Free The Moment You Were Gone by Nicci Gerrard Page B

cappuccino and an almond pastry and sat at a table near the window, easing off her jacket and settling back. She almost felt that she could go to sleep right now – put her arms on the table, rest her face on them, close her eyes. She drank some frothy coffee, licking the foam off her lips; took a bite of the pastry and chewed it slowly. She wondered what Ethan was doing right now. She saw his face as he’d told her about Rosie, and wanted to race back and hug him tight and tell him she would make everything all right, knowing that those days were years in the past. He had said it had been a good childhood, but had it really? Had she been a good enough mother? She’d been chaotic, forgetful, volatile, haphazard. She remembered all those moments of fatigue and irritation, and the way she had longed for time to herself; she had that now but no longer wanted it. His present-day face – impatient and beautiful – was replaced in her mind by a younger one, red-eyed and beseeching. His hands used to be dimpled at the knuckles. His belly used to be plump, his body like a sack of flour, changing shape in her arms.
    She drank more cappuccino to steady herself, took another bite of the pastry. People poured past the window, like figures in a home movie, grainy and slightlyout of focus. She wished she could go back to the beginning and do it properly, do it perfectly, do it again.
    Ethan sat in his room, among the bin bags and boxes. He should put everything away, but he knew he wasn’t going to. Probably they’d be piled up in the middle of his room for weeks. Why not? He could take clothes out of his cases, then put them into a bin bag when they were dirty; when the case was empty, he’d go to the laundrette, which he could see from the window. It seemed like an efficient arrangement. And he could pick out books and CDs as he wanted. He leant back against the bed, pulled his iPod out of his backpack, plugged in the earpieces and turned it on. ‘This is the first day of my life,’ a light-timbred voice sang inside his head. ‘Remember the time you drove all night just to meet me …’ H e winced and skipped to the next track, drank his tepid tea, then finished Gaby’s. He put the two empty mugs on top of the tennis racket, beside the bag of shoes, and lit a cigarette.
    If his father was here, he thought, tapping ash with a hiss into one of the mugs, he would be putting everything away at once, finding a place for all of Ethan’s possessions, trying to turn the room into another home. He could imagine his frowning, concentrated face; the precision with which he organized things. He could be very purposeful, his father, like many of the adults Ethan knew. He strode through his days as if they were a road that led to a known destination and he mustn’t turn aside or let himself be delayed. But Ethan liked the sense he had now of floating in the currents of this day, sitting in a heap in the warm room and having no idea of wherehe should be heading and no particular desire to head anywhere. He could find a bar and stay there until it closed, nursing a beer and listening to other people’s conversation; he could take a bath; he could knock on one of the doors in this corridor of identical rooms and make a gesture towards friendship; he could cook a meal at midnight, smoke a joint, cycle round the city with the map Gaby had pushed into the side pocket of his backpack, go to sleep in this small, warm space, sitting on the carpet with his knees up in a bridge, and only rise as it got dark. Anything was possible.
    He lit another cigarette, drew the smoke into his lungs, let it out in a dissipating bluish cloud. He thought of his mother’s face as she left, screwed up in an effort to be cheerful. Then he reached over and took the pack of playing cards out of his backpack. He dealt columns and started to play patience, as his father had taught him many years ago. He must have played it hundreds, thousands, of times. He’d played