The Dinner Guest by B Walter (best short books to read txt) 📕

agree,’ she said. ‘A young lad on the estate where I live literally collided with me the other day. He was swaying to music on his headphones, his eyes almost closed. Didn’t seem to care about anyone around him.’

My mother nodded enthusiastically. ‘Yes, exactly, I—’

Then she stopped. We all looked over to her, wondering why she had her fork paused in the air, her head slightly to the side, her eyes fixed on Rachel.

‘Er … Mum?’ I said, both a little embarrassed and worried. Was this the sign of a seizure or a stroke? Or the onset of Alzheimer’s?

Her face then relaxed a little. ‘Sorry,’ she said, glancing at me, then turning her gaze back to Rachel. ‘I just … do you know, my dear, it’s the strangest thing, but I feel like we’ve met before.’

I saw a flash of something flicker across Rachel’s face. Then she smiled and gave a little laugh. ‘Oh, I don’t think so. I must just have one of those faces. The type that just looks like everyone. I get mistaken for people in shops sometimes. For someone’s sister or cousin and the like.’ She picked up another scoop of pasta with her fork and started to eat.

My mother was still staring at her. ‘Yes … yes, well. That must be it.’

I met Matthew’s eyes across the table, and I gave him a minute shrug to say, Not sure what that’s all about. He was quick to move the conversation on, telling Titus that his gran had dropped him round some of the Anne Boleyn biographies he’d been after. The subject then slid into a discussion about studying history and coursework and how Rachel was never a fan of it when she was at school, and things started to ease a bit.

But I couldn’t help notice, all through the rest of dinner, my mother’s eyes occasionally wander over to Rachel and linger on her face. As if she were pondering an unusual painting in a gallery that she couldn’t quite grasp the meaning of. And her words continued to echo round in my head for the rest of the evening. It’s the strangest thing, but I feel like we’ve met before.

Chapter Fifteen Charlie

The day after the murder

After my strange, flu-like sleep the night before, I wake up feeling surprisingly well, though a little dazed. I sit on my bed, waiting for the nausea, the crushing grief, the panicky breathing, but none of it arrives. I go and pee and then shower in the guest room en suite. My room here in Wilton Crescent always feels like one of the guest rooms. Never quite ‘my room’, even though I’ve slept in the same one whenever I’ve stayed since my mother moved here nearly twenty years ago. My childhood bedroom in the house in St George’s Square where my father resides still feels like ‘my room’, although I can’t remember the last time I slept there. It may well be over a decade.

The steam and heat from the shower does little to shift the odd, numbing dreamlike state I’m in. When I’m back in the bedroom, I sit still in the chair by the window for a few seconds more, trying to find some clarity in my clouded brain. The feeling of waking up without my husband near me, without him passing some comment on the day ahead, some reason to look forward to an evening together or event we’re going to, some light bickering about something stupid, something trivial … all of it has been part of my mornings for so long, I feel like I’ve been untethered, waking up here in my mother’s house knowing that previous life has for ever been lost.

I go to the drawers at the other end of the room. They’re filled with clothes, all perfectly ironed and folded, although some of them date back to my teenage years. I pull on some boxers and jeans I don’t think I’ve worn since I was twenty, along with a light-pink shirt that’s slightly tight across the chest (I had a sharp, skinny frame until I discovered resistance training in my twenties). I then go downstairs, the hallway carpet soft against my bare feet, the creak of the floor announcing my arrival to my mother.

‘I’m in the kitchen,’ she calls out.

I go inside to find her taking out a tray of croissants from the oven. ‘Palomar nipped out to Waitrose to get us some supplies, but I sent her home afterwards,’ she says by way of explaining why she is preparing breakfast herself, instead of allowing her housekeeper to do it. ‘We can handle cooking and light laundry by ourselves, and then when your father gets home, we’ll go to Braddon.’

I nod. ‘I’m sure we’ll survive cooking for ourselves.’ It is obvious Palomar has been given an impromptu holiday because Mum wants to be able to talk freely without risk of being overheard. There is always the chance the police will want to interview her at some point, especially when they clock that she’s in a prime position to eavesdrop on us all while we’re gathered under one roof. ‘Where’s Titus? And Dad? When is his flight?’

I see a tightness pinch my mother’s face. She’s choosing how much to tell me. ‘Titus is still asleep, and your father is on his way. He’s just getting some work done beforehand.’

I stare at her. ‘Some work done? The murder of his son-in-law isn’t enough of an emergency for him?’

My mother’s eyes continue to bore into mine. ‘Yes. Important work. Important people.’

I sit down on one of the tall chairs at the breakfast bar. I haven’t got the energy to question her further on this, and my mother turns back to the sink. The gleaming modern kitchen is very different from the old design my father has in the St George’s Square property. Mum’s style and appreciation of the new-yet-homely feel to houses is something I’ve always shared with her. My father,