First Date: An absolutely jaw-dropping psychological thriller

by Sue Watson

  Alex comes over to me and puts his arm around me. ‘I understand, my work’s confidential too, but you could just go into another room, or I could?’

  ‘No, I don’t want you to feel like you have to leave a room in your own house because I’m working there, it’s not fair on you. And I just need the space, the peace… you know?’

  First Jas, now Alex. All I want is some ‘me’ time to focus on my work and my clients. I’m beginning to feel slightly claustrophobic in my own life.

  ‘Of course, I understand. You need to be alone somewhere quiet to work, it’s the nature of what you do. I can see that,’ he says, finally giving in. He squeezes my upper arm, and kisses my cheek.

  ‘Thanks, sweetie.’ I kiss him back, surprised at how easily he accepted this; he usually doesn’t take no for an answer.

  ‘So you’re going to work from your flat Wednesday and Thursday evening. Is that what you said?’ He’s picking up our mugs.

  ‘Yeah. Well – I’m actually going to work on Thursday night, but I’m going out tomorrow with Jas.’

  He stands up straight, still holding the mugs, still smiling, but it’s slightly stiffer now. ‘You’re going out with Jas? But I thought you had work to do. I thought that’s the whole reason why you’re not staying here.’

  ‘Alex,’ I moan, ‘stop. I just want to spend a couple of nights in my flat. And I can tie it in with a night out with Jas.’

  ‘I don’t understand why you’d want to spend an evening with her and not me. You said last week she was getting on your nerves, that she was bossy.’

  I am exasperated. Can men ever understand the subtleties, the complex bonds, the conflicting feelings around female friendships? ‘Sometimes, I don’t like her. But she’s my best friend, and I love her. It’s difficult to grasp, I know, but we have such a laugh when we’re together, and as I said at the weekend, I’ve been a crap friend and neglected her since I met you.’

  ‘I’m sorry about that,’ he says genuinely.

  ‘No, don’t apologise, it’s my choice, I want to be with you, I’d rather be with you. But I do enjoy her company, and I think she’s feeling abandoned, especially now I’m in a healthy relationship and she’s still going on dates and sleeping with men she doesn’t love. She’s not a bad person, she just hasn’t found what she’s looking for.’

  He puts the mugs back down on the coffee table, sits next to me, pushing his arms around my waist. ‘I’m sorry, I sometimes forget that other people don’t have what we’ve got.’

  I smile, I feel the same, like we’ve known each other forever.

  ‘And I don’t blame Jas for feeling neglected,’ he adds. ‘We both want you to ourselves.’

  I rest my head on his chest. ‘Thanks for understanding.’

  ‘But keep your phone on so I know where you are, won’t you?’

  I nod, grateful he hasn’t turned this into a big deal.

  ‘I could come and collect you both?’ he offers.

  I sigh, it’s like a loop going round in my head, and I’m actually thinking a couple of nights recharging on my own is just what I need. ‘No. No it’s fine – in fact, I thought I might even drive there from work, so Jas won’t put me under pressure to drink. As much as I need to spend some time with her, I also need a clear head at the moment with work.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he says. ‘Makes sense for you to drive.’ As he stands up, takes my hand and leads me upstairs to bed, he adds, ‘Just be careful. If I’m not there to watch you, anything could happen.’

  Chapter Thirty-One

  I come straight to Alex’s after work today like I usually do, but am surprised to see his car in the drive when I arrive – he’s supposed to be working late this week. When I walk in, he’s on the phone, and while I hang my coat up and take off my boots in the hall, I can hear him talking.

  ‘No, she’s not here all day or evening tomorrow, so you could come first thing when she’s gone to work,’ he’s saying. ‘She usually leaves about 7.30 in the morning, so if you come at 8, the coast will be clear…’

  I’m standing on one foot taking my second boot off when I lose my balance and fall against the coat rack.

  He obviously heard as he ends the call and the next minute he’s shouting, ‘Darling! Are you okay?’

  ‘Yeah fine,’ I say, embarrassed and, after gathering myself together, go into the kitchen, where he’s put down the phone and has started dinner. The coast will be clear, he’d said. Has Helen insisted on meeting him here?

  He asks me about my day, he tells me about his, but as I lay the table, I keep going over what I heard, trying to put it into different contexts. I ask him if he’s busy tomorrow, giving him the opportunity to tell me who he was talking to on the phone, but he offers nothing. He obviously doesn’t realise I’d heard him. And I can’t help but come to the conclusion that Helen is coming over, and he isn’t telling me. I wonder if she’s putting pressure on him to see her – is she threatening to do something to me if he doesn’t agree? Does she want to get back into the house they once shared? Or is there another, far less dramatic explanation? Is he meeting a client here? Or a colleague? But if so, then why not mention it to me?

  So, a little later, I try again, as we eat chicken risotto at the kitchen table. ‘How’s tomorrow looking for you?’ I ask casually, grinding pepper on the creamy rice.

  ‘Good, good,’ he says absently, then looks up from his dinner. ‘And you? Are you heading straight to the office in the morning?’

  I nod, and continue eating. He definitely wants to make sure I’m out of the way.

  As we drink coffee on the sofa in front of some TV drama, I can’t concentrate. I’m on the brink of just telling him I heard him on the phone and asking what’s going on. But it makes me look sneaky and I’ve asked him to trust me, so it also makes me a hypocrite – people only listen to their partners through doors when they don’t trust them. Which now begs the question, do I trust him? After the whole Helen revelation, how can I?

  I tell Alex I don’t feel great and I’m going to take a shower and have an early night. His face shows some concern, but I can see he’s enjoying the TV and really wants to get back to it, so I go upstairs to be alone and think.

  When I said I was going to my flat for a couple of nights this week, he’d tried to change my mind. He was desperate for me to stay here with him – so is he punishing me for leaving him, by inviting Helen round? God that would be sick, surely he wouldn’t?

  A little later, when he comes to bed, I pretend to be asleep. I’m angry and hurt but now isn’t the time to start questioning him. I’ll go to work early in the morning, spend the next couple of nights at mine, clear my head and be ‘me’ for a while. After that, I’ll come back here, and if he still doesn’t mention it, I’ll ask him about it, and I’m hoping he won’t lie to me. But for now, I’ve just got to trust him.

  I came into work this morning feeling horrible. I couldn’t even face Harry’s daily gift of a leftover almond croissant. It’s still sitting on my desk uneaten, and buttery grease has now seeped into the paper napkin. It’s making me feel nauseous. I’m going to have to get rid of it without him seeing, but I’m too busy trying to sort out a care order for Phoebe Cross, a new council flat for Craig Jackson, and, worryingly, I can’t seem to get hold of Chloe Thomson. Meanwhile, Jas has scheduled an 11.30 meeting with me that I don’t have time for. I just hope it’s not one of her ‘vital’ meetings that turn out to be a detailed discussion on what we’re both wearing tonight. I don’t care what anyone wears, not with everything else on my mind. Jas clearly feels differently though, and I notice she’s brought her huge make-up bag and an overnight holdall into work, containing, no doubt, a selection of outfits.

  ‘Have you never heard of a capsule wardrobe?’ I said, as she staggered in with all her bags.

  ‘There’s no such thing. A capsule wardrobe is work clothes pimped up. And what I wear to work is what I wear when I don’t care. Oh, how quickly you forget, Hannah.’ She smiles.
‘When you’re single, you have to dress like every night might be “the night”.’

  ‘Hate to piss on your bonfire, Jas, but I doubt George Clooney’ll be in The Orange Tree tonight,’ Harry laughed.

  ‘You never know. Amal might be busy working on a big legal case. Alex is, isn’t he, Hannah?’ she said.

  ‘Ahh, I see, so while poor old Alex works late, you two are going on a girls’ night out? Look out, lads, the girls are on the pull!’ Harry clearly thought the idea of me and Jas out on the town was hilarious.

  ‘We are not on the pull, as you so delicately put it,’ I rolled my eyes.

  ‘Speak for yourself,’ Jas said, staggering under the weight of the make-up bag and holdall.

  ‘Yeah, but…’ I started, about to remind her I’m taken, then remembering not to rub it in.

  ‘And if I bump into that cute guy who works at the council and he has a friend, I need you to play along. I don’t want you talking about your boyfriend and ruining everything,’ she warned, like she’d just read my mind.

  Two and a half hours later, I’m not surprised to find myself at our 11.30 meeting doing exactly what I didn’t want to be doing. We are discussing what Jas should wear, while I get her take on the phone call I overheard Alex making last night. I wasn’t going to mention it, I know she’ll just use it to create a narrative where he’s the baddie, but I wanted to bounce it off someone and she was there. She was opening up her holdall and laying all her outfits on the desk, and I just blurted it all out between the scarlet jumpsuit and the sparkly wool dress.

  ‘Oh, love, I’m sorry,’ she says, folding the dress, and resting her chin on both hands on the desk. ‘That doesn’t sound too good, does it? “Come when the coast is clear.”’ She bangs her fist on the desk and I see Sameera glance over and say something to Harry, who then looks over more obviously.

  ‘It might be nothing,’ I say, immediately regretting opening my mouth, because it’s made this more real. ‘It could be anything…’ I try to play it down.

  ‘Okay.’ She’s talking to me in her social worker voice. It’s slightly patronising and I can feel myself becoming defensive. ‘So what do you think the reason might be for him saying, “she goes out early, come over about eight, so the coast’s clear”?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t know what to think, but I don’t want to jump to the wrong conclusion. I don’t want to ruin something good, Jas.’

  She raises her eyebrows and clicks her tongue. ‘Sounds to me like he might have done that already,’ she says, slowly shaking her head. ‘I wonder if the wife is a permanent fixture, and all this talk of divorce is just that… talk?’

  ‘No. No,’ I say. I hadn’t thought of it like that.

  ‘You sure you’re not the other woman, Hannah?’

  After that conversation, I go back to my desk and feel even more paranoid. Has Alex been seeing Helen all along? I consider going straight over to his house and having it out with him. But if I’m right, there’s a chance I’ll walk in on them, and I couldn’t bear that. I have to protect myself. I’ll stick with plan A, and deal with this on Friday when I go to Alex’s after work as we planned.

  My phone pings, announcing a text from Alex. It makes me jump, which amuses Harry.

  ‘You’re a bit jittery today, Hannah,’ he laughs.

  ‘Just got a lot on my plate.’ I then add quickly, ‘Workwise.’ I don’t want everyone knowing every single part of my personal business, it’s a small office and we already know too much about each other’s lives.

  I check my phone.

  Hey gorgeous, have a great evening tonight. And don’t forget, if you change your mind about driving, I’m free to play chauffeur. I’m home all evening. Xxx

  This text gives me a glimmer of hope. Why would he offer to collect me if Helen or anyone else is staying over? It doesn’t make sense.

  ‘I might go to Alex’s place after we’ve been out tonight,’ I say to Jas a little later. I can’t bear the not knowing, the constant tumble dryer of possibilities whizzing around my head.

  ‘What? Why? Just go back to your place. Better still, come back to mine. Then you can leave your car here and—’

  ‘No, no. It’s stupid to think I can just ignore this. I’ll drop you off after we’ve been out and go straight to his house. I’d rather deal with whatever’s going on than torture myself about it. The irony is I wanted to take time at home to do some work, but I can’t even think straight.’

  ‘I thought you were taking time away to come out with me?’ She looks a little hurt.

  ‘Yeah, of course. That too,’ I say.

  ‘You guys okay?’ Sameera asks, as I leave Jas’s office.

  ‘Yeah, you two seem to have lots of girlie secrets today,’ Harry teases.

  ‘Oh it’s nothing, I wouldn’t begin to bore you with it.’ I sigh. Jas means well, but I think Alex might be right, I think she does want to spend more time with me, and it’s affecting her assessment of the situation. She just wants to push the idea that Alex is up to no good – then again, all the evidence is pointing to that.

  This is the problem with meeting someone online, however much you think you know, you don’t – you don’t know their history, their lives, their friends. When we met, Alex presented me with a picture of his past and present, but he left out what he felt didn’t fit, like his marriage. And hearing him on the telephone last night makes me wonder what else he’s left out of the perfect picture?

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  By 4.30, I’ve managed to do everything I need to do, except I still can’t get hold of Chloe Thomson; her mother’s not answering her phone either. I don’t want to leave it any longer, I saw her a couple of days ago and she wasn’t good. I reckon she’s still using, even though she denied it, she’s emotionally vulnerable and will need support to get off the drugs. I still don’t know who she’s seeing, but if it is her mother’s boyfriend, it all makes sense. Chloe’s refusing to talk to me about it and I think that’s because he’s threatening her. I’m not sure what worries me the most: the drugs, the self-harm or the fact Chloe’s embroiled in some kind of relationship with an older, abusive man.

  As I can’t get hold of her, or anyone connected to her, I start calling everyone else, from the police, to children’s agencies, to the homeless hostels. Nothing. By 6.15 p.m. in a last-ditch attempt to find her, I start calling the hospitals.

  My first call is to Worcester Royal Infirmary, the biggest hospital in the area, and I’m put through to various wards to confirm if a Chloe Thomson is there. Eventually, I speak to someone who can give me some information. It seems Chloe was brought into the A & E Department at two-thirty this afternoon as a suspected overdose. She was found in a squat just outside the city centre. Her mother has been informed and is now with her. Chloe’s alive, but she’s in a coma.

  I dash over there immediately, but I’m not allowed to see her because she’s in ICU. I talk to one of the nurses who tells me that she was found this afternoon by a fellow squatter, who thought she was dead. Judging by her condition, doctors seem to think she OD’d last night. At this stage no one can tell me anything more, or provide any kind of prognosis, and after a while I decide to leave, and come back tomorrow.

  I return to the office and google her condition, I can’t find anything that helps, except that the longer a patient remains in a coma the poorer his or her chance of recovery and the greater the chance that he or she will enter a vegetative state. This is heart-breaking, and all I can do is hope. And with this in mind, I optimistically try to plan for a good outcome and request a mental-health social worker for if and when she comes round.

  ‘I’m behind you on this,’ Jas says, ‘and as her care-co-ordinator it’s up to you to put everything in place for her. But, babe, you must know it’s not looking good.’

  ‘I know, but I have to have hope. I feel like I dropped the ball, Jas,’ I say, honestly.

  She puts her arms around me and gives me a much-needed hug. ‘Babe, we are
sometimes on the fringes – they won’t or can’t let us in – and you did everything, everything you could for Chloe. You involved the other agencies, you put safeguarding in place – but sometimes things happen outside our control. You’ve been doing this job long enough to know that. So please don’t beat yourself up.’

  ‘I don’t want her waking up to no one. I’ve told the nurses to call me if there’s any sign of her coming round, and I’m going back first thing tomorrow. I just feel like I failed her, Jas.’

  ‘You didn’t, you were brilliant with her, and things were going well. She’d come on leaps and bounds with you guiding her, but we can’t be there all the time. All you can do is be there for her going forward.’

  Ever since I spoke to the hospital and had it confirmed Chloe was there, I’ve felt responsible. I can’t help but feel if I’d been more present, more focused, maybe this wouldn’t have happened.

  I suggest to Jas that we take a rain check on our night out, I’m really not in the mood, but classic Jas, she says it’s even more reason to go out.

  ‘You need some downtime and a few drinks. I know that might sound heartless given Chloe’s situation, but this is our job – it isn’t our life. And if we stayed home feeling guilty every time something like this happens, we’d never go out.’

  She’s right, but I feel it’s wrong somehow to be out enjoying myself when Chloe’s in this state.

  Harry made me feel a bit better. ‘Chloe’s been here before,’ he said, ‘and bless her she’ll probably be there again. And like all the Chloes before and after, we can only do so much for them. She’s a tough cookie, if anyone can pull through, she can.’

  I hope he’s right.

  ‘So, have you thought seriously about your plan to go and gatecrash his romantic evening?’ Jas says as we walk to the car park later. I can’t help but be stung by the cruelty in Jas’s words. She seems to be enjoying the idea of Alex having a night with Helen while I’m away, and I choose to ignore her comment. I think she’s being a little caustic because she’s not too chuffed that I’m driving and not drinking, but I won’t be swayed by her. I want to be in control, I’m shaken by what’s happened to Chloe and the last thing I want to do is drink. I also want to drive over to Alex’s at the end of the evening and find out what the hell is going on. And I definitely need to be sober for that.