Jo returned her gaze to her drink while her ears strained for the sound of approaching footsteps or the jangle of keys in the lock. All she could hear was the background music that she had already turned down until the three tenors had been reduced to the faintest warble.
Draining her glass, Jo stood up and switched off the music before heading back into the kitchen. She couldn’t drink any more sparkling water, so she washed and dried her glass then returned it to the dining table where she had laid two place settings. The crystal candelabra had sparkled an hour ago but the candles had burned themselves out and the romantic ambience she had been trying to create had lost its appeal, as had the pie, which was slowly drying in the oven. She wasn’t sure she could face food now; her stomach was knotted up with nerves. Or was it anger? She wasn’t sure how to feel and wouldn’t know until David arrived home safely and explained why he couldn’t have warned her he was running late.
During her absence from the living room, the minute hand of the clock had sneaked past the hour but there was nothing Jo could do except resume her vigil. Each time she blinked, she could see the ghostly impression of the starburst burnt on to the back of her eyelids.
For the next hour and a half Jo remained in the living room. If this was David’s idea of punishing her he couldn’t have planned it better. Jo hid her insecurities well but they were there and they tormented her now. Only a single lamp glowed in her self-imposed prison, its light too weak to reach the shadows into which she had crawled and was determined to remain until her husband appeared. Other than the torturously slow progress of the hands around the clock, the only other movement in the room came from the rhythmic strum of Jo’s fingers on the armchair. Occasionally the glare of headlights swept across the window blinds, causing the strumming to halt and Jo’s heartbeat to quicken. But without fail the car would continue on its journey, taking with it the hope that a taxi was about to pull up outside and put her out of her misery.
When her gaze could be drawn away from the clock, Jo stared at the two phones she had placed in her lap: one her mobile, the other the house phone. She was using her mobile to dial David’s number at regular intervals, listening only long enough for the automated announcement to kick in advising her to leave a message. She didn’t. She hung up each and every time before waiting precisely ten minutes until she allowed herself to repeat the process.
Jo hadn’t yet decided what she would use the landline for. She wanted to phone someone but didn’t know whom. She had gone through her address book on her mobile but dismissed every one. Right now there was only one person’s voice she wanted to hear and no one else would do, not family or friends and, God forbid, not the emergency services. If there was the possibility that something awful had happened to David then, she reasoned, it wasn’t yet real and it wouldn’t be real until she told someone. She and David lived an unremarkable life; nothing bad had ever happened to them and as long as she didn’t let her imagination run wild, it wasn’t happening now. Telling someone would be like taking a pin and bursting the protective bubble she was desperately constructing around herself.
And then the phone rang.
Her mobile shone through the darkness and the warm rush coursing through her body took Jo’s breath away. She squeezed her eyes shut but it was too late. She had seen the caller ID and the spark of excitement was cruelly extinguished.
Jo’s tone was flat as she answered the late night call from one of her oldest friends. ‘Hi, Heather.’
‘Sorry, I’ve only just seen your missed call and thought it must be important for you to call so late. What’s up?’
‘What missed call?’ she asked but was already working it out for herself. ‘Oh, sorry, I must have pressed a button by mistake when I was going through my address book.’ Jo’s mouth was dry as she spoke, a stark contrast to the tears stinging her eyes.
‘I didn’t wake you up, did I?’
‘No, I’m waiting up for David.’
‘Out on the town, is he?’
‘He’s been in Leeds all day,’ Jo replied, leaving a pause to summon up the courage to say more but Heather was already talking.
‘I’ve just got back from London. I was only away one night but Max acted like I’d been gone a month,’ Heather said of her six-year-old son. ‘He’s been clinging on to me for the last couple of hours so this is the first chance I’ve had for some peace and quiet. I’m sure Oliver’s been winding him up just to put pressure on me to travel less. It wouldn’t cross his mind that my earnings from these sales trips mean I don’t have to squeeze him for every penny he’s got.’
As Heather launched into complaints about her ex-husband, Jo’s eyes returned to the clock. The longest hand was creeping towards ten past eleven – the next ten-minute marker for phoning David. ‘I’d better go,’ she said, interrupting Heather mid-flow.
‘Is everything all right?’
There was a pause. In the fifteen years they had known each other, she and Heather had taken it in turns to be the shoulder to cry on. It was only in the last year, while Heather was going through a bitter divorce, that Jo had found it impossible to confide in her friend. She hadn’t been able to share her worries about the direction of her own marriage because in comparison, her troubles had been trivial. They didn’t seem trivial any more. ‘I don’t know where he is, Heather.’
‘David?’
Jo told her what time David was supposed to have arrived home and left her friend to draw her own conclusions.
‘He’s probably met up with Steve and gone for a drink,’ Heather said. ‘I know what you’re like, Jo. Stop thinking the worst!’
Jo shook her head. If David had gone out with his brother he would have called her from Steve’s phone. Heather wasn’t the only one who knew how much of a worrier she was. ‘I’m sure you’re right, but can I go now? He might be trying to phone as we speak.’
Heather wasn’t fooled by Jo’s quick acceptance but she didn’t think for a minute that her friend’s concerns were warranted. Jo, on the other hand, wouldn’t rest until she heard David’s voice and she cut off the call to Heather before she had even finished saying goodbye. She made the call to David with only seconds to spare.
The automated voice grated on her nerves and Jo cut that call short too. Leaning forward in her chair, she closed her eyes and put her hands over her face. Her bump was substantial enough to make her attempt to curl into a ball uncomfortable. She wished she could hold her baby. She wished she could fast forward four months to the moment David could share in the miracle growing inside her, to a time when they could heal the rift between them, but for now her arms were empty and the only thing she could feel was the pressure on her bladder. She hadn’t dared go to the toilet in case David turned up because she wanted to be there when he came through the door as she knew he would; he had to. Heather’s theory about his whereabouts wasn’t the only one Jo had explored. There were a myriad other explanations which could have delayed him, the majority of which involved nothing more than mild inconvenience and Jo had practised her response to each of them.
He could have lost his wallet and might have decided to walk the eight miles home from the city centre. That would take a good few hours, in which case he should be walking up to the door right about now …
The travel information might be wrong. The train could have broken down or been delayed by a fallen tree, in which case he would be arriving home right about now …
He could have met an old friend and gone for a quick drink, in which case he would be arriving home … right about now …
Or he could have had enough of his interfering wife who thought she knew best. He could have tired of all those