It was Friday morning, five to eight, and Natasha had been back from her run for well over ten minutes. She was standing in her kitchen now, fuming, absolutely bloody furious with everyone, but she was dimly aware that that was easier than being angry with herself. Every time she rang it, Juliette’s mobile went straight to voicemail, and no-one was picking up the home phone either, although Natasha knew Juliette should be there, it was still too early for the school run. Surely one of her many domestic staff would be there by now, why weren’t they picking up either?
Natasha let Juliette’s home phone ring for the umpteenth time – it didn’t seem to go to answerphone, instead just kept ringing and ringing until finally a loud, continuous parp-parp would signal that even BT had had enough of waiting, and then Natasha would call it again, dogged as ever. She debated whether to simply get in the car and go round to Juliette’s – find out where she was, what was going on, so that everyone could get their story straight if something terrible had happened – but the traffic would be awful and she needed to be at work on time today, she had a board meeting to prepare for. As Natasha stood staring at her mobile, ready to hurl it across the room in frustration, another idea came to her. Perhaps she should steer clear of everyone for the time being, it might make things worse. Hopefully she was just catastrophising anyway, but if there was still no news after the weekend she could always go to the police then. She hadn’t done anything wrong after all, not really, and then if anything terrible had happened to her friend – whose mobile still went straight to voicemail (that’s because it’s waterlogged, at the bottom of The Serpentine, said a little voice she tried to ignore) – she, Natasha, would be in the clear. Natasha flinched, both from guilt at even thinking such a thing, and from a noise she’d just heard in the hallway. The kids were still upstairs with the nanny, and the cleaner hadn’t arrived yet. Alistair. Christ, she could do without seeing him this morning – she’d snuck out of bed while he was still pretending to be asleep, his back to her, hostile as ever. Anyone would think it was she who’d had the affair, and the thought made her sad about her marriage for a second – until she remembered to be mad with him all over again. The sounds faded, thank God: he must have heard her too. She knew she needed to confront him soon though – they couldn’t carry on like this, it wasn’t good for the children. The kettle finished boiling and Natasha made a strong instant coffee, no milk, three sugars, and when she drank it she wished desperately that she had a cigarette to go with it, although she hadn’t smoked in years. The coffee was too hot without milk and it burned her mouth, and the sensation, that her tongue was rough and sanded, stayed with her for the rest of that terrible day, like an imprint of wrongdoing.