“Unfortunately, not. Can I ask you a couple of questions, though? I was ill at the time and kind of discombobulated when we spoke.”
“I figured. You sounded pretty frazzled.”
Because I was beginning to separate from who I was?
“By any chance, do you remember the time of the call?”
“Uh, it must have been after lunch. Maybe around three, three-thirty?”
“And did I say where I was calling from?”
“No, but it sounded like you were on the street. You said you’d lost your phone somewhere and borrowed a stranger’s to make the call.”
“Right, right, a passerby was nice enough to loan me theirs,” I say, winging it. “I wish I had the number so I could send a thank-you text.”
“Unfortunately, I can’t help you with that. It would be tough to go back through caller ID.”
Damn it, I think. “Understood.”
“Anything else I can be of assistance with?”
He sounds eager to be done, but I can’t let him go yet.
“Nothing specific, no. I . . . I just hope I wasn’t a bother. I didn’t go on and on about what was wrong, did I?”
“No, you were fine. And no worries, we’ve all been there. Did you figure out the deal with the doctor?”
My heart jerks.
“Doctor? I told you I needed one?”
“It sounded like you had an appointment with someone, but you weren’t sure of the exact time—I guess because you’d lost your phone. You were hoping Nicole would know, but she wasn’t here. I think you mentioned a Dr. Early or something.”
“Right, right,” I say.
Okay, I’ve got another piece of the puzzle. It seems as if I was especially eager, maybe even desperate, to meet with Erling, but due to whatever mental distress I was experiencing, I must have lost track of when my next appointment was, even though Dr. Erling said she talked to me at nine that day. As I’m processing this detail, Carson is interrupted by someone with a question, and I realize I need to let him go. I thank him for his help and sign off.
Just as I set the phone down, Hugh saunters back into the great room, dressed in jeans and his heather green V-neck sweater. After shoving up the sleeves, he pops the plastic lid off the rotisserie chicken, whose juicy, herby scent, usually so inviting, turns my stomach.
“Something up?” he asks, grabbing a pair of poultry scissors.
“Sort of. That was Carson, one of the managers at WorkSpace, and he’s just filled me in about one detail from Tuesday.”
“Really?”
“I apparently called the front desk that afternoon, sounding frazzled. I told him I’d lost my phone and had borrowed one from a stranger. I must have used it to look up the main number at WorkSpace before calling there.”
“Wow,” Hugh says, pausing. “What about your purse? Was that missing then, too?”
“Doesn’t sound like it.”
“So you may have ended up separated from your purse and phone at two different times.”
“Right. And there’s something else.”
Hugh’s started to carve the chicken, but he pauses again, the scissors in midair. “Tell me.”
“According to Carson, I was trying to contact Nicole to see if I’d mentioned the time of my appointment with Erling.”
“So you were already having memory issues?”
“Or I was just really desperate to see her and didn’t have my phone to double-check my schedule.”
“Do you think you were anxious to meet with her because of our argument?”
“Possibly. But I’m starting to wonder if something really upsetting happened to me on Tuesday, midday, which would explain those bloody tissues I told you about. Maybe I lost my phone when this—this incident occurred, or right afterwards, possibly because I was rattled. And then I started to come unglued and was anxious to see Erling.”
Hugh nods his head lightly, pondering my words. He’s done cutting the chicken and pries off the lids from a couple of salads he’s bought.
“Okay, but if the dissociative state actually kicked in on Tuesday afternoon,” he says, “why don’t you recall anything from late Monday night or Tuesday morning?”
“From what I’ve learned, memory loss in this kind of situation can include a period of time before the traumatic event you experienced. I guess in the same way someone with a concussion might not remember events immediately leading up to the injury.”
“What do you think could have happened to you, Ally?”
“Maybe I was mugged?”
“But if you still had your purse later that day . . .”
“I could have struggled with the person but managed to save my purse. And gotten a nosebleed in the process.”
He smiles ruefully. “I don’t know whether your new theory makes me grateful or even more concerned.”
“What do you mean?”
“It scares me to think of you in a bad situation in the city somewhere, but I’m also relieved to know I might not have done anything to instigate this hell you’ve been going through.”
“You’ve been worried you caused this? Hugh, you can’t think like that. Even if the fight did make me unravel, I was part of it, too.”
“You’re giving me a pass on the famous ‘it-takes-two-to-tango’ grounds?”
I lean across the counter and lace my fingers through his.
“Absolutely,” I say. Feeling his hand in mine, I realize how little skin-to-skin contact we’ve had since yesterday. I want more than anything to be in sync with him again. Maybe this is a start.
During dinner I try to savor the food, as Erling suggested, but the chicken is dry, as if it’s spent too many hours churning in one of those supermarket roasting furnaces, and the salads—coleslaw and macaroni, both dripping in mayo—are almost indistinguishable from each other. A glass of wine might help, but I’ve decided to swear off alcohol for at least another day.
“We’ve done nothing so far tonight but talk about me,” I say, setting my fork down. “What’s happening with the Brewster case?”
This is the case Hugh’s currently in the thick of, and it’s a pivotal one for him. It was probably tough for him to focus on it when I was missing.
“Unfortunately, there’s not great news to report.”
“Wait, what?” A swell of panic forms. Am I forgetting something else? “I thought it was going well.”
“Seemed that way, but we had an ugly surprise this morning. It turns out a member of the company’s senior team sent an email several months ago to several colleagues about possible improprieties related to the case. This is going to blow up in their faces—and ours.”
“Oh, Hugh, I’m sorry.” I empathize totally but at the same time I’m relieved this is a new development, not one I should have recalled. “I can’t believe you have to deal with that and all this at the same time.”
“Look, it’s their own fault for not divulging earlier. But I’m going to have to revise my strategy and pray there’s a way to curtail the potential damage.”
“If you need to work this weekend, don’t hesitate on my account. Plus, I’m meeting Roger for a drink Sunday afternoon.”