‘Sure you don’t want wine?’ Jack calls from the kitchen.
‘No thanks, elderflower’s great.’
Today, I am together Elodie. I am out of my pyjamas and in a blue summer dress. I’m wearing light-reflecting undereye concealer and a petal pink lip tint. I am the-world-is-still-my-oyster Elodie. The Elodie who walked into this house is bright-eyed and hopeful. She is drinking only soft drinks so she doesn’t spend her night crying and vomiting. And yesterday, after her run, she got an email from her agent telling her Harriers was reading the new, grittier pitches she’d sent. Everything is possible and as long as she keeps saying this to herself, she can get out of bed each day.
The smell of garlic, tomato and chopped basil makes my mouth water. ‘Want a hand?’
He pops his head around the archway between the kitchen and living room. ‘If I need something burning, I’ll give you a shout.’
‘One time. I burned noodles one time. How was I supposed to know you had to add water?’
He gives me a look. ‘The packet, Fray. You read the damn packet.’
We eat homemade pizza while I flick through our true-crime documentary options on Netflix. ‘We’ve seen most of these – Jaycee Lee Dugard, Elizabeth Smart, Natascha Kampusch …’
‘Kampusch? Who’s that?’ asks Jack. ‘I haven’t seen that one.’
‘She’s the Austrian girl who went missing when she was ten and escaped eight years later. She was kept in a tiny cellar by some creepy middle-aged loner with a monobrow and OCD. Wolfgang … something.’
‘Wolfgang?’ He scoffs. ‘Are you making this up?’
‘It’s an Austrian name, I think.’
‘How’d she escape?’
‘He used her as a slave, cooking and cleaning for him. One day she was hoovering his car, and he got a call. He moved away from her to answer it because of the vacuum noise and when his back was turned, she ran.’
‘Jesus.’
‘I know. It’s awful.’
‘Why did he let her outside? I wouldn’t have let her out,’ says Jack.
‘I suppose he grew to trust her not to run. Eight years is a long time. Some people think she has Stockholm syndrome because she cried when he killed himself. But she doesn’t think she has it. She wrote a book about it – it was huge. I think it’s a film too.’
Jack is googling her. He scrolls through his phone, clicking on link after link. ‘Jaycee Lee Dugard, Elizabeth Smart and Natascha Kampusch,’ he repeats. ‘Know what they all have in common?’
‘Horrific kidnapping stories?’
‘Pretty, blonde and book deals. Every single one of them.’
I shrug. ‘Guess so.’
‘Film deals too.’ He looks up. ‘This could be you.’
‘What?’
‘Yeah, your ticket to a book deal – get kidnapped, escape and write about it. Then you won’t just have Harriers falling at your feet. Didn’t your agent say true crime was selling right now? Looks like it always does.’
I stare at him, trying to figure out if this is a joke but his face gives nothing away. He’s right though. They do all have books. I’ve read them. Every single one. They’re unputdownable. A guaranteed bestseller. ‘You can’t be serious …’
Jack is watching me closely; that intensity is back in his gaze and my heart races in response. I feel the way I do right before a thunderstorm, caught in the crackling, singing tension that fills the air as you wait for something to happen, something electric and terrifying. Then he laughs and just like that, the perfect, terrifying thunderstorm moment passes. Jack takes a piece of garlic bread from the plate. ‘Want some?’
I shake my head, my heart still beating too fast.
‘You’ve lost weight,’ he comments.
‘Only a little.’ I pout, then whine, ‘Feed me. I’m poor.’ Jack is unmoved by my attempt at cuteness. I shrug. ‘I’ve been stressed. I don’t know how anyone can eat when they’re stressed.’ That, and I’m living off a student diet of beans and pasta again because it’s cheap. How is it I graduated seven years ago and I’m no better off?
‘Of course you’re stressed – some weirdo is following you around everywhere. You should stay here tonight. You can stay as long as you need. Move in if you have to.’
His sincerity and generosity are so overwhelming, I look away. The truth is, I can’t move into his spare room, with only bricks between us, and listen to him with a different woman every weekend. Besides, moving in with Jack would mean explaining to my parents and my perfect sister that I have failed and needed rescuing. ‘Thanks, Jack, but can we please not talk about my stalker?’