The Summer Seekers

“He was too drunk to know anything.”

Sean laughed. “I was going to suggest buying you a scary dog with an extra row of teeth, but nothing could be scarier than the sight of you brandishing a skillet in a nightdress. If the press got hold of the story, you’d be the headline.”

Liza clutched the cloth she was holding so tightly that the blood fled from her fingers. “She could have been killed, Sean.”

“But I wasn’t.” Kathleen was calm. “And if that had been the end of me—well, so be it. I will not sell this place. If you really want to do something useful, you can look for Popeye. He’s missing.”

“I’ll do that.” Sean stood, apparently grateful for something that gave him an excuse to leave the house.

“I’m going to spend the morning going through this room,” Liza said. “Clearing the bookshelves. They haven’t been touched in decades.”

Kathleen bristled. “I’d rather wrestle another intruder than throw out books.”

“But there has to be stuff here you’ll never read again.”

“Possibly. But if we throw it out we remove the option. And there is no reason to clear them. I’ve already told you—”

“You’re not selling the house. I know. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a good idea to occasionally have a clear out. We don’t have to rush any decisions.” Liza clearly wasn’t going to give up and Kathleen decided that the simplest solution was to allow her daughter to load a few things into boxes. It would give her a feeling of control, and Kathleen could always unload them again after she’d gone.

“In that case you can start on those shelves in the corner.”

The morning passed, bathed in tension rather than a companionable silence.

Occasionally Liza would hold up a book. “This one?”

“Keep it,” Kathleen would say, or “put it in the box.”

Sean returned, but with the news that Popeye was nowhere to be found. “He’s probably off exploring.”

Kathleen had never thought she’d find reason to envy her cat.

On the other hand if a one-eyed, three-legged cat could go exploring, why couldn’t she? There were no rules that demanded a person be in perfect condition in order to travel beyond one’s own walls.

Liza was sorting through photo albums, flicking through the pages. “There’s a lovely one here of you with Dad.” She put it to one side and picked up the next book. “This must be one of your earliest albums.” She turned a page and smiled. “Here’s your graduation photo. Look at your hair! Why haven’t I seen these before?”

“Because I tend to focus more on the present than the past.” It was Brian who had put the photos into albums. Brian who had turned their house into a home and their little trio into a family. Kathleen had taken thousands of photographs of her travels, but they were stored in boxes in her study.

“Who are these two?” Liza pointed and Kathleen walked across the room and looked over her shoulder.

Emotion lodged in her throat.

She should have destroyed the photo.

“Mum?”

“Mmm?”

“The two other people in the photo. Who are they?”

“Friends. We were all on the same course at college. The three of us were inseparable. That was taken in Oxford.”

“The guy is very good-looking. What was his name?”

“Adam.” Did her voice sound normal? “His name was Adam.”

“And the girl?”

“Ruth.” Her voice most definitely didn’t sound normal. “She was my roommate.” My closest friend.