I Am Watching You

by Teresa Driscoll

many barking into their mobile phones while everyone else ramps up the volume to compete. To be heard.

I read somewhere that by your forties you are supposed to care more about what you think of others than what they think of you – so why is it I am still waiting for this to kick in?

And it all reminds me of that very particular feeling in your tummy. You know.

I know, I know. I really shouldn’t be listening, but we’ve been over this. I’m

The two young men have just got out of prison. The black bags contain their personal effects.

Karl has served a sentence at Exeter prison for assault; Antony for theft.

me shrinking smaller and smaller into the shade

What if they found out that it wasn’t only that?

It was Anna who broke it, she shouted at them.

She spat the lie at them just as she had spat it over and over to the police.

Sarah was petrified. What if other witnesses now came forward? From the train or from the club.

She remembers her father’s reaction at the Paradise Hotel in London. At first she refused to talk to him. It had been years since he left the family, and she’d refused all contact.

You calling my daughter a slut?

The Ballards’ farmhouse is at the end of a half-mile, single-lane track.

Matthew immediately feels guilty – forced now to look into those eyes.

‘Oh.’ Her demeanour changes immediately, along with her tone. ‘That woman.’

Finding Anna.’ ‘Bit late for that now.’ ‘I’m sorry.’ She shrugs. Staring at him now. More defiant.

Barbara Ballard’s eyes.

That is why I like to watch people. Have to do this.

He cries for Anna, who will never be found. And who knows the worst of him. You disgust me, Dad . . .

Sorry. Just tired. Coffee machine is on.

‘That’s not what Dad said.’ ‘Pardon?’

THE FRIEND Sarah

I’m worried he had something to do with Anna . . .

‘OK. Maybe just a little bit. But only because you see everything differently once this happens.’

This is also the bit I am very good at. The right face. The right tone. So that you don’t know who I’m watching. Or why.

Luke got the text late last night. Emily has lost the baby.

I know that it is Luke’s. And I try to work out what on earth I am going to do now.

THE FATHER Henry

‘Dad texted me the night Anna disappeared. He knew from Mum that we were in town, and he wanted us to meet him at a hotel in London. Some swanky place he was staying at for his new job. Did you know he’s a manager now – big haulage firm? Anyway. I said no. But I showed Anna the text.’

Tucked in my pocket is the flat piece of plastic I found on the floor outside the shop. A simple piece of plastic that has so confused me. Why would Luke lie to me?

maybe none of this would have happened if the two chaps – Tim and Paul – had— ‘Tim. I think it’s probably time you went home.’

I’m sending a photograph over right now. Karl at the window with his hostage. You have to get a message through to the Spanish team.’

‘At least, I don’t know if she did. Or if he took her, or spiked her drink or whatever,

We felt really grown up. I feel stupid admitting that now, but it’s the truth.

Just wandered off. Pretty much ignored us.’ Sarah’s voice quietens as she remembers how it felt. How angry she felt.

a whisker from suspect status – until this is all resolved. You disgust me, Dad.

The hostage? Why is she saying that? Why isn’t she calling her Anna? How dare she. This is his daughter. She should use her name

Yes. Maybe I was the one who dropped it.

Anna is still gone. The news obsessed with the wretched weather. And I am in exile.

‘Try? You have the nerve to ask me to try? After you practically blow your head off in the barn, and then I find out you have been putting it about on our very doorstep. Off with some local whore while our daughter . . .’

She doesn’t know who yet, thank God, but she’s put the pieces together somehow.