“Oh yeah,” Laura said as the truth dawned on her. That was why she looked familiar; she looked a bit like him. Something around the eyes, the set of the mouth, the way she tilted her chin up a little when she spoke. “Oh God. I didn’t think about that. So she’s his aunt?”
“That’s right,” Irene said, her eyebrows knitting together. “I take it you heard about what happened to Daniel, then?” she asked, and Laura nodded.
“Yeah. Yeah, you could say that.”
“It’s been all over the news, hasn’t it, and they haven’t caught the people who did it.”
“Early days, I suppose,” Laura said, her gaze slipping away from Irene’s, gratefully casting her eye over the list that the woman had given her, frowning as she did. “Is this your list? Did she write this?”
Irene nodded. “Oh, yes, she didn’t have the patience to wait for me to think of the things I needed, she just went into the kitchen and looked in my cupboards and deduced.”
Laura rolled her eyes. “Muesli? You don’t like muesli, you like crunchy nut cornflakes.”
“I did tell her that,” Irene said, “but she wasn’t having it.”
“Wild rice? What the actual . . . Jesus Christ.” Laura ripped up the list, tossing the pieces into the air like confetti. “What you should do, yeah, when you think of something you need, is make a note on your phone—”
“Oh, I can’t type on those things, it’s all too small and I can’t see what’s going on even with my glasses, and half the time the damn thing changes your words without you asking, so you end up with gibberish—”
“No, no,” Laura protested, “you don’t have to type anything. What I do, see, is record stuff. I’ve got a terrible memory so as soon as I think of something I need to do or buy or whatever, I just use the voice recorder so you don’t need to type, you just need to say stuff—”
Irene shook her head. “Oh, no, I don’t think so. I’ve no idea how that works. I’m not even sure I have one of those on my phone.”
“Course you do.” Laura picked up Irene’s handset and swiped the screen. She located the voice recorder app and clicked on it. “Crunchy nut cornflakes,” she enunciated, loudly. “Not sodding muesli.” She winked at Irene. “Then, see here, you can play it back.” Crunchy nut cornflakes, not sodding muesli, the phone intoned.
“Oh, that does look easy,” Irene laughed. “Show me again.”
* * *
After they’d put together a new list, Irene told Laura to take a twenty-pound note from her purse to cover the shopping. Irene paid her five pounds per time to fetch her groceries, which was pretty generous since it generally took her all of fifteen minutes, but this time Laura helped herself to two twenties anyway. She spent fourteen pounds and pocketed the rest, losing the receipt on the way home.
While she unpacked the groceries, she filled Irene in on what had been going on—how she’d lost her key and had to break into her flat, how she’d hurt her arm and then lost her job on top of that. She left out the part about Daniel. Irene didn’t want to hear about that, didn’t want to hear about the fucking and the argument and the getting arrested.
“I’m really sorry I didn’t get in touch earlier,” Laura told her, once she’d finished putting everything away, once she’d made them both a cup of tea and laid some chocolate biscuits out on a plate. “I’ve just been all in a spin, you know?” Irene was sitting in her favorite chair and Laura was leaning up against the radiator under the window, her legs stuck out in front of her. “I didn’t mean to let you down.”
“Oh, Laura.” Irene shook her head. “You didn’t let me down, I was just worried about you. If something like that happens again, you must let me know. I might be able to help you.”
Laura thought of the money she’d taken and hated herself. She should give it back. She should slip it back into Irene’s purse, and then just ask her, straight out, the way a normal person would, for a loan. For help, just like Irene said. It was too late now, though, wasn’t it? Irene’s bag was right there next to her chair—she couldn’t put the money back now; there was no way she could do it without Irene noticing. And anyway, if ever there was a time to ask for help it had just passed, a few seconds back, when Irene offered it. She stayed for a little while longer, time for another cup of tea, a couple more biscuits, but she’d barely the appetite for it; her dishonesty curdled within her, souring everything.