_OceanofPDF.com_The_Girl_on_the_Train_-_Paula_Hawkins

beyond. I glance to my right and notice that the photographs are gone, all
of them. There’s a prickle at the back of my scalp, the hairs on my
forearms raised. I sip my coffee and struggle to swallow. None of this is
right.
Maybe his mother did it: cleared everything out, took the pictures
away. His mother didn’t like Megan, he’s said that over and over. Still,
who does what he did last night? Who fucks a strange woman in the
marital bed when his wife has been dead less than a month? He turns
then, he looks at me, and I feel as though he’s read my mind because he’s
got a strange look on his face—contempt, or revulsion—and I’m
repulsed by him, too. I put the mug down.
“I should go,” I say, and he doesn’t argue.
The rain has stopped. It’s bright outside, and I’m squinting into hazy
morning sunshine. A man approaches me—he’s right up in my face the
moment I’m on the pavement. I put my hands up, turn sideways and
shoulder-barge him out of the way. He’s saying something but I don’t
hear what. I keep my hands raised and my head down, so I’m barely five
feet away from her when I see Anna, standing next to her car, hands on
hips, watching me. When she catches my eye she shakes her head, turns
away and walks quickly towards her own front door, almost but not quite
breaking into a run. I stand stock-still for a second, watching her slight
form in black leggings and a red T-shirt. I have the keenest sense of déjà
vu. I’ve watched her run away like this before.
It was just after I moved out. I’d come to see Tom, to pick up
something I’d left behind. I don’t even remember what it was, it wasn’t
important, I just wanted to go to the house, to see him. I think it was a
Sunday, and I’d moved out on the Friday, so I’d been gone about fortyeight
hours. I stood in the street and watched her carrying things from a
car into the house. She was moving in, two days after I’d left, my bed not
yet cold. Talk about unseemly haste. She caught sight of me and I went
towards her. I have no idea what I was going to say to her—nothing
rational, I’m sure. I was crying, I remember that. And she, like now, ran
away. I didn’t know the worst of it then—she wasn’t yet showing.
Thankfully. I think it might have killed me.
Standing on the platform, waiting for the train, I feel dizzy. I sit down
on the bench and tell myself it’s just a hangover—nothing to drink for
five days and then a binge, that’ll do it. But I know it’s more than that.
It’s Anna—the sight of her and the feeling I got when I saw her walking
away like that. Fear.