Even though there was nothing untoward about my clandestine meeting with Glenn, guilt nibbled at me. Jacob would not be impressed if he knew, and I clung to his jealousy as a sign of hope that Flo was a fling and it was me he loved. I would not give up Glenn for him, though. Not when your dad had betrayed me when I needed him most. Not when Glenn had become such an indispensable friend in so short a time, and I needed someone to offload my pain with. Someone whose feelings didn’t have to be tiptoed around.
For such a wide, open landscape, I felt strangely claustrophobic while waiting on the marsh for him. As if someone were watching me – your attacker, perhaps. I could be seen for miles in the daylight, and it made me uncomfortable. This was supposed to be a secret meeting, but anyone could happen across us. Still, it was a lot less public than the pub. Even if we’d met in Wapentake, the chances of us being spotted together were high; it wasn’t exactly a great metropolis, boasting a population of around thirty thousand.
Despite my paranoia, there didn’t seem to be another soul in sight, aside from the wading birds far in the distance, hurrying up and down the tideline for food. The wind slapped my face, trying to beat some sense into me, but I pulled my hood up, instantly comforted, like a child diving under a duvet to keep monsters at bay. But I missed the wind. Some people hated the constant breeze that haunted the fens. The area was so flat, it rarely ceased. Even in summer it could be fierce, and one gloriously sunny day a few years earlier I had got a huge blister on the top of my ear from windburn after hours of walking without a hat on. But even so, I loved the wind, especially now. It felt like a treasured companion: the one thing that could always be relied on in this uncertain world.
Screw it. I threw my hood back and turned my face to feel my cold February companion clawing and numbing my flesh. We revelled in one another’s company.
‘Beth? Are you here? Can you hear me?’ I called softly.
The wind gentled, smoothing my clothes, soothing my skin with its caresses. It whispered in my ear, but I couldn’t make out what it said. Was… was that you, Beth? I knew it was only wishful thinking, but wanted so much for it to be you. My arms ached, physically ached, to hold you.
‘Melanie?’
I gave a little cry of shock, jumping. I’d been concentrating so hard on the wind that I had somehow missed the sound of Glenn’s van pulling up in the car park, and him walking up behind me.
‘What’s happened? Have the police arrested someone? Are you okay?’
‘It’s Beth’s guitar teacher, James Harvey! I found a diary Beth was keeping and…’ Tears leaked from my eyes; I bullied them away. I started to walk along the sea bank, Glenn by my side, bringing him up to date on finding your diary and calling the police.
I had to speak up to be heard over the wind in our ears, but there was no one to listen in so I could speak freely. And I did.
My fears that you had been groomed… You being fooled by a clever, manipulative man… The things you hinted in your diary that you had done…
They were bad enough. But it was my reaction to those things I really needed to share. My pain. My fury. My fantasies of grabbing my sharp dressmaking scissors, which had lovingly snipped squares of fabric to make patchwork cushions and throws for my family. But which I now wanted to use to chop James Harvey’s penis off.
I wanted to punch him, kick him, have him on the ground, bloodied and beaten and shown no mercy. I wanted to be as strong as a man, and reduce his handsome young face to jam for desecrating my daughter.
It took a lot to articulate these terrible thoughts. I didn’t want to admit them to myself, let alone anyone else. But my biggest terror was that, if I didn’t get them out of me and into the world, they would poison me into acting on them.
This was not your mother speaking, Beth. The woman who had nurtured you, taught you always to be kind. Who had kissed you better when you hurt yourself. This was not the woman your dad loved. It wasn’t someone I wanted either of you ever to meet.
Glenn was wonderful. He didn’t seem to mind my pain. The graphic scenarios. In fact, the only time he said anything was to probe a little deeper, to get me to open up further. I appreciated that.
As I spoke, my body quaked. Adrenaline rushing around even though I was lost only in memory. We went over my emotions again at discovering you were missing. My fears. How I had imagined your body broken and twisted by a car; the feelings that had swept through me when we had thought you were dead.
Glenn flushed at the impact of my words, clearly angry on my behalf. But he never once told me that he had had enough. He took verbal blow after blow.
I talked, too, of how hope faded for you as time went on.
‘I’m betraying Beth for even thinking these things, let alone speaking them out loud. If Jacob knew…’
‘Well, he won’t hear from me. No one will.’
‘Thank you.’ My words were spoken so quietly, and were snatched away instantly by the tumbling air. I wasn’t sure if Glenn heard. But other words were pushing forward, eager to be shared.
‘I used to hold her hand all the time. I didn’t want to let it go. Thought if I talked hard enough, prayed hard enough, begged her to come back, that it would happen. One night I held her hand and tried to will it to happen. You know? I mean, actually trembled with effort.’
I laughed at my stupidity and grabbed at my face. ‘My cheeks were wobbling like this. Imagine! But magic doesn’t work. There are no gods. There’s no great They that will step in and do good works if you only believe hard enough.’
The wind skirled around us, and my sigh joined it. ‘I’m so sorry for talking so much. If you don’t want to hear me going on, I understand…’
‘Hey.’ He held his hands up. Those big, strong, practical hands, so different from Jacob’s artistic, tapered fingers. ‘I’ve told you I don’t mind. I’m a good listener, remember.’
‘The best. Aren’t you cold?’ I added, suddenly noticing that once again Glenn was carrying his coat instead of wearing it.
‘Told you, I’m tough. Men don’t feel the cold like women do. Even when we do, it’s one more thing to fight against – I’m not going to get beaten by the cold, I’m going to win.’
‘You know that’s crazy, don’t you? Why fight the cold when you can put a coat on and be warmer?’
He made a dismissive gesture, slowing to squeeze my shoulder, but quickly let his hand drop away. We were friends, nothing more, and I was grateful to him.
‘How are you doing? You must miss Katie so much.’
His face was a careful blank. ‘I’m fine.’
‘Hey, you can talk to me, too, you know.’
Turning his back on me, he sighed. ‘I’d say you had no idea, but you’re one of the few people who knows exactly how I’m feeling – and you’re going through something even worse.’
His voice was so gentle that I barely heard him. I stepped closer.
‘Talk to me about it.’
When he turned, the pain etched on his face was a mirror of my own. ‘What a pair, eh? Both grieving for our lost daughters. Please God, they’ll come back to us soon.’
Beth, my heart went out to this father forced apart from his child. It was so unfair. I made up my mind there and then that if I could help him in any way to get back in touch with Katie, I would. I would track down his wife and persuade her to let this wonderful man see his family.
‘Fancy a drink?’ he said abruptly.