‘Dylan? He’s been hanging round with him a fair bit.’
I imagine the two of them in the park, drinking from a cheap bottle of cider, my son getting hit by a car as he crosses the road. Or maybe they’re messing about on a railway bridge, daring each other to go over the edge, to dodge an oncoming train.
‘Or Evie. Can’t you call her mother?’
Of course I can’t call her mother, I want to say. I don’t know who her mother is.
Again I see Lukas, this time standing over Connor. I blink the image away.
‘I don’t have her number. You think he’s with her?’
‘I don’t know.’
I think back to the other day, after he left me in the restaurant. He’d been packing his bag. I’m going to see Evie!
‘He’s with her.’ I begin to head up the stairs, towards his bedroom. ‘We need to find her.’
‘We don’t know that—’ says Hugh, but I’m taking the stairs two at a time, already ending the call.
I hesitate in the doorway of my son’s room, looking helplessly for some kind of clue. His bed is unmade, piles of clothes sit unhappily on his desk and chair, an empty glass is by the bed, a plateful of crumbs. He’s become more private in the last few weeks, I guess worried I’ll find a stash of magazines or a semen-encrusted T-shirt thrown under his bed, not realizing that the more private he becomes the harder I find it not to look.
I take a step in, and then stop. I call him again, but this time his phone is switched off. I try a third time, and a fourth, and this time I leave a message: ‘Darling, please call me.’ I try to keep my voice even, to keep everything from it but my concern. I don’t want him to hear anything he might mistake for anger, even for a moment. ‘Just let me know you’re all right?’
I go further into his room. I know why he’s doing this. I’d stopped him from running to Evie that day; now he’s showing me that if he wants to do something he will. There’s nothing I can do about it.
I look in his wardrobe first, then under his bed. Piles of clothes, old trainers, CDs and video games, but the bag isn’t there. He must have taken it to school, already packed. ‘Fuck!’ I say to myself. I stand in the middle of the room in the fading light of the afternoon. I’m drowning, helpless.
I open his computer and navigate first to his emails. There are hundreds, from Molly and Dylan and Sahil and lots of others, yet none from his girlfriend. I try Skype next, and then Facebook. He’s back online, of course. In the search box at the top of the screen I type ‘Evie’.
Her name appears, next to her photograph. It’s a different picture to the one he’s shown me; she looks a little older and is smiling happily. It’s not the girl at Carla’s party, I realize, though they don’t look dissimilar.
But in the background is the Sacré-Coeur.
I feel another tug downwards, another sickening plunge.
It’s nothing, nothing at all. I hear myself talking out loud. Lots of kids have been to Paris. The Sacré-Coeur is somewhere to visit, absolutely on the tourist trail, something to have your photograph taken in front of. It’s just coincidence that it’s also where Lukas proposed to Anna. It has to be.
A moment later the machine pings and a box appears in the bottom of the screen. It’s a new message. From Evie.
– You’re online! it says. Immediately, I’m back in the middle of my affair with Lukas. So many conversations that started with those words, or similar. So many times I let myself be drawn in.
Yet I’d wanted it, at the time. Hadn’t I? I’d wanted it all.
I push the thoughts away. I have to focus. I have to answer Evie’s message.
I remind myself she thinks she’s talking to my son. I could tell her she’s wrong, or I could find out what’s going on.
– Yes! I type.
– On your phone?
For a moment I don’t understand the relevance of her question, but then I realize. She’s assuming he’s not at his computer, not at home.
– Yes.
– I love you.
I don’t know what to say. Again I’m being slammed backwards, into the past, with a ferocity that leaves me breathless.
– Tell me you love me, too.
I have to focus on Connor. This girl thinks she loves him, or tells him so at least.
– I love you, I say.
– You got out of school okay? Are you on your way?
So it’s true. He’s bunking off, he’s gone to meet this girl. I’m about to reply when my phone rings. It sounds way too loud and I startle before snatching it up. ‘Connor?’ I say, but it’s not him. It’s Anna.
‘Julia,’ she says. She sounds hurried, breathless with anxiety, but I can’t deal with her right now. Next to Connor she seems utterly unimportant.
‘I can’t talk now. I’m sorry.’
‘But—’
‘Connor’s missing. It’s complicated. I’ll call you right back, I promise. I’m sorry.’
I end the call before she can reply, then type again.
– Yes. I’m on my way.
– I can’t believe I’m finally going to get to meet you! I can’t believe we’ve found him!
I feel myself contract, my skin pulls tight. Found who?
– Just imagine! After all this time! Your dad!
The trapdoor opens. I plunge.
So this is what he’s been doing? Trying to find his father.
Succeeding.
But how?
I force myself to stay in the present. I have to. I force myself to imagine what my son might write.
– I know! It’s going to be amazing! Where shall I meet you again?
I press send. A moment later she replies.
– At the station, where we arranged! See you there!
I lean forward to type, but a moment later her final message arrives. Three kisses. And then she’s gone.
Fuck, I think. Fuck. Maybe I should have told her who I am, that I’m furious, that she’d better tell me right now where she plans to meet my son.
But now it’s too late. The green dot next to her name has disappeared. She’s offline, and there’s no way of contacting her. I’m stuck, with no idea where my son has gone. The station. It could be anywhere.
The whirring cogs of my mind engage, the engine catches. I can’t afford the descent into despair. I have to stay focussed. I have to find him. Which station, where? There has to be a clue. There’s a pile of papers and magazines on the desk and I riffle through these, then I open the drawer. Nothing. Just pens and pencils, a copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy that Hugh gave him for his birthday a few years ago, a hole-punch and a stapler, a pair of scissors, Post-it notes, the detritus of study.
I stand up, turn round. I take in the football poster above his bed, the scarf over the back of his door. No clue, nowhere obvious to look.
And then I have an idea. I turn back to his computer and a moment later have pulled up his browser history. The first thing I see is a new Twitter account he must have created. @helpmefindmydad. But before I can even absorb what this means, I see, at the top, the last website he looked at. This morning, before school. Eurostar.com.
When I click on the link it takes me to a map of Gare du Nord.
He’s on his way to Paris.
Chapter Thirty-One
I try to tell myself it’s a coincidence, it has nothing to do with Lukas.
But I can’t believe it. Not today of all days. The day he’s due to return to Paris; it can’t be a coincidence that my son is going there, too.
Even if Hugh has spoken to Evie, even if he is sure she’s a girl.
Anna answers after the second ring. ‘Thank God,’ she says.