Anywhere for You by Abbie Greaves

Author:Abbie Greaves
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: William Morrow
Published: 2021-04-06T00:00:00+00:00

Mary stumbled outside, her head spinning. She had seen Jim that morning. He had looked knackered but mumbled something about not sleeping well and then kissed her, as usual, before heading off to work. Or so she had thought.

He hasn’t been in the office all week. How was that possible? For the last four evenings Jim had arrived home by 7 p.m. at the latest. Mary had been so overwhelmed with commissions in the last few months that she hadn’t the time to fetch Jim from the station at the end of the day. She missed that routine, sure, but they were still spending time together and that was what mattered, right? All week they had eaten supper together, then curled up on the sofa to watch TV. Mary always asked after his day at work. Always. And while it may have been a routine question, she never got anything other than the routine answer from Jim, either. Fine—the assumption being that he had spent his days in the clinic, not wherever he was hiding out now.

In the Tube station she jogged onto the first train she saw, listing every possible explanation for a situation that seemed to defy all reason: he hadn’t wanted to tell her he was sick; maybe something had come up with his parents and he hadn’t wanted to worry her. But for a whole week? Unless it was an affair . . . but Jim wasn’t the type. Not the Jim she knew and loved. Mary pressed her head into the dimpled handrail ahead, as if she could press some more convincing conclusion out of it. It took ten minutes for her to realize she had been traveling in the wrong direction.

She had half expected Jim to be sitting at the kitchen table when she walked in, his bag slung on the sofa and an explanation on his lips, but as soon as she got through the door, Mary knew the house was empty. The detritus from preparing the picnic was still on the chopping board, a gift for the christening they were due to attend tomorrow still perched on the hallway table. What if he wasn’t back for it? Mary thought her legs would give way.

Before she lost her resolve, she sent him a text: Hope you’re having a good day at work x. Her thumb grew sore from checking to see if it had been read.

Nothing.

Should she even be at home? If something bad had happened, then she should be out looking. But what could have happened to Jim, Mary wondered, that was so bad on the previous four days, yet meant he could still find his way back to the flat, come evening, leaving Mary none the wiser that anything was wrong? He was skiving work all day, then returning home for his supper—why? A crisis of conscience? A pang of longing for his girlfriend of four years? It didn’t add up.

In the absence of anything better to do, Mary put the television on for some background noise.

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