‘Simon’s not here,’ I told Steven when he asked to speak to him. ‘Isn’t he with you?’ I’d presumed he’d taken his work clothes with him in a backpack and gone straight to the office after his run like he often did.
‘No, he’s bloody not,’ Steven snapped. He could be a real grumpy sod when he wanted to be. ‘I’ve been trying to convince the client I’ve been stalling for half an hour that even though we’re a small company, we’re just as professional as the majors. How can he take me seriously when half of us can’t even turn up for a hotel breakfast meeting on time?’
‘He’s probably lost track of the time. You know what he’s like sometimes.’
‘When you see him, tell him to get his arse down to the Hilton quickly before he screws this up.’
‘I will, but if you see him first, could you ask him to call me, please?’
Steven muttered something unintelligible and hung up without saying goodbye. I was glad I wouldn’t be in Simon’s shoes when he did turn up.
11.30 a.m.
Seventeen ironed work and school shirts and two cups of coffee passed by before I realised Simon hadn’t called me back.
I wondered if Steven and I were mistaken, and that he hadn’t been for a run but actually had a meeting of his own to go to. But when I popped my head around the garage door, his Volvo was still parked there. Back in the living room, his house keys sat on the record player lid; above them, a montage of photos from our tenth-wedding-anniversary party hung from the wall.
As another hour went by, a niggling doubt began to irritate me. For the first time in almost twenty years, I couldn’t feel Simon’s presence around me. No matter where he was or how far we were apart, I always felt his presence.
I shook my head to make the doubts disappear and scolded myself for being daft. Too much coffee, Kitty, I told myself, and vowed decaf was the way forward. I put the coffee jar back in the cupboard and sighed at the mountain of washing-up waiting for me.
1.00 p.m.
Three and a half hours after Steven’s phone call and I felt jittery.
I’d called the office, and when Steven admitted he still hadn’t heard anything, I began to panic. Before long, I’d convinced myself Simon had been out for a run and had been hit by a car. That he’d been carelessly tossed to the side of a road by a hunk of metal and a driver without a conscience.
I strapped Emily into the stroller she was too old and too big for, as it was quicker than walking with her, attached the lead to Oscar’s collar and dashed off to find my husband. I asked in the newsagent’s if Simon had popped in earlier, but he hadn’t. Neither had our neighbours, nor Mrs Jenkins from behind her twitching net curtains.
As we walked the route Simon normally ran, I made a game of it, explaining to Emily we were hunting for snaggle-waggles – the mythical bedtime creatures he’d created to ease them to sleep. I told her they loved to hide in wet muddy ditches, so we’d have to look carefully in each one.
We covered a mile and a half and found nothing before we began walking towards Simon’s office. Steven was no longer angry with Simon, which bothered me further. It meant he was worried about him. He tried to reassure me Simon was probably okay, and suggested that maybe he was on a site visit. But when we checked his diary, his day was clear of all appointments.
‘He’ll come home tonight pissed as a fart after being at the pub all afternoon, and we’ll all be laughing about this later,’ added Steven. But with no definitive proof as to where he was, neither of us was really convinced.
On our way home, Emily and I took the dirt track past Harpole Woods, where Simon sometimes ran. I hid from Emily how worried I was, but when she dropped Flopsy, a now-threadbare toy bunny he’d bought her, onto the path, I’m ashamed to admit I lost my temper and shouted at her for being careless. Her face scrunched up and she bawled, refusing to accept my apology until I carried her home.
Even Oscar had grown sick of being walked, and dragged his heels behind us. I must have been a strange sight: a perspiring mother with a screaming child in one arm, dragging a knackered dog and a stroller behind me, all the time searching for snaggle-waggles and my husband’s dead body.
5.50 p.m.
Six o’clock, I told myself. All will be okay at six o’clock because that’s when he always comes home.
It was Simon’s favourite time of the day, when he could help bathe the kids, put them to bed and read them stories about Mr Tickle and Mr Bump. They were too young to sense the distance and sadness that remained between Simon and me. I’d come to terms with the fact things might never get back to how they’d been, no matter what we did or said. Instead, we were adjusting to a new kind of normal in the best way we could.
I’d picked up James and Robbie from school earlier. As I threw some breaded fish under the grill and set the table for dinner, James tried to explain something about his friend Nicky and a Lego car, but I wasn’t listening. I was too on edge. Every couple of minutes, my eyes made their way towards the clock on the wall. When six o’clock came and went, I could have cried. I left my food untouched and stared out of the window, into the garden.
In those gorgeous summer months, we often finished the day on the patio, poured ourselves a couple of glasses of red wine and tried to enjoy the life we’d made for ourselves. We’d talk about the funny things the children had said, how his architectural business was coming on, and how one day we’d have enough money to buy an Italian villa and live half our year here and half over there. In fact, we’d talk about anything except for what had happened that day over a year ago which had left our relationship so exposed.
I hurried the children through their bedtime routines and explained that Daddy was sorry he couldn’t be there but he’d gone away for work and wouldn’t be home till late.
‘Without his wallet?’ asked James as I tucked him in.
I paused.
‘Daddy’s wallet is on the sideboard. I saw it,’ he continued.
I tried to think of a reason why he wouldn’t need it. There wasn’t one. ‘Yes, silly Daddy forgot it.’
‘Silly Daddy,’ he tutted, before wrapping himself in his sheets.
I dashed downstairs to check if he was right and realised I must have passed it countless times throughout the day. It was always the one thing Simon took before leaving the house, even when going out for a jog.
And it was in that moment I knew for sure something was wrong. Really, really wrong.
I called his friends to see if he’d gone to one of their houses. I was sure the click of each receiver was followed by me being the subject of their pity once more, even if it always came from a place of kindness. I flicked through the phone book for the numbers of local hospitals. I called all twelve of them, asking if he’d been taken in. It pained me to think he could have been lying in a hospital bed all day without anyone even knowing who he was.