_OceanofPDF.com_The_Girl_on_the_Train_-_Paula_Hawkins

—Abdic—about the way she was when she came back. There was
something about her, a lightness.” He exhales loudly. “I don’t know.
Maybe I’m imagining it.”
I have the same feeling I did yesterday—that he’s no longer really
talking to me, he’s just talking. I’ve become a sounding board, and I’m
glad of it. I’m glad to be of use to him.
“I’ve spent the whole day going through Megan’s things again,” he
says. “I’ve already searched our room, the whole house, half a dozen
times, looking for something, anything that would give me an indication
as to where she could be. Something from him, perhaps. But there’s
nothing. No emails, no letters, nothing. I thought about trying to contact
him, but the practice is closed today and I can’t find a mobile number.”
“Is that a good idea, do you think?” I ask. “I mean, do you not think
you should just leave him to the police?” I don’t want to say it out loud,
but we must both be thinking it: he’s dangerous. Or at least, he could be
dangerous.
“I don’t know, I just don’t know.” There’s a desperate edge to his
voice that’s painful to hear, but I have no comfort to offer. I can hear his
breathing on the other end of the line; it sounds short, quickened, as
though he’s afraid. I want to ask him if he has someone there with him,
but I can’t: it would sound wrong, forward.
“I saw your ex today,” he says, and I can feel the hairs on my arms
stand up.
“Oh?”
“Yes, I went out for the papers and saw him in the street. He asked me
if I was all right, whether there was any news.”
“Oh,” I repeat, because it’s all I can say, words won’t form. I don’t
want him to speak to Tom. Tom knows that I don’t know Megan
Hipwell. Tom knows that I was on Blenheim Road the night she
disappeared.
“I didn’t mention you. I didn’t . . . you know. I wasn’t sure if I should
have mentioned that I’d met you.”
“No, I don’t think you should have. I don’t know. It might be
awkward.”
“All right,” he says.
After that, there’s a long silence. I’m waiting for my heartbeat to slow.
I think he’s going to ring off, but then he says, “Did she really never talk
about me?”
“Of course . . . of course she did,” I say. “I mean, we didn’t talk all
that often, but—”