Down to Earth

Chapter Four (#ulink_6943eb63-b915-5c67-a837-8df61c4c280a)

The pub toilet wasn’t the ideal place to hide. Apart from being less than hygienic, customers kept coming in to use the facilities to find me alternately splashing cold water onto my face and slapping or pinching myself in the hope that I’d wake up from this terrible nightmare. Most of the ladies coming in and out averted their eyes, though one or two looked at me sympathetically as they washed their hands or touched up their make-up.

Eventually the barman, who turned out to be the pub landlord, called me out and told me the pub was closing for the night.

‘There must be someone you can call,’ he said as he cleared the tables of glasses. I watched, perched on a bar stool as he picked up a discarded local newspaper and tossed it into a blue plastic bin.

‘Don’t throw it away!’ I exclaimed, reaching for the paper and smoothing it out.

‘I wasn’t throwing it away, love, I was recycling it. Look, that’s the recycling bin.’

I spread the paper out on the bar top and peered at the date. He hadn’t struck me as a save-the-planet type of guy, but I didn’t have time to wonder at his idiosyncrasies, because I was staring at the date printed in the top right hand corner of the paper. ‘Monday, 20 October 2008’.

‘Where did this newspaper come from?’ I demanded tremulously.

He shrugged. ‘One of the customers must have brought it in.’

‘Is it a joke or something?’

He stopped in mid-stride, his fingers full of glasses and stared at me suspiciously. ‘In what way might it be a joke?’

‘The date,’ I whispered. Something in his expression stopped me from protesting further and I backtracked quickly, a plausible lie leaping to my lips, ‘Sorry, I lost my reading glasses in the accident and I’m having trouble seeing the small print. This is today’s paper is it?’

He came over and took the paper out of my hand. ‘Of course it is. Look, love, I’ve got to close up and you can’t stay here. I don’t want to throw you out with nowhere to go, but what do you expect me to do with you?’

We stared at one another helplessly for a moment. No amount of prayer was going to help me now, I decided. Tears welled in my eyes and I blinked them furiously back, feeling in the jumpsuit pocket for a tissue, determined not to cry in front of this stranger. But it wasn’t a tissue my fingers located – it was a crumpled piece of paper with a telephone number scribbled in pencil.

‘Matt,’ I breathed.

‘Excuse me?’

‘There is someone else I could try, if you don’t mind letting me use the telephone one more time.’

He waved me towards the back. ‘Be my guest, but make it quick will you?’

I dialled the number with trembling fingers. Matt had only given me his number a couple of hours ago, but those few hours seemed to have turned into half a lifetime.

‘Please answer,’ I begged, shifting from one weary foot to the other as the phone rang in the distance. ‘Please, please pick up.’

And then there was a voice at the end of the line. ‘Hello?’

‘Matt?’

‘Who is this?’

‘It’s Michaela. Michaela Anderson. You gave me your number and asked me to give you a call …’

The silence at the end of the line seemed to stretch into eternity. I thought for a moment I had lost the connection, but then his voice came again, hesitant but clear.

‘Is … is it really you, Michaela?’

‘Yes. You suggested going for a drink sometime, but something has happened and I don’t know how to get home.’

‘Where are you?’

‘I’m in a pub near the airfield – the Royal Oak, I believe.’

‘Wait right there. Do not move, do not talk to anyone. Give me ten minutes and I’ll come and fetch you.’

The line went dead and I turned to find the landlord look -ing at me. ‘Is someone coming for you?’ he asked hopefully.

‘In ten minutes,’ I replied with the faint beginnings of a smile. ‘I’ll be out of your way as soon as he gets here if you don’t mind letting me wait a little while longer.’

The landlord grinned with obvious relief, indicating a seat by the door. ‘Be my guest,’ he said.

It was nearer fifteen minutes when the door opened startling the landlord, who was leaning against a wall, waiting, key in hand, to lock up and go to bed.

My head, which had drooped wearily onto my chest, shot up as the door swung inwards and I saw a figure emerge through the doorway. A tremor of something indefinable flooded through me.

‘Matt?’ My voice came out as a hoarse croak. ‘You … you’ve had your hair cut.’

I knew it was an odd observation to make, considering the circumstances, but not as odd as the fact that although I could see quite clearly that it was Matt, he looked older, had put a little weight on his slim frame and just seemed … different.

And he was staring at me as if I were a ghostly apparition.

‘My God, Michaela … it really is you.’

I opened my mouth to speak, but closed it again in confusion.

He seemed to come to a decision and held out his hand. ‘Come on let’s get you out of here.’

I rose to my feet, ready to follow him goodness knows where but felt a sudden nagging doubt. What was I doing going off with someone I barely knew? I turned to the landlord, but he was holding the door open for me and I realised that I had little choice but to leave with Matt. ‘Thank you so much for letting me wait here, it was very kind of you.’

‘Don’t mention it.’ He yawned widely. ‘I just wish I could remember where I’ve seen you before.’

It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him that he had several posters of my face stuck all over his back walls, but Matt had taken my elbow and was guiding me out into the dark night. He released me as soon as we were outside. I saw a black car parked at the kerb and Matt walked towards it and indicated I should get in.

I would normally never get into a stranger’s car, but the alternative was to continue being lost and alone and that was something I could not contemplate a moment longer, so I slid onto the cream leather upholstery of the front passenger seat and clipped my safety belt into place. The driver’s door opened and Matt climbed in, started the engine and guided the car out onto the road.

‘Where are we going?’

‘I’m taking you straight to the police station.’

My insides gave an involuntary lurch. ‘Why?’

He risked taking his eyes off the road to glance at me. ‘Michaela, you’ve just turned up out of the blue after all this time. Everyone’s been searching for you. We have to let them know you’re back so that they can question you.’

So I had come down in the wrong place and they had been looking for me all day and all evening. My theory that I must have bumped my head and become disorientated was right. ‘Couldn’t it wait until the morning? I’m very tired and I’d rather just go home.’