_OceanofPDF.com_The_Girl_on_the_Train_-_Paula_Hawkins

It’s darker still, I’m sure of it, but I look up and Kamal is there, his
eyes on mine, his expression soft. He’s listening. He wants me to tell
him. My mouth is dry, so I take another sip of wine. It hurts to swallow.
“We called her Elizabeth. Libby.” It feels so strange, saying her name out
loud after such a long time. “Libby,” I say again, enjoying the feel of her
name in my mouth. I want to say it over and over. Kamal reaches out at
last and takes my hand in his, his thumb against my wrist, on my pulse.
“One day we had a fight, Mac and I. I don’t remember what it was
about. We did that every now and again—little arguments that blew up
into big ones, nothing physical, nothing bad like that, but we’d scream at
each other and I’d threaten to leave, or he’d just walk out and I wouldn’t
see him for a couple of days.
“It was the first time it had happened since she was born—the first
time he’d just gone off and left me. She was just a few months old. The
roof was leaking. I remember that: the sound of water dripping into
buckets in the kitchen. It was freezing cold, the wind driving off the sea;
it had been raining for days. I lit a fire in the living room, but it kept
going out. I was so tired. I was drinking just to warm up, but it wasn’t
working, so I decided to get into the bath. I took Libby in with me, put
her on my chest, her head just under my chin.”
The room gets darker and darker until I’m there again, lying in the
water, her body pressing against mine, a candle flickering just behind my
head. I can hear it guttering, smell the wax, feel the chill of the air
around my neck and shoulders. I’m heavy, my body sinking into the
warmth. I’m exhausted. And then suddenly the candle is out and I’m
cold. Really cold, my teeth chattering in my head, my whole body
shaking. The house feels like it’s shaking, too, the wind screaming,
tearing at the slates on the roof.
“I fell asleep,” I say, and then I can’t say any more, because I can feel
her again, no longer on my chest, her body wedged between my arm and
the edge of the tub, her face in the water. We were both so cold.
For a moment, neither of us move. I can hardly bear to look at him,
but when I do, he doesn’t recoil from me. He doesn’t say a word. He puts
his arm around my shoulder and pulls me to him, my face against his
chest. I breathe him in and I wait to feel different, to feel lighter, to feel
better or worse now that there is another living soul who knows. I feel
relieved, I think, because I know from his reaction that I have done the
right thing. He isn’t angry with me, he doesn’t think I’m a monster. I am
safe here, completely safe with him.