Hannah’s heart sinks. Is it that obvious?
“I—I’m not sure,” she says slowly. “I’ve had some weird news.”
“Oh my God.” Robyn’s hand goes to her throat, and her eyes flick involuntarily to Hannah’s stomach, and then back up to her face. “Not—”
“No!” Hannah says quickly. She tries to smile, though it feels false and stiff. “Nothing like that—it’s just—just family stuff.”
It’s the closest she could come to the truth on the spur of the moment, but she wishes, as soon as the final words leave her mouth, that she had not chosen them. John Neville is not family. She doesn’t want him or his memory anywhere near her family.
“Do you need to go?” Robyn says. She looks at her watch and then at the empty shop. “It’s nearly five. I doubt we’ll get a rush now. I can handle anything that comes up.”
“No,” Hannah says reflexively. She shouldn’t need to leave—after all, what’s really changed? Nothing. But at the same time, the thought of trying to stand here, smiling at customers like nothing has happened, with the memories boiling and churning inside her…
“Go,” Robyn says, making up her mind. “Honestly, just go. I’ll explain to Cathy if she comes in, but she won’t mind.”
“Really?” Hannah asks, and Robyn nods firmly. Hannah stands up, picks up her phone, feeling a rush of guilt and gratitude. She finds Robyn irritating sometimes—her relentless Girl Guide–ish cheerfulness, her habit of telling customers “No, you have a great day!” over and over again. But now there’s something immensely comforting about her solid, unflappable kindness.
“Thank you so much, Robyn. I’ll return the favor, I promise.”
“Hey, no thanks needed,” Robyn says. She smiles, pats Hannah on her arm, but Hannah can see the concern in her eyes beneath the friendly smile, and she feels Robyn’s gaze on her as she walks slowly back to the staff room to gather up her things.
* * *
WHEN SHE LEAVES THE SHOP the rain has stopped, and it’s a damp clear autumn afternoon, so like the day she first turned up at Pelham that for an instant the links to the past feel almost sickeningly real. As she stops at the traffic lights, waiting for the green man, she has the strangest sensation—that at any moment she might see April walking casually through the crowd, that lazy mocking smile on her lips and the deep dimples coming and going in her cheeks. For a second Hannah has to steady herself on a lamppost, the past is so real, so close. She feels an unassuageable yearning for it to be true—for that tall blond girl hurrying through the crowd with the light behind her to be April—brilliant, beautiful, alive. How would she greet her? Would she hug her? Slap her? Cry?
Hannah does not know. Maybe all of them.
She is heading through the crowds of tourists towards the bus stop for her usual number 24 back to Stockbridge, eager to get home in time to get supper on, put up her increasingly weary feet, watch some trashy TV.
But as she nears the stand and her pace doesn’t slow, she realizes that she is not going to stop, that the thought of spending twenty minutes trapped in a stuffy bus in the halting city traffic appalls her. She needs to walk. Only the pavement beneath her feet will help her pace off this sense of unease, order her thoughts before she has to face Will. And besides, what is there for her at home except an empty flat and a waiting laptop, with all the sickly glittering allure of the Google searches she knows she will perform as soon as she’s back?
For now, though, she’ll allow herself just one—just to make it real, in the same way she didn’t quite believe the child in her belly was real until she saw the images on the screen, heard the strange, subterranean whoosh and echo of its heart.
In the shadow of the castle she stops in a doorway and pulls out her phone. Then she opens up an incognito browser tab, and types the words into Google: John Neville BBC News. She doesn’t need the last part, but she’s learned not to put anything as unfettered as just his name into search engines—the sites that come up are full of gross images, wild speculation, defamatory statements about her and Will that she has neither the time nor the resources to fight.
At least the BBC can be relied upon to stick mainly to the facts.
And there it is—the top result.
BREAKING: PELHAM COLLEGE KILLER JOHN NEVILLE DIES IN PRISON
The shock is like ice water on her skin, but she steels herself and clicks through.
John Neville, better known as the Pelham Strangler, has died in prison aged 63, prison authorities confirmed earlier today.