Steph no longer felt as if she was in her body. The sleepless night and nightmarish day had taken her to pieces. Part of her was still in the street, shouting, “Where are you going?” as Paul charged into the night. Another part was trapped in the surreal motions of registering their daughter as a missing person. Reciting her date of birth and her blood group, handing over her smiling photograph to be sealed inside a clear plastic bag.
Now, standing at Emma’s door, Steph seemed to sway, untethered. None of this should be happening. She should be catching up on The Apprentice with Freya, discussing how irritating all the contestants were, Freya’s feet lolling across her lap.
Panic swept her as she tried to remember the last time they’d actually sat like that on the sofa, actually watched an episode together. It had once been their never-missed thing, but for the last few weeks Freya had claimed homework and disappeared into her room, leaving Steph to press Record and feel bereft. She imagined episodes stacking up on their cable box, waiting for Freya’s return, and the thought made her want to howl.
The door opened in front of her and she struggled to reset her face.
Emma’s outfit was more subdued than usual: knee-length gray sweater over mustard-colored tights. A closer look revealed that her collar and cuffs sported tiny jeweled pineapples. Steph had never been sure of Emma’s age. She was petite, with a youthful face and fashion sense, but sometimes there were glimmers of maturity. Once, for example, they’d seen each other in the street when Freya had just sprinted off for her bus, Steph was doing up the fiddly buttons on her long coat, and Emma was folding polythene-wrapped dresses into the boot of her battered car. Emma and Steph had swapped the usual pleasantries. Then Emma had nodded toward Freya, flying down the road with her phone at her ear, and said, She’s full of life, isn’t she? Steph remembered how it had made her pause, surprised and pleased at this insight into how others saw her daughter. But also, Emma’s observation had seemed to place her closer to Steph’s age bracket than Freya’s.
“Steph,” Emma said now, “I . . . Freya . . .”
“She’s gone missing,” Steph said, and the words enclosed her in dread.
Emma nodded, blinking. “I’m so sorry. You must be so worried.”
You have no idea, Steph felt like saying. She wasn’t exactly sure why she’d knocked on Emma’s door. She’d had a thought that her neighbor might have seen something. Steph got the impression she was home during the day, more than she used to be: Her Corsa was constantly parked in the street. The police would talk to all the locals but Steph had the chance to act sooner, faster, to find her, find her, find her.
More than that, though, she couldn’t face being alone. Couldn’t let herself think about the way Paul had reacted, where he might have gone, and how all the things they’d never properly talked about might somehow be linked to this, the worst day of their previously unspoiled family life.
Emma beckoned her into her flat. It was less than half the size of theirs but seemed to have twice the amount of stuff. Steph often wished for more storage space for all Freya’s sports equipment, Paul’s vinyl that he never listened to, her own books she never gave away. But Emma’s living room heaved with boxes, as if she’d never unpacked or was preparing to move, as well as an old sewing machine, scattered piles of fabric and thread, and what looked like a giant wine rack full of shoes. There was a noise just audible in the background, like a turning wheel . . . A hamster?
Steph was sure a man used to live here with Emma. Or maybe still did? She’d never actually met him, only heard the muffled back-and-forth of their voices, and glimpsed them together sometimes on the street.
“Were you at home yesterday?” she asked.
“Yes . . .” Emma perched on her sofa and fiddled with the turquoise tassels of a throw, gesturing for Steph to sit down too. “I remember thinking the street felt quiet. The day seemed to drag.”
“What about before that? Had you noticed anyone hanging around? Ever seen Freya with anyone who seemed . . . ?” She shut her eyes at the horror of the questions, the inescapable trains of thought.
“No, nothing like that.” Emma sounded pained too. Steph wondered what she must think of her. Who could let this happen to her child? What kind of mother had to ask a neighbor, pretty much a stranger, whether she knew things about her daughter?
“Who saw her last?” Emma asked.
“We don’t know exactly,” Steph admitted, with another wrench. “She was in her final lesson of the day but the police can’t interview the teacher until first thing tomorrow.” It was excruciating having to work with other people’s schedules when she’d been catapulted into this new sense of time. Even the police search, which had been launched within half an hour of them registering Freya as missing, was at the mercy of daylight. Right now, Steph knew, the team was trawling the limited CCTV footage from around Freya’s school and bus stop.
“And her phone’s off?”
“Yes. She’s normally glued to it.”
As if on cue, a phone beeped. Steph’s heart vaulted and she reached into her pocket before her brain could register that the chime wasn’t one of hers. Still she opened her messages, WhatsApp, emails. Emma sheepishly picked up her own mobile.
“Sorry, that’s me.” She moved to put it aside without reading the message, but seemed to change her mind, tapping the screen and frowning with distraction. Steph felt a vicious slash of jealousy. What is it, Emma? Hair appointment canceled? Friend wants to meet at a pub you don’t really like? Boyfriend trouble? She knew she was being unfair, but even the worst of other people’s problems were enviable to her now.
She leaped to her feet. She was wasting time with a woman whose Friday-night drink was going flat, whose phone was buzzing with her own life.
Emma stirred, and jumped up too. “You don’t have to go!”
“I should be out there looking for her . . .” Steph glanced toward Emma’s undrawn curtains. The night seemed to glisten and swell, like black water. Usually she loved night skies, the more vast and starry the better, but now she couldn’t stand the thought of it, dark and depthless.
They were diverted by another ringing. Traditional this time, like a landline. Emma looked at the handset in the corner of the room, seeming surprised. Presumably her home phone rang as rarely as Steph’s did these days.
“Answer it,” Steph said. “Just in case?”
Emma hesitated, then walked over and picked up the phone. “Hello?”
There was a pause before she repeated: “Hello?”
A chill touched the back of Steph’s neck. She became conscious of that rumbling, hamster-wheel noise again, gathering momentum.
“Is anyone there?” Emma sounded perturbed now. “Hello?”
She replaced the receiver but kept frowning at it, rubbing her lips together with their traces of coral gloss. “Wrong number, I guess.”
Steph watched her for a beat longer. Emma’s face seemed to have paled. Her cheek was dappled by the moving shadow of a dream catcher that hung from the ceiling. Was there something she wasn’t letting on about the call? No, of course not. Why would there be? And even if there was, why would it be anything to do with Freya? It was already becoming impossible to distinguish between things that meant nothing and things she should seize on.
And then there were the things that made her brain power down when she thought about them.
Paul asking to speak to the police alone.
Paul flinging his water glass onto their kitchen floor rather than answer her questions.
“I have to go,” she told Emma again.
“Please, let me—”
“I really do.” Steph stumbled to the door. The hallway seemed to represent a fork: back upstairs, to do what, or back outside, to go where? She lurched toward the stairs, hoping she could collect her thoughts once she was in her own flat.
“If you need anything,” Emma was saying behind her, “I’m—I’m just downstairs.”
Steph stopped and twisted back. Emma seemed young again, framed in her doorway, her blue serrated fringe in her eyes.
“Just keep looking out of your window,” Steph blurted. “Look for . . . I don’t know. Anything. Anyone.” Tell me what Paul’s face looks like when he comes home, she wanted to add, before he’s prepared himself to come back upstairs.
Tell me what you think of this street, our neighbors, this place that was meant to be safe.
Tell me, do you ever get the sense our house is being watched?