Dave sat at his work desk staring at the engineering drawing on the screen in front of him. He thought work might act as a distraction but found it impossible to concentrate on anything while his brother lay unconscious. Two days had passed since Stuart’s collapse and the staff at the hospital were none the wiser as to the cause of his condition. Dave went over in his head repeatedly the last conversation he’d had with his brother; the so-called wife, the inability to recognise his own home, the strange address in Croydon. What had happened to him to make him think these things? He continued to monitor his brother’s email and post but found nothing to help explain his behaviour. The only clue suggesting something strange had happened was in the email from the girl Stuart met in the pub. He looked at his calendar. According to the mail she would be there tonight.
Angela was sat at the same table with the same five friends when Dave entered the bar. He approached the table, introducing himself and engaging awkwardly in small talk with the group who were already well on their way to being drunk. The table was cluttered with glasses varying from almost full to empty. A dozen empty shot glasses in the middle indicated the group’s intention for the night. At the opportune moment Dave asked Angela if he could have ten minutes with her on his own. This drew cheers and wolf whistles from her friends. He felt himself blush for the first time in many years. Initially she was reluctant to join him, clearly still annoyed at the way Stuart had treated her. But when Dave explained what had happened the following day her annoyance turned to concern. She offered to help in any way she could. She excused herself from her friends, drawing another round of raucous cheering. They headed to a table at the other side of the pub. Dave went to the bar to buy drinks before joining Angela at the table. As soon as they sat down she opened up to him about the events that took place following his departure that night. “I really liked your brother. He was charming and funny, we were getting along really well. He invited me to his place for a nightcap so I accepted without giving it a second thought.”
“Would you say there was anything strange about the way he was behaving?” Dave asked. She took a sip of her drink before answering. “Not at all. Everything was really nice, we got a bit carried away but it was fun. But then he ruined it by disappearing and leaving me alone in his house.” She explained how when they arrived Stuart’s home they ended up going straight to bed. Without elaborating she made it obvious they’d had sex. “We’d already been in bed for over an hour before he finally offered me the night cap he promised” She gave Dave a coy smile. “When he went downstairs to get the drinks I nipped to the loo. When I came back the drinks were there but he wasn’t. He must have gotten changed because when he went for the drinks he’d pulled on a pair of shorts and they were now on the bed.”
“How long did you wait before you left?” Dave asked. “Over an hour,” she said petulantly, “I looked everywhere for him but he was nowhere. After about an hour of waiting I gave up and called a cab.”
Dave could not think of any logical reason why Stuart would disappear like that. Angela seemed a nice woman and it wasn’t Stuart’s style to treat women that way, even if he did have commitment issues. He had called him the next morning at nine-thirty and Stuart called back within minutes. Somewhere during the six hours between leaving Angela and that call, something happened to his brother that turned his world upside down.