Paula Hawkins - The Girl on the Train

He’s knocked off early, he says, and invites me to have a drink with him. I say no, and then I change my mind.

“I owe you an apology,” I say, when he—Andy, as it turns out—brings me my gin and tonic, “for the way I behaved on the train. Last time, I mean. I was having a bad day.”

“S’all right,” Andy says. His smile is slow and lazy, I don’t think this is his first pint. We’re sitting opposite each other in the beer garden at the back of the pub; it feels safer here than on the street side. Perhaps it’s the safe feeling that emboldens me. I take my chance.

“I wanted to ask you about what happened,” I say. “The night that I met you. The night that Meg—The night that woman disappeared.”

“Oh. Right. Why? What d’you mean?”

I take a deep breath. I can feel my face reddening. No matter how many times you have to admit this, it’s always embarrassing, it always makes you cringe. “I was very drunk and I don’t remember. There are some things I need to sort out. I just want to know if you saw anything, if you saw me talking to anyone else, anything like that . . .” I’m staring down at the table, I can’t meet his eye.

He nudges my foot with his. “It’s all right, you didn’t do anything bad.” I look up and he’s smiling. “I was pissed, too. We had a bit of a chat on the train, I can’t remember what about. Then we both got off here, at Witney, and you were a bit unsteady on your feet. You slipped on the steps. You remember? I helped you up and you were all embarrassed, blushing like you are now.” He laughs. “We walked out together, and I asked you if you wanted to go to the pub. But you said you had to go and meet your husband.”

“That’s it?”

“No. Do you really not remember? It was a while later—I don’t know, half an hour, maybe? I’d been to the Crown, but a mate rang and said he was drinking in a bar over on the other side of the railway track, so I was heading down to the underpass. You’d fallen over. You were in a bit of a mess then. You’d cut yourself. I was a bit worried, I said I’d see you home if you wanted, but you wouldn’t hear of it. You were . . . well, you were very upset. I think there’d been a row with your bloke. He was heading off down the street, and I said I’d go after him if you wanted me to, but you said not to. He drove off somewhere after that. He was . . . er . . . he was with someone.”

“A woman?”

He nods, ducks his head a bit. “Yeah, they got into a car together. I assumed that was what the argument was about.”

“And then?”

“Then you walked off. You seemed a little . . . confused or something, and you walked off. You kept saying you didn’t need any help. As I said, I was a bit wasted myself, so I just left it. I went down through the underpass and met my mate in the pub. That was it.”

Climbing the stairs to the apartment, I feel sure that I can see shadows above me, hear footsteps ahead. Someone waiting on the landing above. There’s no one there, of course, and the flat is empty, too: it feels untouched, it smells empty, but that doesn’t stop me checking every room—under my bed and under Cathy’s, in the wardrobes and the closet in the kitchen that couldn’t conceal a child.

Finally, after about three tours of the flat, I can stop. I go upstairs and sit on the bed and think about the conversation I had with Andy, the fact that it tallies with what I remember. There is no great revelation: Tom and I argued in the street, I slipped and hurt myself, he stormed off and got into his car with Anna. Later he came back looking for me, but I’d already gone. I got into a taxi, I assume, or back onto the train.

I sit on my bed looking out of the window and wonder why I don’t feel better. Perhaps it’s simply because I still don’t have any answers. Perhaps it’s because, although what I remember tallies with what other people remember, something still feels off. Then it strikes me: Anna. It’s not just that Tom never mentioned going anywhere in the car with her, it’s the fact that when I saw her, walking away, getting into the car, she wasn’t carrying the baby. Where was Evie while all this was going on?

SATURDAY, AUGUST 17, 2013

EVENING

I need to speak to Tom, to get things straight in my head, because the more I go over it, the less sense it makes, and I can’t stop going over it. I’m worried, in any case, because it’s two days since I left him that note and he hasn’t got back to me. He didn’t answer his phone last night, he’s not been answering it all day. Something’s not right, and I can’t shake the feeling that it has to do with Anna.

I know that he’ll want to talk to me, too, after he hears about what happened with Scott. I know that he’ll want to help. I can’t stop thinking about the way he was that day in the car, about how things felt between us. So I pick up the phone and dial his number, butterflies in my stomach, just the way it always used to be, the anticipation of hearing his voice as acute now as it was years ago.

“Yeah?”

“Tom, it’s me.”

“Yes.”

Anna must be there with him, he doesn’t want to say my name. I wait for a moment, to give him time to move to another room, to get away from her. I hear him sigh. “What is it?”

“Um, I wanted to talk to you . . . As I said in my note, I—”

“What?” He sounds irritated.

“I left you a note a couple of days ago. I thought we should talk—”

“I didn’t get a note.” Another, heavier sigh. “Fuck’s sake. That’s why she’s pissed off with me.” Anna must have taken it, she didn’t give it to him. “What do you need?”

I want to hang up, dial again, start over. Tell him how good it was to see him on Monday, when we went to the woods.

“I just wanted to ask you something.”

“What?” he snaps. He sounds really annoyed.

“Is everything OK?”

“What do you want, Rachel?” It’s gone, all the tenderness that was there a week ago. I curse myself for leaving that note, I’ve obviously got him into trouble at home.

“I wanted to ask you about that night—the night Megan Hipwell went missing.”

“Oh, Jesus. We’ve talked about this—you can’t have forgotten already.”

“I just—”

“You were drunk,” he says, his voice loud, harsh. “I told you to go home. You wouldn’t listen. You wandered off. I drove around looking for you, but I couldn’t find you.”

“Where was Anna?”

“She was at home.”

“With the baby?”

“With Evie, yes.”

“She wasn’t in the car with you?”

“No.”

“But—”

“Oh for God’s sake. She was supposed to be going out, I was going to babysit. Then you came along, so she came and cancelled her plans. And I wasted yet more hours of my life running around after you.”

I wish I hadn’t called. To have my hopes raised and dashed again, it’s like cold steel twisting in my gut.

“OK,” I say. “It’s just, I remember it differently . . . Tom, when you saw me, was I hurt? Was I . . . Did I have a cut on my head?”

Another heavy sigh. “I’m surprised you remember anything at all, Rachel. You were blind drunk. Filthy, stinking drunk. Staggering all over the place.” My throat starts to close up, hearing him say these words. I’ve heard him say these sorts of things before, in the bad old days, the very worst days, when he was tired of me, sick of me, disgusted by me. Wearily, he goes on. “You’d fallen over in the street, you were crying, you were a total mess. Why is this important?” I can’t find the words right away, I take too long to answer. He goes on: “Look, I have to go. Don’t call anymore, please. We’ve been through this. How many times do I have to ask you? Don’t call, don’t leave notes, don’t come here. It upsets Anna. All right?”