We’d turned out the light and were settling into sleep when, into the darkness Quin suddenly said, in a squeaky voice, ‘Our life is pretty outdoorsy!’ Then in his own voice, ‘Pair of spanners.’
38
I woke early, my head full of last night. Playing on my mind was the tender way Luke had called her ‘Kal’。 Even more painful was the glimpse Kallie had given into their shared life – thinking about them getting stoned and dancing on the deck cut shards of envy into my gut.
It sounded so sexy. I could actually feel it, Luke sliding his arms around Kallie’s waist, pulling her to him, against his hips. Kallie twirling away as he watched admiringly, then spinning back, landing hard against his body, discovering how much he wanted her.
Lucky.
Fucking.
Kallie.
This morning, my clean life of recovery seemed brain-numbingly boring – a very dangerous train of thought. I wanted to be the girl I’d been in my twenties, before my addiction had caught up with me, when there had been nights of wildness and adventure and no thought of tomorrow.
I’d have to ring Brigit. She’d detail how tragic and desperate I’d actually been.
It was only 7.30 a.m. but as I was awake, it seemed like a good idea to go to work. I was worried about Trassa. After yesterday’s revelation, she was bound to be extremely vulnerable.
Often, during a person’s time in the Cloisters, a trauma that had been stashed for perhaps decades broke the surface. Ultimately, casting the cold light of day on it was a good thing, but in the short term, Trassa would need a lot of minding.
All the counsellors were trained in crisis care and the nursing staff would have kept a watchful eye on her during the night, but she was ultimately my responsibility.
I was in two minds about waking Quin but he surfaced just as I was leaving.
‘Come back to bed.’ He pulled me against the warmth of his chest.
‘No, honey. See you tomorrow night.’
‘Not tonight?’
‘Laundry,’ I said.
‘Bring it here,’ he insisted. ‘I’ll do it.’
Hah! That was a laugh. His cleaner Irini would end up with the job.
‘I also need to go to Aldi,’ I said. And hopefully talk to Brigit, but I kept that to myself.
‘Life hack,’ he mumbled. ‘Do your big shop Monday nights at twenty to nine in Dundrum. Best time of the week. Nobody else there to annoy you.’
But today was Wednesday and there was nothing in my house. ‘Tomorrow night, you, Taryn and Timothy are coming to me for Transylvanian food. Remember?’ I kissed him, then ran down the stairs and slipped out into the day.
As I was getting into my car, my phone vibrated – a WhatsApp from Kallie. Ohmigod, Rachel, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!
In a mad rush of sympathy, I decided to ring her – she was clearly awake.
‘Rachel?’ She said, ‘You hate me, right?’
‘No.’ Then I added, ‘You big eejit. I mean that affectionately. An Irish thing, Luke can explain it.’
‘I was anxious,’ she said. ‘I drank too much wine too quickly. Those questions I asked you and Quin, about your drugging, I am truly embarrassed. I am so sorry.’
‘It’s really okay.’
‘My reasons …？ So Luke loves me, I know that. But in some ways – okay, lots of ways – he’s unavailable. You know that, right? So when I found out he’d once been married, I … Wow, it was a big shock. She must have been one amazing lady.’
‘Oh-kay.’
‘I want to figure him out. I thought you were one of the clues.’
Should I tell her that she’d probably never figure him out? Let’s face it, once upon a time he’d been absolutely mad about me and look at how that had turned out.
Somebody had bought ‘my’ Chanel bag! At first I couldn’t believe it. I clicked and scrolled, up and down, up and down, changing the search parameters and starting all over again. When the truth dawned, I was almost as unsettled as if my actual handbag had been stolen. For a few uncomfortable seconds, I felt genuinely bereft. Now what would I obsess about?
However, going by past behaviour, finding something new to fixate on shouldn’t prove difficult. As I cycled swiftly through emotions, I landed on anticipation, wondering what kind of surprising lunacy would snap me up. I hoped it would be another unattainable bag – they provided so much distraction in exchange for very little trouble. Not like, say, wheelbarrows, which were just-about-affordable and very unwieldy. （I’d bought one last summer after thirteen blurry days of head-racing obsessing. It was delivered to work, proved too big to fit in my car and Murdo had to borrow a friend’s van to get it to my house. And after all that drama it had only been used three times.）