Sara Foster - Come Back to Me

There were a few other people in the restaurant, mostly couples or groups, and everyone was pretty quiet. However, there was one woman on her own with a shock of curly hair and kind eyes, wearing the baggy shirt and trousers combo that was almost a traveller’s uniform. As the van full of screeching lads went past, followed by a car with a waving Santa perched on top, she came over.

‘May I?’ She indicated the empty seat.

Amy recoiled at first, but then suddenly craved company. She glanced at the other people in the bar. They weren’t going anywhere. And this woman didn’t look like she’d follow her, or attack her once she’d befriended her. Besides, Amy decided, she didn’t want to be watching over her shoulder all the time. And she could always move on. Now she was free to run away whenever she chose.

She wished she could be someone else; someone completely different.

Maybe that was the answer.

Immediately a person floated into her mind. The sunniest person at school. The girl everyone loved, who didn’t seem to have a care in the world. Who floated through life, smiling. What was her name?

The woman was looking at her curiously, still waiting for an answer.

‘Sorry.’ Amy shook her head and gave a small smile. ‘Of course.’ She gestured to the seat. ‘Happy New Year.’

‘Same to you.’ The woman sat down. ‘Amazing, isn’t it – the Millennium’s arrived in most parts of the world now, and so far nothing terrible seems to have happened. So much time spent putting the fear of god into people, and it nearly always amounts to nothing.’ She leaned across the table and held out her hand to shake. ‘I’m Sophie.’

Slowly, Amy lifted her arm and tentatively grasped the other woman’s fingers.

‘Julia,’ she replied.

London

November 2009

Chloe walked through the front door and down the hallway, peering into the living room on her way to the kitchen. Everything was neat and tidy, and very still. It felt as though the house were holding its breath.

She was unnerved by the quiet. Hearing a small noise behind her, she swung around.

Alex was standing there. ‘We need to talk, Chlo.’

‘Has she gone?’ Her voice came out quiet and hoarse, and sinisterly calm.

‘Yes.’

‘For good?’

Alex paused a fraction too long. And Chloe’s frayed temper finally snapped.

‘Alex, you’d better start talking, and fast,’ she shouted at him.

Alex came towards her and tried to put his hand on her arm. ‘Chloe…’

She shook him off, walked a few paces, turned back and yelled, ‘Just tell me, for god’s sake – I can’t bear all… this.’ She threw her hands in the air. ‘If you’re having some kind of affair, just bloody well admit it.’

‘No! Chloe, look at me. Look at me, please! I’m not having an affair. I’m not having an affair …’ He strode across and grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her slightly, trying to force the truth into her. She looked in his eyes and saw nothing except an entreaty for her to believe him. She felt a little calmer.

‘So then, what’s going on?’ she asked.

‘We were together for a couple of years, a long time ago,’ Alex answered, not slackening his grip. She could feel the warmth of his breath on her face with each word he spoke. ‘We met at university, and then went travelling. And while we were in Australia she got attacked and raped and nearly killed. And after that, we fell apart.’

‘What?’ Chloe couldn’t take it in. She watched as Alex spoke; every muscle of his body seemed taut with tension.

‘When we came home, she disappeared. She said she was only going away for a little while, but she never came back. I never saw her again until Thursday night – that’s why I was so shocked. That’s why this is all so awful and weird.’

Chloe just looked at him, her mind a jumble of incoherent, half-formed thoughts. How could she have ever prepared for this?

In a few days it felt as if her whole world had changed.

‘Chloe?’ Alex’s voice was alarmed.

She stared at him blankly, then was jolted out of her stupor on seeing the tears in his eyes. They were still so close, his hands on her arms, his face inches from hers.

‘So you were a couple for how long?’

‘Two years.’

Two years, Chloe thought. She and Alex had been together only a little longer than that.

‘And you loved her?’

Alex sighed and closed his eyes for a moment as he said, ‘Yes, I did.’ She watched his face as he looked at her again, his intense dark eyes boring into hers. ‘But it was a long time ago now, Chloe. Way before you and I ever met.’

‘So you don’t love her any more?’

Why had she asked that, when she was so close to his face she couldn’t fail to gauge his reaction. He looked as though she had struck him.

There wasn’t much of a pause before he tried to speak, but it was enough. She let out a cry and pushed him away, running out of the kitchen, down the hallway and up the stairs. She could hear him chasing her.

‘No, Chloe, no, you’ve got it wrong. Don’t do this, please…’

She swung around at the top of the stairs as he took them two at a time to try to reach her. ‘ Me do this?’ she screamed. She turned on her heel before he could touch her and strode into the bedroom, pulling open the closet and beginning to throw random items of clothing onto the bed.

‘Chloe,’ Alex cried as he came into the room. ‘What are you doing? Come on, we need to keep talking about this.’

‘I can’t, Alex,’ she said, as tears began to stream down her face. ‘I just need some space.’

Alex came around the bed fast, and tried to pull her to him. He caught her arm but she wrenched herself away, her free hand groping along the dresser and grabbing things, hurling them onto the bed.

‘Don’t go, Chloe,’ he said, his voice low and husky with emotion. ‘Please. This thing happened so long ago – and I’m so sorry you’ve been caught up in it like this. But it doesn’t change you and me at all. I love you, Chloe. Don’t go.’ He stood there watching her sadly, his eyes moist.

‘Alex, I think the only way I can cope with this is if I know that it’s over, that you’re never going to see her again. Can you do that?’

Alex shook his head. ‘Chloe, please try to understand. I don’t want a relationship with her, of course I don’t – I’m not in love with her like that any more, I’m in love with you . But there’s a history, and a long time ago I made promises, to her and to myself -’

‘You made promises?’ Chloe interrupted, her voice rising again. ‘What about the promises you made to me, Alex?’

‘Chloe -’

She marched out of the bedroom and along the landing, grabbing a suitcase from a cupboard there. She carried it back to the room and began to throw things into it, not making any attempt to pack them properly.

Alex watched her for a minute, then came forward, and said, ‘Chloe, stop.’

She paused and looked at him. His face was wretched.

‘You don’t have to go. I’ll go, until we’ve both calmed down enough to talk,’ he said, gently taking her things out of the case and laying them on the bed.

She watched him, but suddenly felt too tired to argue. She didn’t have a clue where she would have gone anyway.

‘I’ll wait downstairs,’ she said, and walked out.

She stood by the table in the kitchen for ten minutes, hardly aware of her surroundings. She heard a noise in the hallway and mechanically walked out to look.

Alex was there with a suitcase next to him. He picked up a bag and turned back to her.