it right. The bar girl clearing the table beside them gives her a funny look.
‘I have fine conversations with myself,’ Laura continues, not noticing the look or not caring. ‘And with Mossie and Ring. And inanimate objects.’
‘You wouldn’t be alone in that.’ He smiles, watching her, completely intrigued.
She makes a new sound, one that makes him laugh. It sounds like a phone vibrating.
‘What is that?’ he asks.
‘What?’ She frowns.
And then suddenly he hears the sound again and it’s not coming from Laura’s lips, though he has to study her closely. He feels his phone vibrating in his pocket.
‘Oh.’ He reaches into his pocket and takes out his phone.
Five missed calls from Bo, followed by three messages of varying desperation.
He puts it face down on the table, ignoring it.
‘How did you know Tom?’
‘More questions.’
‘Because I find you intriguing.’
‘I find you intriguing.’
‘Ask me something then.’ He smiles.
‘Some people learn about people in other ways.’ Her eyes sear into him so much his heart pounds.
‘Okay.’ He clears his throat and she imitates the sound perfectly again. ‘We – me, Bo and Rachel – made a documentary about Joe and Tom. We spent a year with them, watching their every move, or at least that’s what we thought. You seemed to elude us. My experience of Joe and Tom is that they had no contact with anybody at all, apart from suppliers and customers, and even then it was rare for it to be human contact. It was just them, every day, all their lives. I’m not sure how Tom would have met your grandmother.’
‘She met him through my mum, who brought them food and provisions. She cleaned their house.’
‘Bridget’s your mother?’
‘Before Bridget.’
‘How long ago are we talking?’ Solomon asks, leaning in to her, enthralled, whether she’s spinning bullshit or not. He happens to think it’s the truth. He wants to think it’s the truth.
‘Twenty-six years ago,’ she says. ‘Or a little bit more than that.’
He looks at her, slowly processing. Laura is twenty-six years old. Tom did her grandmother a favour. Her mother was a housekeeper at their house twenty-six years ago.