Of course, he could still call the police, but he already knew what they would say: So, he had found a car. So what? No one denied there might have been a car. But it wasn’t Izzy he’d seen in it. Oh, they would be nice. Patient. Understanding. To a point. The point where they treated him like he was crazy. Just like before. He had grown used to them rolling their eyes whenever he came into the station. The polite but firm tone. The suggestions of talking to someone, of counselling. People he could see, numbers he could call.
In a way, he had preferred it when the police thought he was guilty of something. At least they listened to him. At least they treated him like a grown man, rather than some pathetic figure of pity. That was the worst. Becoming invisible, soundless. The assumption that everything he said was nonsense.
There is, Gabe had learned, more than one way to become lost.
For now, he supposed, he was on his own. If he were some hard-boiled detective, he might add, Just the way I like it. But he didn’t like it. He found himself thinking about the blonde waitress again. He wasn’t sure why. Yes, she was attractive, and she seemed kind. But then, that was her job—to be nice to customers, to smile politely. It wasn’t as if he really knew her. Besides, she looked like she had plenty going on in her own life as it was. She certainly didn’t need his problems. And, aside from a rusty old camper van, that was all he had to offer.
He opened the map and spread it out on the table. A few places had been marked with an X, but they didn’t mean anything to him. He folded it back up and picked up the Bible. He had glanced at it only briefly before, the soft, moldy feel of the pages putting him off handling it for too long. Besides, he remembered the stickers on the back window of the car.
When you drive like I do, you’d better believe in God.
Real men love Jesus.
The Bible seemed appropriate. But now, as he thumbed through the still-damp pages, he noticed something else. Certain passages had been underlined:
But if there is any further injury, then you shall appoint as a penalty life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. (Exodus 21: 23–25)
If a man injures his neighbor, just as he has done, so it shall be done to him. (Leviticus 24: 17–21)
You shall purge the evil from among you. The rest will hear and be afraid and will never again do such an evil thing among you. (Deuteronomy 19: 18–21)
He will avenge the blood of His servants and will render vengeance on His adversaries. (Deuteronomy 32: 43)
Real men may love Jesus, but it seemed that this one was strictly Old Testament. Vengeance, retribution, blood. Gabe felt an icy nail scrape down his spine.
He put it to one side and opened the notebook. Ripped edges. Blank pages. Why rip them out? What was written on them?
“Americano?” a voice asked.
He jumped, looked up. The blonde waitress with the kind eyes stood by his table holding a coffee.
“Oh, yes, thanks.”
He noticed that she wore a hoodie over her uniform.
“On your way home?”
“Just heading off.”
She put the coffee down and nodded at the notebook. “Looking for a message in invisible ink?”
He glanced at her more sharply. “What?”
“Sorry. You were just staring really hard at a blank page and…just a joke.” She started to turn away.
“Wait!”
Something sparked suddenly in his brain. Pages torn out. There must have been something written on them. Maybe something someone didn’t want anyone else to see. “Have you got a pencil?”
“Err, yeah.” She fumbled in her pocket and produced a stub.
He took it and started tracing it over the paper. He wasn’t sure it would work. He had only ever seen people do this on TV. But as he watched, words appeared faintly through the lead, an imprint from the previous page.
Gabe held the notebook up and stared at it. He frowned. “Don’t suppose that means anything to you?”
The waitress shrugged. “Sorry.”
He nodded, deflated. “Here’s your pencil.”
“You keep it.”
She walked away. Gabe stared back down at the notebook. Several fragments of words and letters had overlapped. But three stood out. A ghostly imprint of a dead man’s hand.
THE OTHER PEOPLE.
Tentative streaks of silver were just starting to lighten the sky when Katie emerged from the services. Despite feeling tired to the marrow of her bone, every limb aching with exhaustion, she liked this time of day. There was a calmness to the first hours of dawn. The day just waking, nothing to spoil it. A new beginning. A fresh start.
All rubbish, of course. There were no fresh starts. Not really. We’re all too entrenched in our own personal ruts, unable to summon up the energy to dig ourselves out. Life, as we know it. Or as she knew it, anyway.
This morning, like most mornings, she would drive to her younger sister Lou’s house to pick up her children and make breakfast. Then she would see Sam and Gracie off to school and finally get home to bed for some sleep. At 3:10 p.m. she would pick the children up, make dinner, drop them at her sister’s again and, after they were in bed, head back up the motorway to work. Like bloody Groundhog Day. Although, at least, she reminded herself, she had a couple of days off before the routine started again.
She walked across the car park and climbed into her battered Polo. She turned on the engine and selected a CD. Yep, her car was so old it still had a CD player and she was so old she still had CDs.
Tom Petty seeped out of the speakers as she drove, singing about a good girl who loves her mama. Lucky her. Maybe “Mama” wasn’t a bitter drunk (mental note—better call Mum tomorrow). She turned the song up. “Free fallin.” Just what she felt like doing sometimes. Forgetting everything, putting her foot to the metal, driving past the turn-off that would take her home: to the dirty dishes, toys scattered across the floor like a Lego and Barbie obstacle course, the bills on the doormat, the sheer drudgery of everyday life. Driving as far as she could, to places she had never been.
Of course, it would never happen. She would tear her own heart out before she ever left her children. And don’t get her wrong—life wasn’t bad. She was luckier than most. She had a job, a house, her health. But she still couldn’t help wishing there was something more. Problem was, she didn’t know what. Perhaps it didn’t even exist. You could spend a lifetime running from one life and chasing another. Gold at the end of the rainbow. Greener grass across the meadow. But, in most cases, the gold would be fake and the green grass would be AstroTurf.
When she got married, she had dreamed of a perfect family. A lovely home with a big garden. Maybe a dog. Holidays in a pretty cottage in Cornwall. She and Craig would watch their children grow up and grow old together.