I have no idea if my session with Sonia was effective or not. I haven’t had another amnesia attack since I saw her six days ago but I still have terrible dreams. I dream that I’m driving around Bristol, looking for Billy, and then I see him—he’s at the end of the road, baseball cap jammed onto his head, shoulders hunched against the driving wind and rain. There’s a van, four cars in front of me, and it’s going slowly, so slowly and I’m swearing at the driver to put his foot on the gas so I can get to my son before he disappears. Then the van stops. The passenger door opens and Billy gets in. I scream and pull at my door but it’s jammed shut and I can’t get out. The van drives off and I can’t stop screaming.
Sleep deprivation has wiped my memories of the last six days. People have come and gone. Mum, Dad, Liz. There’ve been hugs, lots of hugs. And countless cups of tea. The days have run into each other as we all try and come to terms with what DS Forbes told us about Jason Davies. On a couple of occasions I’ve grabbed my car keys intending to go out and look for Billy, only to put them down again seconds later, unable to breathe.
Mark went back to work the day after my session with Sonia.
“I’ll stay,” he said after the alarm bleeped and he reached out a lazy arm to turn it off. “Claire, I’ll stay if you need me to.”
I shook my head. He’d spent all of the day before pacing the house like a caged animal, settling for minutes in front of the TV and then up again, into the kitchen for a cup of tea, then out to the garage, then back in again. He spent a lot of time standing by the window, looking out at the park opposite our house. He reminded me of one of the tigers in Bristol Zoo, stalking back and forth along the same patch of worn grass, eyeing the visitors beyond the glass wall. He could see what freedom looked like but he had no means of escape.
“No,” I said. “You need to go to work. I’ll be fine. Jake will keep me company.”
“If you’re sure?” I could hear the conflict in his voice as he reached out his arms and pulled me close. I pressed my face into his hairless chest and inhaled his warm, sleepy, musky scent. “Is Jake taking another day off then?”
“Yeah. He told me last night that he couldn’t face going to work.”
“I’m worried about him. He spent all of yesterday in his room.”
“We’ll go out. Take a walk.”
He stroked the hair back from my face and kissed me on the forehead. “I think it’ll do you both good to get some fresh air.”
We never did go for that walk. When I knocked on Jake’s door he said he had a headache and maybe we’d go later. I rang Mum and we drove out to Chew Magna and walked around the lake together. She didn’t mention the website, the appeal or the photos. Instead we held hands and we talked about Dad and his bridge games and the weather and the woman in the corner shop whose husband had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. Then Mum told me how worried she was about me.
I told her I’d started seeing a counselor again but I didn’t mention the amnesia. She squeezed my hand tightly and it struck me, not for the first time, how hard this must be for her and Dad. I am their child, Billy is their grandchild. They must feel the same sense of powerlessness that I feel. That’s why Mum works so hard on the website. It’s her way of helping, of showing she cares.
When I returned home just after eleven Jake was still in his room. At twelve I knocked on his door and offered him some lunch. He said he wasn’t hungry. At tea time he asked if he and Kira could eat their meals in their room. Mark and I ate our steak, chips and peas in front of the TV. I can’t even remember if it was on.
The next day I had a call from Ian, Jake’s boss. He asked if Jake was over his stomach bug yet. I deliberated before answering, unsure whether to lie and say he was still ill or tell him that we’d had some bad news. Ian knows about Billy; Jake had only been working there for a few months when he vanished but I couldn’t tell him the real reason Jake was off work. We weren’t allowed to tell anyone outside our immediate family about Jason Davies. Ian didn’t ask any questions when I said Jake was having a difficult time at the moment but he did agree to let him have a few more days off. I was grateful when he said goodbye.
This morning he rang back. Could I let him know whether Jake would be back at work some time this week as they had a big job planned and he needed to know whether or not to get someone else in? I asked him to hold on, then knocked on Jake’s door. He opened it seconds later, in the same faded pair of boxer shorts he’s been wearing for days, his eyes bleary, his jawline covered in stubble. Behind him, on the opposite side of the room, the curtains were still shut, the only light the blue haze of his laptop screen, the lid half-closed.
“Ian wants to know when you’re going back to work.”
“Huh?”
“Ian. Your boss. He’s got a big job on. He needs to know when you’re going back or he’s going to have to get someone else in.”
Jake shrugged. “Whatever.”
“You’ll lose your job if you don’t go back soon, Jake.”
“Who cares?”
“You do. You love your job.”
“None of that shit matters anymore.”
“Jake!”
“Mum”—he rubbed a hand over his face—“I can’t deal with this right now. Can you tell him I’ll ring him back?”
He closed the door before I could reply. I stared at the knotted wood, grubby with semicircular gray patches—the remains of stickers he’d plastered on the door as a kid—and raised a fist to knock again, then remembered I’d left Ian hanging on the line and bolted back down the stairs.
“Hi, Ian. Is it okay if Jake rings you back this evening?”
He sighed. “I like Jake. And I know he’s got a lot of family stuff to deal with but I need to have a team I can rely on. If he doesn’t call me in the next couple of hours I’m going to have to get someone else in. I’m sorry, Claire. Business is business.”
I can’t help to find Billy but I can still look after one of my sons. I can still help Jake.