‘Cigarettes?’

‘Hadn’t you noticed? On his clothes …’

I shake my head. I haven’t noticed any such thing. Either I’ve become neglectful, or Hugh is imagining things, and I suspect it’s the latter. ‘Maybe his friends smoke? Have you thought about that?’

His eyes narrow in accusation.

‘What next? Drinking?’

‘Hugh—’

‘Fighting at school—’

‘What?’

‘He told me. He got involved in some scrap.’

‘He told you?’

‘Yes. He was upset. He wouldn’t tell me what it was about, but it’s not like him, Julia. He’s never fought at school before.’

He’s never lost his mother before, I think, but I don’t say it.

‘Maybe we need to let him make his own mistakes? He has to grow up. He has to let off steam, especially given what’s happened.’

‘I just think we need to keep a closer eye on him.’

‘Me, you mean. You think I should be keeping a closer eye on him. You know, it seems to me that you’re a perfect father whenever it just involves playing chess or ordering takeaways when I go away. Yet whenever he needs some kind of discipline that’s suddenly my job?’ He ignores me. ‘Well?’

‘I don’t mean that. Look, I’m just not sure you’re—’

‘I’m what?’

I know exactly what he means. Setting a good example. This is about what happened in Paris.

‘I’m not sure you’re there for Connor at the moment like he might need you to be.’

I can’t help but laugh, but it’s a reflex. At some level he might be right.

‘Meaning what, exactly?’

He lowers his voice. ‘Julia, please calm down. Be reasonable.’

I go back to the table, to finish clearing it, to turn my back on him. It’s then that it happens. In front of me is the glass I’d been drinking from and as I pick it up a sudden and almost irresistible urge bubbles up from nowhere. I imagine filling it from the bottle of red wine they hadn’t quite finished, drinking it down. I can feel it, heavy in my mouth. I can taste it, peppery and warm. I want it, more than anything.

I hold the glass in my hand. I tell myself this is the first time since Paris, the first time I’ve even been tempted. It isn’t a relapse. It only means what I let it mean.

‘Julia?’

I ignore him. Ride it out, I tell myself. Ride it out. The desire will crest like an ocean wave and then subside. I just have to wait. Hugh is here, anyway, and whatever happens I won’t drink in front of him.

Yet I managed to drink in Paris, and that was weeks ago. I haven’t even been tempted since. Even if I were to drink now it wouldn’t have to signify the beginning of the end.

I think back to the programme. The first step. This isn’t something I can control; the fact I’ve gone for weeks without being tempted again doesn’t mean I’m over it. All control is an illusion.

I think of my sponsor, Rachel. ‘Addiction is a patient disease,’ she said to me, once. ‘It’ll wait for your whole life, if it has to. Never forget that.’

I haven’t, I tell myself. I won’t.

‘Julia?’ says Hugh. He sounds annoyed. I’ve missed something; he’s been talking to me.

I turn round. ‘Yes?’

‘I know he’s upset about his mother’s death—’

His choice of words stings, but my anger forces the desire to drink to slip down another notch.

‘He’s never thought of Kate as his mother.’

‘You know what I mean. Kate’s death is bound to bother him, but—’

‘But what?’

‘But he’s still not really talking about it, and I find that worrying. He should be, by now.’

His comment enrages me. ‘Has it ever occurred to you that it’s a process? There isn’t a timetable. Not everyone can deal with Kate’s death in the same way that you have.’

‘Meaning?’

‘It’s going to take Connor a good deal longer to get over Kate’s death than it’s taken you, that’s all.’

I think of what Adrienne has told me. ‘Don’t ever think Hugh doesn’t care. It’s just his prissiness. Grief is messy, and he doesn’t like mess. Plus, don’t forget he has to deal with life and death at work. All the time. It must harden you, a little bit.’

He looks shocked. ‘I’m not over her death. Kate and I were close once. I miss her, too. What makes you say that? It’s hurtful.’

‘Are you still talking to the Foreign Office? Or are you leaving it all to me—?’

‘I talk to them all the time, Julia—’

‘You don’t think I should go online and look at the place she was killed—’

‘I just think you’re in a bad enough state as it is. You need to concentrate on Connor, on your work. On the future, not the past.’

‘What is that supposed to mean?’

He opens his mouth to speak, but then seems to think better of it. A moment later he turns and throws down the tea towel that he’d hooked over his shoulder.

‘Julia, I’m really worried about you.’

‘About me?’

‘Yes, believe it or not. I think you need to go and see somebody. You’re not coping. I’m going to Geneva on Monday and you’ll be here on your own—’

‘Oh, I’ll be fine,’ I say, but he’s still talking, he doesn’t seem to have heard me.

‘—and I just wish you’d at least consider going to see someone—’

My fury surges, doubled in strength. Something breaks. I can’t take it any more. ‘Oh, just piss off, Hugh.’ The glass I hadn’t realized I was still holding smashes on the floor. I don’t remember throwing it.

He takes a step towards me, then seems to think better of it and turns as if to leave. He’s finally angry, and so am I, and it almost feels better. It’s something other than numbness, or pain.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Out. I’m going for a walk. I need to cool off.’

He leaves. The whole house shudders, then falls silent, and I’m alone.

Chapter Eight

I sit on the edge of the bed for a while. I stroke the duvet cover. Egyptian cotton, duck-egg blue. Our bed, I think. What happened?

We bought it when we moved in here four years ago and it’s nothing particularly special. It’s a place we sleep, talk, read. Occasionally we make love, and when we do it’s still tender, slow. Enjoyable, usually, if not exciting.

Was it ever exciting? I think so, for a while, but the frenzy of a relationship’s early days is unsustainable; it has to burn out, become something else. It’s not his fault, or mine. It happens to everyone.

Maybe it happened sooner, with us. Hugh is the son of my father’s best friend; he’s known me since I was at school. Though he was older than me, we always got on, and as his father tried to look after mine, Hugh looked after me, and helped me to look after Kate. Our passion, when it eventually came, was muted. It was already accompanied by a history. Sometimes I think it’s as if we missed out a stage, as if we went from being friends straight to being companions.

I hear Hugh come back home. He goes into the living room. I stand up. I have to go downstairs, to talk to him, to sort things out. If I don’t he’ll sleep on the couch in his office and I’ll spend another night lying in bed, alone, trying to sleep while my brain fizzes with images, with thoughts that won’t subside. I’ll turn the events of the evening over and over, and always at the centre will be Kate. Walking down the alleyway, looking up to see a figure in the shadows in front of her, smiling a greeting but then, as she steps forward, he raises his hand and her smile turns to terror as she realizes that things have gone wrong, this time she’s made a mistake. The man she’s come to meet isn’t who she thought he was.

I know that if I were to close my eyes I’d see it, as clearly as if it were happening in front of me. A fist in the face, a booted foot. Why didn’t I know, somehow? That psychic connection I always thought we had; why did it let us down, when it really mattered? Was it severed when we took Connor? I’d see her blood, spilled on to the concrete. I’d see her nose, broken. I’d hear her cry out. I’d wonder if she knew, if she sensed this was it. I’d wonder how much pain there was. I’d wonder if she thought about me, and if so whether it was with love. I’d wonder if, at the end, she forgave me.