‘I want you to rest this afternoon,’ he told her. ‘Promise me you’ll stay away from that damned laptop and take it easy.’ His tone was forceful, almost angry, but Mandy understood that behind his emotion was his concern for her.
‘Okay, I promise,’ she said.
TWELVE
But it was a promise soon broken. Too restless to stay away from the computer, Mandy felt herself being drawn back to spend time reading back through the pages of Orgasm of Blood.
The strangest thing was that she could now barely remember having written a word of it. ‘That’s because you didn’t,’ she said out loud with a bitter chuckle. ‘Jessica Lomax did.’
Whatever the case, it was finished. Nothing more could be done except put the thing out live on Amazon and see whether anyone out there would actually want to read it. Closing down the file for the last time, she opened up her new Amazon self-publishing account, went through the file upload procedure, and within minutes the publication process had begun.
‘There,’ she said. For better or for worse, it was done.
She emailed Chester to tell him, then turned off the computer and finally tore herself away from the desk. There was a sick feeling in her stomach. She didn’t feel well, and it wasn’t the wine.
She spent a long while staring out of the window. It was getting colder. Autumn was taking a tighter hold over the landscape, trees that had looked golden and radiant in the sunshine just days before now were starting to seem gaunt and bare. The sight somehow made her feel uneasy.
As the afternoon wore on and the sky darkened, all Mandy wanted to do with herself was curl up and sleep. Just to be alone. She regretted having arranged to meet Todd at the pub later. She lay on the sofa, listening to the wind outside the window and the creaking and rattling of the old house all around her.
The dog whimpered in the dark room. She realised she’d forgotten all about his walk, felt rotten about neglecting the poor creature. Forcing herself to get up, she donned her coat and boots, grabbed the torch, and they set off.
The wind drove the mist like smoke across the meadow and blew Mandy’s hair over her face and into her eyes as she walked through the long, wet grass. She swept the bobbing torch-beam in front of her, trying to keep Buster in sight as he ran on ahead in the darkness. Seeing him halt to cock his leg on a bush, she took advantage of the pause to gaze back at the dim shape of Summer Cottage, sixty or seventy yards away through the mist.
Despite everything, she told herself, she loved her new home. She needed to be here and would never want to leave.
Uncertainty scratched at the back of her mind as she walked on, but she didn’t have time to dwell long on her doubts. Up ahead, Buster suddenly stiffened and then took off in pursuit of something he’d spotted. The torch beam caught a flurry of movement across the dark meadow: a rabbit or a hare, racing off madly through the grass. Buster tore after it, and in seconds both he and his quarry were lost in the darkness.
Mandy yelled his name, shone the torch this way and that, but couldn’t see him. Her fear was that he’d streak right across the fields to the road in the distance and get hit by a car. Cursing, she started running in the direction in which he’d disappeared. The ground was rough; what from her windows looked like a smooth expanse of lush green and wildflowers was in fact full of ruts and rabbit holes, concealed in the long grass and all too easy to stumble over. To make matters worse, the batteries in her torch were beginning to fade, the beam turning a sour sepia yellow in the thickening mist.
‘Buster! Come! Buster!’
No sign of him. She stumbled on.
Relief flooded through her moments later as the fading torchlight picked out his little white shape not far ahead. Whether the rabbit had got away from him or whether he’d suddenly lost interest in it, he’d given up the chase and was standing still in the long grass.
Standing very still. Watching something. Fixated, rigid.
As she approached, she saw his whole body was trembling, his tail sticking straight out behind him and quivering like an arrow.
She turned to look in the direction he was staring so intently. And then she saw it, too.
Summer Cottage was shrouded in mist a little over a hundred yards away, its windows glowing amber through the darkness. Mandy’s bedroom window was one of the most visible from this spot. The light was on and the curtains open.
A figure stood at the window. Just a shape, silhouetted against the dim light of the room. Looking out.
Looking out at Mandy.
A cold shudder pierced her and made the fading torch tremble in her hand.
Buster began to growl, then to whimper.
A drifting pocket of mist obscured the house for just a moment; when it passed by, the figure had drawn back from the window and could no longer be seen.
It was almost eight-twenty, and Todd was sitting in his usual place near the fire in the Fox and Hounds. He took another sip from his pint of ale, wondering where Mandy was.
He wouldn’t have been worried, if she hadn’t been acting so strangely. It was beginning to dawn on him how little he really knew this woman: he had to remind himself that they’d only just met. Was she always like this, so highly strung and prone to extreme bouts of nervousness? She might well be, he had to admit to himself.
Todd hated to think it, but he was actually looking forward to his trip to Cornwall, just to get away. It’d be good to have some time apart because, frankly, she was driving him around the twist with all this tension. Was it the stress of moving house, taking on the responsibility of a big place as a single self-employed person with no guaranteed income? Or perhaps it was simply normal behaviour for writers; he’d never known one before, after all. Maybe, he mused, that was just the price they paid for being creative, for delving into the dark recesses of their own minds. God knew there was obviously some dark stuff going on in Mandy’s. He’d been more shocked by the content of her new book than he’d been willing to let on.
But, as he fervently hoped, things might settle. For all he knew, when he returned from Cornwall he’d find that her pre-publication nerves, or post-move jitters, or whatever the hell was going on, were done with and she’d get over this weird phase.
It had to be that way. He truly cared about her, and wanted nothing more than for this relationship to survive and develop.
Fifteen more minutes went by before Todd saw her enter the pub. Spotting where he was sitting she hurried over to his table. Right away, he knew that something was up. She looked flushed, flustered and very angry.
‘Put down your drink, Todd,’ she said breathlessly.
‘What are you talking about? Why?’
‘Because I want you to come with me. I want you to witness something.’
She was heading for the door before he could say another word, motioning urgently for him to follow. He went after her, bemused. Outside the pub, he saw she’d left her Kia parked on Main Street with the engine still running. The dog was sitting in the back, nose to the glass.
‘Get in,’ she said to Todd, like a command.
He shook his head. ‘First you tell me what this is about. You’re acting really odd, Mandy.’
‘Trust me. Please. I’m begging you. I need you there.’ Her look of rage melted away to one of pleading, and by the light of the streetlamp he could see tears welling up in her eyes. She clutched at his hand, leading him towards the car.