Helen Callaghan - Dear Amy

He would.

But would you have him, under such terms?

Perhaps it’s not how you think. Perhaps he’s lying on someone’s sofa right now, mourning your loss, his own foolishness. Perhaps he is missing you. If you don’t yield a little, check in with him, how would you ever know?

Lying on someone’s sofa? In their bed more like. You never did trust him. And with good reason, in the end.

I sighed so wearily that the woman on the escalator ahead of me turned to stare at me as I blinked back tears.

Shopping for things like make-up and perfume has always been tough going for me. I can’t stand a hard sell. So I had to drift lightly between counters, just taking a little squirt out of the tester bottles, then moving off quickly before I got hammered with a strident, ‘Can I help you?’ from one of the breezy girls behind the counters. Obviously they can’t help me. If I’d made my mind up, I wouldn’t have to test their wares, would I?

I was just sniffing something in an outrageously elaborate glass bottle when a man caught my eye. An anomalous enough creature to see in a perfume department, but I’d noticed him because he’d been looking at me keenly when I’d glanced up, then immediately looked away.

Hmm. So much for the art of flirting, I thought, rounding the counter and heading off for the next one, where I tested something that smelled like cat’s urine and violets. Urgh. Definitely not for me.

Or, more embarrassingly, perhaps he’d seen me on the television and wanted to strike up a conversation about it. I was constantly being asked about this ‘new evidence’ that had turned up in the column, and sometimes no amount of declaring that the police had sworn me to secrecy was enough to deter people.

I backtracked as I saw the girl behind the counter put down something in preparation for pouncing on me. I stepped backward and turned, and I saw that the man who’d been staring at me before hesitated, not knowing which way I was going.

He was dressed in a suit and long coat, and he had dark hair and a smooth face. He was following me.

I was breathless, light-headed with fear, and I paused near the counter, clutching the edge, perversely wishing the girl serving would engage with me now so I could whisper to her to call the police.

I stole a glance at him in one of the multitudinous mirrored surfaces on the counter.

It’s not the same man.

I couldn’t tell you exactly how I realized this, but I did. The shape of his face, his build, the way he held himself – it wasn’t the man who’d parked outside my house. I would have sworn on my life.

I started to breathe again.

It struck me then that he didn’t want to approach me, just to follow me. He must have been a store detective, who thought I was a shoplifter. I wanted to laugh suddenly with embarrassment and relief. On the other hand I felt strangely guilty – I don’t know why. I suspect there is a secret shoplifter in me who reacts the same way when confronted by authority. I pulled my bag up on my shoulder as the colour rose in my cheeks.

The cool night air was soft after the air conditioned heat of the shop. I paused outside the door, at something of a loss.

I hadn’t had a very good week so far, and this evening was proving no exception.

I would treat myself, I thought, heading off down Market Street. I would go into Heffers and buy myself a new novel. I would choose one packed with incident, erudition and sex, in a shiny dust jacket. It would be pleasantly heavy in my bag as I walked back to my car, and when I got home I would cuddle up on the sofa with it, with a packet of biscuits and a bottle of wine, and read it right through. It would be a sensual pleasure. The anticipation of it was already erasing my embarrassment.

I walked on past the brightly lit shop fronts, the coyly illuminated pubs and cafes, the stony grandeur of the colleges – Emmanuel, Pembroke, Peterhouse, St Catherine’s, Corpus, King’s, with gargoyles growling at me from their cornices, each splendidly overdressed in fluted railings and manicured lawns. I love this place – opulent, medieval and alien as it is, it nevertheless stretches out its arms and includes me. It was here that I first learned to breathe freely, to express my thoughts with confidence. Cambridge is my alma mater in truth, and I do tend to cling to her skirts, despite Eddy’s disgust. ‘It’s just a bloody school,’ he would say, as gown-clad academics hurried off to some Formal Hall at Christ’s and confused foreign students practically cycled under his front wheels on Downing Street and King’s Parade, only their lack of speed saving them. ‘A school with pretensions.’

‘Yes and no. It’s a world within the world.’

He would merely sigh impatiently. ‘You should try working in it. Your romantic memories of it would last two minutes.’

I didn’t reply. Mother Cecilia had been so happy when I’d told her I’d got in. The memory still made me smile.

It’s ironic that Eddy should be so cynical, as he is the one that never left. He is still a senior member of his college and we would turn up for Formal Halls together in their vast vaulted dining hall about three times a year. He was desperately angling to be elected a Fellow, though the disaster with Ara wasn’t likely to help his chances.

I spent an hour browsing through the bookshop, poring over covers full of blurb, hearing the books creak as I opened them, smelling fresh ink and cut paper. I forgot about my embarrassment with the store detective. It had been something and nothing, one of the momentary weirdnesses that life is full of.

When the staff at Heffers eventually threw me out at closing time, I had a bulky novel nestled in my bag and a small smile on my face. On the other side of the tiny cobbled street was Trinity College, dark but for the homely glow of the entrance. Porters moved within, sporting their trademark bowler hats, nodding acknowledgement at a lone student hurrying through the gateway into the inner quad. I looked up into the night sky. A few stars poked spikily out of the clear, sharp air. What a bizarre night. I felt disorientated, but it was not unpleasant. In fact, I actually felt carefree… as though a great weight had lifted from my shoulders. When I got back to the underground car park beneath the Grand Arcade I practically bounded down the steps.

My car was on the second sub level of the multi-storeyed edifice, and as I approached it I became dishearteningly aware that it had been a stupid place to park. The light was dim, the place was utterly deserted – the other shoppers had all gone home – and I was a long way from help or hope of it.

I gripped my car keys firmly and marched up to the Audi, attempting to look less intimidated than I felt. What a stupid, stupid, prizewinningly stupid place to park…

Then I was angry. Why couldn’t I park where I liked? I’d paid, hadn’t I? Was I expected to be under some kind of curfew after dusk, just because I was female?

I was at the car, and quickly opened it, after having a peep into the back seat. There was no one lurking in there. Once in the car, with the reassuring smell of upholstery and air freshener, I felt secure. I’d just have to remember to be more careful next time. I gunned the engine, its roaring alarmingly loud in the echoing concrete surroundings. Time to go home.

I glanced in the rear-view mirror.

The man from the department store was crossing the deserted concrete towards me. I craned around to stare at him.

He saw me looking and smiled at me, a big toothy grin, then waved a friendly hand, as though asking me to wait. His other hand was in his pocket, and his shadow, grotesquely elongated, was approaching the back of my car.

He wanted to tell me something.