Her Last Tomorrow

Chapter 6

6 Tasha

Fuck, f**k, f**k. That’s the only thing I can think right now. Everything’s a noisy blur. Part of me is so angry at Nick. All he had to do was get Ellie ready for school and drop her at the gate. Even he could manage that. She’s probably just gone for a wander, I tell myself. She’s probably somewhere inside the house or in the garden, or she’s gone to a friend’s house. Children don’t get kidnapped. Not really. Not from people like us.

Besides which, I imagine Nick hasn’t looked properly. He’ll have done what he usually does and just panicked, unable to deal with even the simplest of situations. And now I’m going to miss the conference and I’m going to miss the Maxxon meeting. I might be able to reschedule the meeting, but the conference is going to go on regardless, whether I’m there or not. It’s always a juggling act, and it’s one I always seem to lose. I sacrificed spending at least a bit of the morning with Ellie in order to make this conference, and now I’m going to miss that, too. She’s growing up without me as it is. I’d love to be able to see her off at the school gate in the morning and be there when she comes out in the afternoon, but if I did that we wouldn’t have a roof over our heads. I’m losing the present by providing for the future.

I slide my train ticket into the slot on the barrier and it throws it straight back out the top, the red light flashing and bleeping at me. I try again and get the same result. I fight my way back through the crowd of people tutting behind me and make my way over to the man on the gate. He looks thoroughly bored and fed up. I know how he feels.

‘My ticket won’t let me through,’ I say, handing it to him.

‘It’s a receipt,’ he says. ‘You need to insert your ticket.’

I clench my teeth. I just want to get home. Now. I look at the ticket. It’s definitely a credit card receipt. I go into my purse again and look for the ticket. I can’t find it. ‘Look, there’s been an emergency,’ I say. ‘My daughter. I’ve got to get back earlier than I planned. I don’t know where my ticket is, but I’ve got the receipt so you can see I’ve bought one.’

‘Sorry,’ the ticket inspector says. ‘That doesn’t tell me anything. Just shows how much you paid.’

‘Exactly. So you can see it’s not for just one journey, can’t you?’

‘Sorry,’ he repeats. ‘I can’t let you through without a valid ticket. You’ll have to buy another one from the ticket office.’

I clench my hand around the receipt, which is now a complete waste, scrunch it up and throw it in the man’s direction. I know instantly he could probably order me to pick it up or have me ejected from the station – or worse – but I think he can see the frustration and desperation on my face as he calmly bends down and picks it up himself.

A few minutes and sixteen pounds later, I’ve got my ticket and I make my way back through the barriers – successfully this time – avoiding making eye contact with the man on the gate.

It seems to take an interminable time for the train to arrive, but the clock tells me it’s only three minutes. I get on and find a seat, most of them littered with half-read newspapers and coffee cups.

The train seems to be on the go-slow. They always are around here, but the one time I want it to be quicker, it’s not happening. If I could get off and run, I would. I glance down at my phone for what must be the twentieth time since I left London. There’s no signal. I keep on at Nick to get our contracts changed and to move on to a provider which actually covers our area of the country properly, but I’m not holding my breath. I’ve got a signal at home and at work, but that’s about it. The countryside in between is a no-go area.

I look at my watch. It should be forty minutes or so before I get to my stop, and then I’ve got to walk home. It might be quicker in a cab, but that depends on traffic. It’ll be a complete waste of time anyway. He’ll probably have found her by the time I get back, which will mean waiting for another train back into London and missing the conference altogether. Not to mention the extra expense. I just wish for once in his life he could make himself useful and stop making mine even harder than it already is. I’ll get home, we’ll find her, and my day will be wasted.

It’s not long before I realise this isn’t me getting annoyed at what I anticipate happening; it’s wishful thinking. I want it all to be a complete waste of time. I want it all to be Nick’s fault. I want him to find her before I get home. Because if none of that happens, that means only one thing: it means our baby is gone.