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‘I’m sorry if that sounds harsh,’ she said. ‘But I worry people will take advantage of you. And look, the party is next week. Surely, her A list got invitations months ago.’
‘It’s a good charity,’ I said. I resented her bursting my bubble. The evening looked fun. I didn’t love parties, but a sit-down dinner and an auction would give the event structure and something to talk about if conversation flagged.
‘Then donate to it, but don’t mistake this for a heartfelt invitation. I mean, itmightbe, only you can be the judge of that, but it might not. Before you say yes, you need to have a good think about who your real friends are.’
When I got home, I asked Kitty what she thought, and she said that Sasha had a point. I dithered for twenty-four hours but decided to go to the event anyway and RSVP’d via email and sent the money for my seat at the banquet. For the first time since Nick died, I was feeling better about myself, mentally and physically. If I could get close to Sasha, I thought, I might be able to rekindle other friendships and make something of them. Sasha would get over it when she saw that these women cared about me genuinely.
When I told her I was going, she didn’t see it that way. ‘You’re drawn to those women like a moth to a flame,’ she said. She seemed sad. ‘Don’t blame me if they damage you again,’ she warned. ‘But if they do, know it’ll be hard for me to witness.’
She didn’t call the next day and cancelled our yoga class via a group message. When I contacted her directly to ask if she was alright, I heard nothing.
Kitty said that perhaps I’d upset Sasha. ‘I expect she doesn’t want to see you get hurt,’ she said.
‘She told me to be brave,’ I said. ‘And you did, too.’
‘Brave,’ Kitty said. ‘Not foolhardy. Remember how upset those women made you feel. They were like rubberneckers atMr Creed’s wake, nosing around the place, complaining about the canapés.’
‘They complained about the food at Nick’s wake?’
‘And the service. I didn’t want to tell you. It wasn’t the time or place.’
That hurt. I started to second-guess my decision to go. I felt guilty that I’d given Sasha the impression that I didn’t value her advice. Not seeing her for a few days was a jolt, too. Without her daily call and messages, I quickly began to feel unmoored again, the way I’d done right after Nick’s death. I drove to the yoga centre, even though class was cancelled, and asked them to give a handwritten card of apology to Sasha if she came in, because she still wasn’t replying to my messages.
The night of the party came around quickly. I decided to go because I didn’t want to pull out at the last minute and give anyone a reason to be upset with me. As I arrived at the venue, I still had some hopes that it might be a nice evening, but as soon as I stepped through the door to the ballroom, I found myself crippled with social anxiety. My dress looked old and frumpy compared to the other women. I’d done my hair myself but nobody else had. The hairdressers in Chepstow must have been busy that afternoon.
I pushed through the crowd to find the hostess, but she barely acknowledged me after an initial air kiss. I expected her to introduce me to the people she was with, but she moved on and so did they. I went to look at the table where the auction prizes were and ran into another woman I knew. ‘Oh! You’re still in the area!’ she said. ‘Where have you been hiding?’ It felt like implied criticism and my anxiety began to escalate. Everything felt tooloud and too busy after the quiet and isolation of the Manor. I felt like putting my hands over my ears. I hovered at the edge of the party, lacking the courage to break into any groups. I had hopes that things would improve at the banquet, but I was seated at the worst table and was totally ignored by the strangers sitting on either side of me. I felt invisible.
I ate my dinner slowly, the food like ashes in my mouth, and realised that I’d made a terrible mistake. Sasha was right. This scene wasn’t me and these people weren’t true friends. I fled before dessert and the auction, telling the man beside me that I felt sick, but he barely seemed to listen, let alone care. I had a full-blown panic attack when I got into my car.
Back at home, I found that Kitty had already gone to the Coach House. I went to bed but couldn’t sleep. For hours I could hear brushing sounds behind the panelling. It didn’t make sense. There are openings behind the panelling downstairs that a person can hide in, but not upstairs. Unless it had been accessed by a rodent. When the noises stopped, finally, I plucked up courage to run down the landing to the spare room at the far end and tried to sleep there, but the wind whistles around that side of the Manor and a branch kept striking the window, the sound like nails dragging on the glass.
I woke late the next day, feeling horrible. It was Kitty’s day off. I didn’t bother to get up, only dragging myself to the toilet. I didn’t shower, I didn’t brush my teeth, I didn’t eat. I felt ashamed of myself for ignoring Sasha – the one person who meant something to me in this post-Nick existence – and letting myself get snubbed and overwhelmed. Moth to a flame was right.
Kitty found me in bed when she arrived the next day. I told her what had happened. ‘You’ve got yourself in a state,’ she said, shaking her head, as if she’d known I would. ‘Leave it to me.’
A few hours later the door to my bedroom opened softly. ‘Anna,’ Kitty said. ‘There’s someone here to see you.’
Sasha sat on the edge of my bed. ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘I heard you were struggling.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ I told her. ‘I should have listened to you.’
‘You need to trust me.’
‘I know. I will. I do.’
‘Promise?’ she said. ‘Because it’s hard to be friends, otherwise. I have to look after myself, too, and if you don’t trust me it’s damaging to me. It means we’re not connecting properly.’
‘I promise,’ I said. ‘I absolutely swear it.’
‘I missed you,’ she said, and my heart felt full.
19
TUESDAY
Hal
Hal makes his way down the path leading towards the nature reserve at Lancaut and Jen follows. They pass some of the search team, heading up in the opposite direction, looking hot and tired. The path is steep and strewn with loose stones. Occasionally, his foot slips. He’s grateful for the shade cast by the trees. On a different day, if he was making the trip for a different reason, he would stop and admire the beauty, but not today.
