Breathe You In (2 page)

After piling my hair high, I wandered into
the kitchen. The kettle was just coming to the boil when I heard the letterbox
rattle. My heart gave a familiar flip. I’d been waiting nearly eight weeks to
hear back from Brian Davis. Would today be the day?

The brown hessian doormat held the usual
bills and junk mail, but there was one slim white envelope with my name, Katie
Lansdale, printed on the front. Quickly, I ripped it open, pulled out a sheet
of paper and saw the words
Brian Davis,
Private Detective
, written in bold print at the top.

I juddered in a breath, willed myself to
keep calm, not to tear the paper in my urgency to unfold and read. My knees
were weak so I headed into the kitchen, forced myself to lay the letter on the
table and then made a cup of tea. The ritual of milk, sugar and stirring settled
my movements if not my nerves.

Questions without answers spun in my head
like a sticky web, each one leading to the next, but not if you couldn’t
navigate the way. Would Brian have found anything out about the man who stomped
through my thoughts? Had that man even survived this long? And if so, where was
he now? In Britain? Europe? The other side of the world?

Eventually, tea made, kitchen door flung
open to the back garden and the doves now pecking on the patio, I sat at our
round kitchen table and unfolded the letter. The impulse to just scan the
sentences was strong, but I controlled it and started from the beginning,
slowly, each word forming in my head.

Dear
Mrs. Lansdale,

Further
to our meeting on the 2
^nd
of May, I have undertaken an investigation.
Your request was unusual and did pose some ethical issues, but it seems fate has
been on our side and I’ve found the man you seek.

He’d found him! I took a sip of tea, holding
it over the table but away from the letter
—
my hand was shaking and I didn’t want to spill a drop and risk blurring
any precious words.

His
name is Ruben Strong, and as you were already aware he is thirty-three years
old.

From
what I can gather he is doing extremely well health-wise. He is a UK resident
and lives in Northampton, England, working as a curator in the town’s park
museum.

Since,
as we discussed, address details cannot be revealed from health service
documents, that is the extent of the information I can share. I trust that will
satisfy your curiosity and have enclosed an invoice for the remainder of my fee,
which should be settled within three weeks.

Yours
sincerely

Brian
Davis

Personal
Investigative Services.

“Ruben Strong.” The name sounded hard and alien
on my lips and so different from melodic Matthew Lincoln Lansdale. Yet he had a
part of Matt, he
was
a part of Matt.
I re-read the letter, soaking up the information anew. Northampton. That was
only an hour away from Leicester. In fact, I was pretty sure the cosmetic shop
I worked for had a branch in the town center there. Here was me thinking he
could be anywhere in the world and he was only forty miles away.

And after all this time he was doing well.
That was good, wasn’t it? Yes, of course it was. It meant something positive
had come out of the senselessness of Matt’s death. He was dead, but someone
else was alive. Not just alive but ‘doing extremely well’.

I read the letter twice more then picked
up my tea and stood in the doorway, my shoulder huddled against the frame as I
sipped and stared out at the garden.

The doves sat side-by-side on the wooden
bench, fussing each other’s feathers. The sun beat down on my dry and crinkled
lawn—I’d been unkind to it and had forgotten to put the sprinkler on
night after night. Matt would have remembered
—
he was good like that.

But I didn’t linger on the withered grass;
instead, I wondered if Ruben Strong was like his name. Strong, big and tough.
Not likely, not if he’d needed a new heart and lungs. Maybe he’d had formidable
strength once, but perhaps he’d always been sickly. He could have spent thirty-three
years hoping someone would die in tragic circumstances so he’d get the chance
of a normal life.

What must that feel like, to hope a
stranger dies so you can live?

A bitter taste sat in my mouth. The tea wouldn’t
wash it away. It was the unfairness of it that was sour. Why did anyone need to
die or be ill in the first place? Young men, all in the prime of their lives,
taken or about to be taken. I shut my eyes and tipped my face to the sky,
wondered: What divine creator would dream up such unfair scenarios?

The sun beat down on me, unrelenting,
unconcerned, just blistering. The neighbor thankfully turned off his cranky old
mower.

I sighed then took a deep breath. The scent
of summer filtered toward me; the pink roses that sat beneath the kitchen
window were in full bloom. Matt had planted them on our first anniversary, and
they were content in their south-facing position. I decided to cut several
stems for the table—that was a normal thing to do, wasn’t it? Have a vase
of flowers in the kitchen?

I swapped my empty mug for a pair of
scissors and set about snipping. The velvety petals were a delicate baby pink
and smaller than usual roses. Their heads were dainty and didn’t droop with
weight. I gathered a dozen or so and stepped back into the shade of the house,
already feeling a drip of perspiration in my cleavage.

After reaching for a glass vase then
filling it with water, I dropped the stems in.

“Ouch. Bugger!” A thorn had caught on the
inside of my index finger. Quickly, I sucked the drip of blood, pulling it into
my mouth to take away the sting. As I stared at the haphazardly landed roses,
an urge rushed into me. It was like getting hit by a moving object. It railroaded
through my chest, swirled up that weight in my stomach, hurricane-style, and
sent my heart rate rocketing.

I’d been a fool. A damn fool to think just
knowing his name and where he worked would be enough. Didn’t I know anything
about myself? Had I learned nothing about grief and its obsessive, dark,
manipulative nature?

It was obvious I hadn’t, because one thing
was as sure as every rose having thorns, and if the thorn in our marriage had
been Matt’s death, then the thorn in me now was that I’d be unable to rest
until I’d seen Ruben Strong.

The time it took from the first gush of my
desire to see Ruben Strong to arriving at the museum in Northampton was exactly
two hours. One and a quarter of those hours had been in the stuffy heat of my
car. Fifteen minutes applying a sweep of make-up, earrings and taming my hair
—
regular things to do, and people always seemed glad that I’d made an
effort
—
and the other thirty had been lurking in
the park surrounding the museum, assessing the stern brick-built building. Not
actually entering, just observing and beating down a wave of nerves and
wondering if I had the courage to go through with my plan.

I knew I could be rash, impulsive, and act
without thinking. Matt had always said it was one of the things he adored about
me, my sense of adventure, but I wasn’t so sure what he’d think now. Was I
being foolish and irresponsible? Setting myself up for more heartache when already
I’d had quite enough?

A bench, the farthest edge in the shade of
a huge pink rhododendron bush, offered a vantage point to the front of the
museum and around the side toward a long drive and ornate metal gates. It
didn’t look particularly big, this collection of Northampton artifacts, nothing
like the colossal London or Birmingham museums I’d been to. But it was a decent
size, perhaps twenty or so sash windows over two levels, a green front door
propped open with a big iron cobbler and a shallow roof that I suspected housed
a dusty attic.

Summoning bravery and firming my resolution,
I walked onto the gravel pathway, the crunch echoing from my soles to my ears.
I darted my gaze about looking for a man who’d suit the name Ruben Strong. But
the hotness of the day had sent most people scurrying indoors. Two weeks into a
heatwave
and the novelty of sun worshipping had worn
off for most people.

I took a seat at the end of the bench, in
the shade, and watched as a couple of mothers with babes in prams approached. A
gaggle of young children wandered behind them, licking melting ice creams and
with their sunhats skew whiff. They meandered lazily, not a care in the world,
and for a moment a pang of jealousy hit me. The desire to be like that again, absorbed
and content with an ice cream and a trip to the park was almost overwhelming.
How long ago had it been since I’d felt carefree? How wrong I’d been when I’d
truly thought pushing a pram with Matt’s child inside it was part of my
destiny.

They ambled off, leaving me alone as far
as I could make out. The shrill call of what sounded like a peacock made me
jump. I glanced over my shoulder, looking for it as I shooed a bug that was
attracted to my lemony-colored dress. I hated big birds; the doves were fine,
but anything bigger just gave me the creeps.

I should go into the park museum. That’s
why I’d come here. To see him. Nothing else, just to catch a glimpse, spot him
from a distance, satisfy my curiosity about what he was like. But how would I
know who he was? What if there were lots of men in their thirties working here?
Maybe there were hundreds? Well, no, not hundreds, but perhaps three or four.

Taking a deep breath, I stood and
tightened the strap of my handbag over my shoulder. I had to do it. What would
be the point in turning around and driving all that way back up the motorway?
It would be a waste of time and petrol, not to mention I’d hate myself when I
got home for wimping out. I could just picture how my evening would go. There’d
be the usual moping around and tears, forcing myself to eat, because people
always asked if I had, but on top of that there would also be moments when I’d
just want to kick myself or bang my head against the wall in frustration. Then
I’d be planning a trip back to Northampton tomorrow. I’d suffer this all over
again.

No, I had no choice. I had to see this through.
There wasn’t one part of me that wouldn’t. I had to at least try to get a peek
of him, this man who had a piece of what was mine, a very important piece too.

I smoothed my dress, checked the front
hadn’t tugged too low, which it was prone to these days, then walked toward the
front entrance.

The peacock screeched again, and I spotted
it this time, out of the corner of my eye. It was parading on the lawn with its
tail feathers spread and the dotty-eyed pattern shimmering in the sunshine. It
appeared to be looking straight at me—not only that, it was strutting
toward the same door I was. I hurried a little, not wanting it to get too close
but also quite fascinated by its haughty beauty and exquisite coloring.

The moment I stepped into the cool hallway
a dense silence enveloped me and thoughts of the peacock left my mind. Coolness
drifted over my shoulders and arms and clung there. I paused to let my eyes adjust
after the dazzling outdoors and allowed the stillness that only museums seemed
to emit soak into me.

“Good afternoon.” A female voice.

I swallowed; my mouth was dry. I licked my
lips and teeth. “Hello.”

A middle-aged lady sat behind a low desk that
held a cash register, several books of various sizes and a stack of leaflets,
one of which she was offering my way.

“Would you like a map, dear?”

“Yes, thank you.” I took the fold of
glossy paper. I had words on my tongue and questions that sat heavily in my
throat. Did she know Ruben Strong? Did he indeed work here? Was he on duty
today? How was he?

But I said nothing. Instead, I pressed my
lips together and bided my time. What if she said yes and quickly went to get
him? What the hell would I say? I didn’t want to speak to him. I just needed to
see him from afar. To be sure he was fit and healthy and that what he had of
Matt’s was serving him well, and that he was serving it well too. That was
important to me.

“Most people start through that way,” the
lady behind the counter said, pointing to her left.

I noticed she had on a name badge with a
tiny picture of the museum and the name Ethel next to it in bold black print.

“Okay, thanks.”

“Hot out there, isn’t it?” She picked up
another leaflet and fanned it in front of her face.

“It is, yes. Do I,
er
,
have to pay or anything?”

“No, no, dear, it’s all free, go and have
a look around and keep out of the midday sun. You know what they say about mad
dogs and Englishmen, but I think these last few weeks has converted us all,
don’t you?”

“Yes, it’s certainly been warm.”

She smiled, and then a phone on the table
trilled to life. “Oh, excuse me, dear. You have a nice little look around now,
any questions just ask a member of staff.” She picked up the phone. “Hello,
Ethel speaking…oh yes, of course…I’ll man this desk while you sort that out
then…the 1940s display, yes, ten minutes, okay.”