‘I heard you on the radio this morning,’ I say. ‘I’m so sorry, I can’t imagine what you must be going through.’ I pause. ‘I’m happy to tell you anything you want to know. I really don’t know what else I can tell you, though. Except what I told the police.’
At the mention of the police, his face contorts.
‘I don’t trust them,’ he says. ‘I’ve been on at them for two weeks. I told them it’s not right, that she wouldn’t just disappear. I told them something must have happened to her. And they’ve done nothing.’
‘I … I think they are taking it seriously now. I mean, the press conference –’
‘About time.’
‘I’m sure it will help,’ I say, trying to sound encouraging.
Now his bravado slips a little, his shoulders sloping. He finally slumps down into the sofa, gives a long sigh, like air escaping from a crumpled balloon.
‘I dunno, Helen. I hope so. I hope it’s not too late. I couldn’t bear it if … I couldn’t bear it.’ He drops his head, presses the balls of his hands into his eye sockets. I touch his shoulder, gently, but he flinches. I quickly pull my hand away.
I wish Daniel was here. He’s said he wants to work late every night this week – that way we’ll have more time together when the baby arrives. ‘It’s not long now. I’m just getting ahead,’ he said. ‘It makes sense, doesn’t it? Call me if you need me. Or if anything happens.’ I agreed at the time. But now I’m starting to regret it.
‘You know, she didn’t have that many friends,’ John says gruffly.
I sit down, gingerly, on my inflatable birthing ball. I try to sound breezy. ‘Oh, I’m sure she had –’
‘No,’ he says bluntly, shaking his head, ‘she didn’t.’ There is an expression of sadness on his face. ‘She had trouble with friends, our Rachel.’
I am not sure how to react to this. John cracks his knuckles in his lap. It’s too warm in here. The central heating’s on too high. I stand up to open a window. Without me weighing it down, the ball drifts off and bounces gently against the wall.
‘The police said that you reckoned Rachel was pregnant,’ he says. ‘Was she?’
I nod. ‘Didn’t she tell you that?’
He shakes his head. ‘Why wouldn’t she tell me?’
‘I can’t answer that.’
‘No, that’s right,’ he says, the anger in his eyes flaring up again, like a gas light. ‘You’re the same as them. No one will give me a straight answer, and no one seems to care.’
I take a deep breath in and out. I press my hand into the side of the sofa, try to calm myself down.
‘Listen,’ I say, trying to sound gentle, ‘that’s just not true. I’m worried about Rachel, of course I am. But you have to remember, she sent me that –’
‘I should have taken better care of her.’ He starts pacing around the room again. His boots are filthy. It is as if he’s forgotten I’m here, as if he’s talking to himself. ‘I was proud she was in London. That she was making something of herself. If I’d known how she was living … when she said Dalston, well. I didn’t know it would be like that … that horrible tower block, those two stuck-up girls always sneering at her. And now you tell me she was pregnant –’
‘Hang on. Dalston? Like, you mean in east London? When was she living there?’
He stares at me. ‘Until she moved in with you.’
‘But that can’t be right. She definitely lived around here, in Greenwich. At least by the time I met her in the summer.’
John frowns and sits back down. I glance at the tea on the table. It must be cold by now. A grey semicircle is forming on the top.
‘Definitely not,’ he says. ‘She never lived round here. This was miles away from her place.’
‘But I don’t understand. She was always around here. She told me she lived on the other side of the park.’
He shrugs.
‘But … she was at the Greenwich antenatal classes.’
‘The what?’
‘Antenatal classes. You go when you are pregnant,’ I gabble. ‘It’s only for Greenwich residents. The whole point of the classes is that you go to your local … you meet local people.’
I try to think. Did she really tell me she lived around here? Or did I just assume it? We never went to her place. Did she ever even tell me where it was? Did I ever ask?