The Missing Wife

by Sam Carrington

  ‘Ah, mate – that’d be good. I could do with some time out. Cheers.’ Oliver’s grateful look to Brian made Louisa’s stomach lurch.

  ‘Settled then. Well, I’ve got to go to work. See you lot later.’ Brian kissed Emily on the head and Louisa on the cheek. So, there wasn’t going to be any discussion about Emily’s behaviour – her taking Noah without telling either of them, not to mention then walking with Oliver, a man she’d met once and knew nothing about.

  In fact, none of them knew much about Oliver.

  Louisa had known him a long time ago. Even then, she was likely to have only scratched the surface.

  She certainly didn’t know the Oliver standing in her kitchen now.

  Who he was, what he’d done.

  ‘Emily – I’d like to talk about this with you after school,’ Louisa said. She shot a look at Oliver and added, ‘In private.’

  ‘Fine. Nothing to talk about, but whatever. I’m getting ready for school then, see you later,’ and she smiled at Oliver before breezing past Louisa without even looking at her.

  ‘Teenagers, eh?’ Oliver chuckled. ‘You’ve got your work cut out there.’

  ‘Thanks for the observation. Now, I need to get on, get Noah washed and fed. So …’

  ‘Oh, right.’ Oliver drained his coffee and placed the mug near the sink. ‘Although, I haven’t got anything to do, really. I’m at a loose end, as they say. I could hang around, help out. I’ll be your baby-sitter if you like, so you can rest?’

  ‘I don’t think so. But thanks for the offer.’

  ‘I’m not sure what you’re afraid of, Lou-Lou.’ He moved towards her, his eyes focused fully on hers. A shiver rippled down her back.

  ‘Someone walk over your grave?’ he said, smiling.

  Louisa’s eyes widened. She hadn’t thought her shudder was visible. She tried to ignore the sensation that he was somehow inside her head, listening to her thoughts. ‘Something like that.’ Louisa made to move past him, but he put his arm out so it was level with her chest.

  ‘I’m only trying to help. I think you could do with it, don’t you? I’m sure Brian and Tiff would want to know you’ve got someone here to keep an eye on you.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘They’ve been worried about you. Being here on your own with Noah all day. It can get lonely, monotonous. If I stay, I can do all the feeds, look after Noah and you can catch up on your sleep. You may as well make the most of the opportunity. And it would help me so much, you know – take my mind off Melissa.’

  Louisa had always found it difficult to resist Oliver’s charm. It had been something he’d possessed even back then – always drawing people to him. All her college friends loved Oliver and she’d felt smug, as well as deliriously happy, that he’d chosen her.

  ‘You can stay for the morning, if you must,’ Louisa conceded, ‘but that’s it. You’d be better off going and looking for your wife, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘I’ve exhausted all the possibilities I had, Lou. It’s in the hands of the police now.’

  ‘Won’t they be watching you, your movements? If they see you spending time here, with me, that won’t look good, Oliver.’

  ‘On the contrary, I think you and your family helping me puts me in a good light. No one would believe me guilty of anything if they could see that a good family, and one with a new baby, were willing to have me in their home to support me during this difficult time.’

  Louisa wasn’t so sure but maybe that was why he was there, why he’d been keen to have her help in the first place. She had such mixed feelings about him; even the way he spoke sometimes added to her apprehension – he could come across as manipulative and someone not to trust. But there was something else underlying his words. Louisa thought he was afraid. Genuinely worried about the outcome of his wife’s disappearance. Was she being too harsh on him purely because she had a bad feeling about what had happened whilst they were at college? Or was it that she wanted to make him suffer now, like he’d made her suffer back then when he left her?

  ‘Right, well, I’ll get Noah sorted. You can make yourself some breakfast if you want. There’s cereal, toast – maybe some bacon in the fridge. I’ll see you in a minute.’

  The smell of cooking bacon wafted upstairs. Then a shout came from the kitchen.

  ‘Come and get it!’

  Louisa reached the top of the stairs with Noah in her arms just as Emily disappeared down them and rounded into the kitchen.

  ‘Wow, Mum,’ Emily said with a stuffed mouth as Louisa walked in. ‘Why don’t you ever cook breakfasts like this for me?’

  ‘I didn’t know I had all this in the fridge,’ Louisa said, ignoring Emily’s question as she took in the three plates all holding a full-English breakfast. Damn him. She didn’t want to be grateful, but she couldn’t help herself. ‘Thanks, Oliver, this is great.’

  ‘I took a wild guess that you didn’t get many breakfasts cooked for you, so I thought I’d knock this up.’ Oliver grinned.

  ‘Can you cook for us every day?’ Emily said, tucking into the fried bread.

  ‘I suspect you couldn’t afford my services,’ Oliver said.

  Emily laughed. It was a rare sound, Louisa realised. She was even being nicer to Louisa, which was a refreshing change from her behaviour of late.

  After Emily bolted out of the door for school, and Oliver had loaded the dishwasher, they sat in the lounge, a morning programme on TV playing quietly. Oliver had Noah in his arms. Louisa’s tummy fluttered at the sight. She looked away.

  ‘Why don’t you close your eyes, Lou-Lou? Relax.’

  The words felt strangely hypnotic, and with a giddiness that Louisa took to be tiredness, her eyes fell shut.

  A door banged, and Louisa’s eyes flew open. Brian was standing in the doorway, looking into the lounge.

  ‘Oh, Brian,’ she said, her hand on her breastbone to still her rapid heart rate. ‘What are you doing home?’ Louisa sat up. She’d fallen asleep in the feeding chair. She had no clue as to how long she’d been out. Her eyes travelled to the sofa. She froze.

  Oliver was lying full length with Noah asleep on his chest. His bare chest.

  She sucked in air as she tried to say something, but failed. Brian came into the room, and, without saying anything to Louisa, moved alongside Oliver and bent down.

  ‘Hey, little man,’ he said.

  Louisa’s held breath released itself. He didn’t sound mad. Oliver moved, then, and shifted Noah. He’d obviously been asleep too.

  ‘Sorry, Brian. Goodness, it’s surprising how tiring looking after a baby can be.’ He sat up, handing a floppy Noah to Brian.

  ‘Why are you home so early?’ Louisa tried to take Brian’s focus off Oliver. Why didn’t he have his shirt on?

  ‘It’s not early, it’s six, the same as always,’ Brian said.

  ‘What? It can’t be.’ Louisa shot out of the chair. She was groggy from sleep, and for a moment wondered if she were having another dream. Another hallucination.

  ‘I fed Noah two bottles; they’re washed out and back in the steriliser,’ Oliver said. ‘Oh, and several awful nappies, urgh – how do you deal with those – I gagged for England and even managed to get it on my shirt.’ He shot Louisa a glance before adding, ‘Hence the bare-chested look. Sorry – I didn’t want to disturb Lou’s beauty sleep by asking for one of yours, Brian.’ He smiled.

  ‘Oh, mate, no problem, I’ll get you one. I know just how lethal those nappies can be. I usually have to pull up my T-shirt to cover my nose!’

  The two men almost fell about laughing.

  Louisa felt a sense of unease watching the scene play out in front of her. Did Oliver have some kind of game plan? He seemed so intent on injecting himself into their lives.

  ‘You may as well stay for tea, Oliver. Eh, Louisa? You could stretch the food for one extra, couldn’t you?’

  It was spiralling out of Louisa’s control, fast. It annoyed her that Brian was even entertain
ing Oliver being there, especially given the fact he was her ex-boyfriend. She would certainly never allow one of his exes into the house and wouldn’t dream of inviting her to the pub for a cosy drink.

  What could she say, though? Thanks to her dismissive explanation about her and Oliver’s past relationship, Brian didn’t see an issue with him being around and would think her rude and ungrateful if she said no. And more to the point, he might question why she wasn’t keen to have him stay for tea. Like she was trying to hide something going on between them now. Louisa tried to keep her eyes averted from Oliver’s torso, but it was hard not to see; he was in her eyeline.

  ‘Well, I suppose I could see what’s in the fridge, but you still haven’t taken me shopping, Brian, so it’ll be slim pickings.’

  ‘Oh, please, don’t worry, Lou,’ Oliver interjected. ‘Why don’t I order a takeaway? It’s the least I can do to thank you for putting up with me.’

  ‘Great idea – that’s fine by me, can’t remember the last time we had takeout. Then we can hit the pub – what do you say?’ Brian’s face seemed to illuminate at Oliver’s suggestion.

  ‘Perfect. And I can have Noah while you go shopping tomorrow; it’s no problem.’

  Louisa wanted it to stop. Wanted Oliver to quit the knight in shining armour routine.

  ‘No, it’s fine. Emily will look after him while we go,’ she said, firmly, giving no room for interpretation.

  ‘Okay, well if you change your mind.’ Oliver’s smile faded. Then his eyes narrowed as he looked to Brian. ‘It must be hard only having the one car to share.’

  ‘Ah, no – it’s because Louisa doesn’t drive. If she drove we’d get another car and she wouldn’t have to wait for me to drive her around,’ Brian said.

  Louisa saw a frown appear on Oliver’s face. ‘You don’t drive anymore, Lou?’

  ‘No. Not for years, and I’ve lost the confidence now.’

  Oliver nodded slowly, his expression giving the impression of understanding. Why was he looking at her like that? Oliver must’ve caught her confusion.

  ‘It’s understandable, given the circumstances,’ he said, looking directly at her.

  ‘Circumstances?’ She had no idea what he was referring to.

  ‘The accident. When you were at college – wasn’t long after you passed your test, was it; so it was always bound to have a big effect.’

  ‘You never said that was why you didn’t drive, Louisa?’ Brian turned towards her.

  ‘That’s because I didn’t have an accident. You must be mistaken, Oliver.’ Louisa was confused. She’d never been in an accident.

  ‘Oh, okay. Memory playing tricks, I guess. Must’ve been someone else from college,’ he said, giving her a strange look – one that made Louisa feel like he may as well have given her a nod and a wink. It was as though he was going along with whatever she said, like they were colluding in a lie.

  ‘Right, come on, mate,’ Brian said, turning his attention back to Oliver. ‘Let’s choose some food.’ He got his phone out and opened an app. Oliver sidled in beside Brian, and they both began scrolling through the online menus.

  The buddy approach from Brian was making Louisa’s skin crawl, but she was glad to have moved on from the conversation being about her. She was going to have to tell Brian she didn’t want Oliver hanging around. She didn’t feel comfortable being around him, knowing how things stood with Melissa. More than that, she didn’t want to be around him because she now felt sure that he knew more about what had happened to her back at college than she did.

  24

  THE DRUNK

  Saturday a.m. – Day 8 post-party

  Brian stumbled into the bedroom, knocking hard against the chest of drawers before finding the bed and falling onto it. Louisa tutted, though he hadn’t actually woken her. She’d been struggling to drop off, probably due to her long daytime nap. That, and the fact her mind had been working overtime wondering what Brian and Oliver were talking about at the pub, meant she was far too wound up to sleep. Now, with him close to her, his uncoordinated movements, together with the overpowering smell of lager, made sleep impossible. She checked her phone. One-thirty-eight in the morning. Where the hell had he and Oliver been until this time?

  ‘Pub have a lock-in, did it?’ she said, her voice edged with annoyance.

  ‘Yeah, good ole Marky-Mark was on good form tonight,’ he slurred. ‘Oliver made an excellent impression.’ The bed bounced as he fell back onto it, his shoes banging against the bedroom wall as he propelled them from his feet.

  ‘Could’ve taken them off in the bloody hallway, Brian.’

  ‘Shhh. Don’t be mad at me, Lou-Lou.’

  Louisa tensed. Lou-Lou? He’d never called her that. She yanked the duvet up, turning away from him. She’d ignore it for now, put it down to drunkenness. It wasn’t often that Brian went out drinking, so she couldn’t really complain. He deserved to have some downtime – she just wished it hadn’t been with her ex-boyfriend, and husband to the missing woman. Oliver making a good impression suggested he was not playing the distraught, moping husband as people would surely expect in his situation. How was that going to do him any favours?

  ‘Well, you can tell me all about it in the morning, once you’ve sobered up.’

  Louisa felt clumsy hands groping for her beneath the duvet. She closed her eyes. Not now. Since having Noah they’d only had sex once; she was just too tired and too disinterested. She was certainly long past having drunk sex, especially when only one of them was inebriated.

  ‘Go to sleep, love,’ she said. ‘We’ll only get disturbed by Noah crying anyway.’

  ‘Spoilsport. Oliver said you and him were at it like rabbits when you were together. But then, he is all manly and good-looking. You scraped the bottom of the barrel with me, didn’t you?’ His words, although slurred, clearly carried a hint of jealousy.

  Louisa smarted. The thought of her husband and ex-boyfriend discussing their experiences of having sex with her was unbearable. She’d been seventeen when she’d first been with Oliver; it was all new and exciting. She couldn’t keep her hands off him. It was incomparable to her relationship now with Brian. Hadn’t they been at it like rabbits when they’d first got together though? Louisa reached back into her memory. Things had been very different with Brian, right from the start. Why had that been? She couldn’t remember. Whatever the reason, she didn’t want to be talking about it at almost two in the morning.

  ‘Shut-up, Brian, before you say something you can’t take back.’

  He mimicked her words, childishly, before turning away from her. ‘Oliver was right about you,’ he mumbled into his pillow.

  Louisa lay perfectly still, listening to her hammering heart – feeling the thud against her arm like a drumbeat. She wasn’t going to humiliate herself by asking what that meant.

  But it was going to be a long, sleepless night spent worrying about it.

  Louisa sat feeding Noah in the chair in his nursery rather than downstairs watching television. She wanted the quiet – after the restless night, her head ached. Noah sucked hard at the teat, and before she realised, he’d drained the bottle. Great. That would mean a good hour of her trying to bash the wind out of him. She should’ve taken more notice, but her mind had drifted to Brian’s drunken words. Oliver was right about you. In the cold light of day, Louisa didn’t know which of them to be more angry with. She’d be having words with Brian when he surfaced; there was no way she was allowing him to socialise with Oliver again.

  A gentle tapping on the nursery door disturbed her thoughts, and a moment later, Emily walked in and plonked herself on the floor in front of Louisa.

  ‘You’re up early again. And it’s a Saturday. Everything okay?’ Louisa gave her daughter, who was sitting cross-legged in her pyjamas, a concerned look.

  Emily wrinkled her nose and shrugged. ‘Can’t sleep.’

  ‘Sorry Noah is waking you. I’m hoping he’ll settle into a better routine—’

  ‘It
’s not Noah, Mum,’ she cut in.

  Louisa frowned. If it wasn’t the baby, then what was bothering her teenager? There could be all manner of things, and in an instant, Louisa’s mind had conjured some worst-case scenarios: she was taking drugs, she was pregnant, she’d been shoplifting.

  ‘Oh, okay. Well, do you want to talk about what’s on your mind?’

  Emily lowered her head and began picking at the carpet pile. Louisa waited.

  ‘You never told me about Oliver,’ she said finally.

  Louisa gave an internal sigh of relief, thankful it wasn’t as serious as her imagined scenarios. If that was all that was worrying Emily, she could handle it. ‘Well, there was never any reason to, really. I’d had a few boyfriends before your dad, as he had girlfriends before me. It’s not usually something that ever gets discussed once you’re married with children.’

  Emily nodded gently, but then looked up – her eyes bright, her cheeks flushing. ‘But Oliver said you and he would’ve got married if it hadn’t been for something you did that meant he had to go away, and then you went and chose Dad.’ Emily’s words rushed out, as though she’d been holding them in her mouth for too long and the pressure of them had built to the point they were forced to burst out.

  Shit. Why would Oliver have told her that pack of lies?

  ‘Emily. That’s not true. When did Oliver tell you that?’

  ‘Yesterday. When he saw me walking the pram and joined me.’

  ‘Yes, about that. Why did you take Noah and where did Oliver see you?’

  Emily sighed loudly. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know. I thought I was doing something good, to make up for being a total bitch to you lately. But I knew, deep down, it would make things worse if you woke up and he wasn’t in his cot. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, Mum.’

  ‘Oh, Emms.’ Louisa inched forward in the chair, balancing Noah as she stood. She placed him in the cot, hoping he’d be quiet for long enough to give her some time with Emily. ‘Come here,’ she said, her arms held out to Emily. Emily got up and went to her mum. Louisa embraced her, stroking Emily’s hair. ‘It’s been a huge change, having Noah, for all of us. I know I’m the one whose behaviour has altered the most, and I’m so sorry, love.’