Read Random Acts of Unkindness for Free Online Page B

reality as I pulled on a headscarf.
    ‘I’ll go down to the infirmary. If he’s nowhere else, then he’s there.’
    Colin slammed the door shut behind him and I locked the back door. How would Thomas get in if I wasn’t here? He didn’t have a key because I was always here. I unbolted the door and called to Jenny next door.
    ‘Ey, Jen, watch the door for me. I’m just popping out.’
    ‘Ay, all right then.’
    I didn’t see her, just heard a weak voice in her kitchen. I walked through the house and opened the front door. I half expected Thomas to be cycling down the road waving. He wasn’t and I caught the bus to the hospital.
    I stood outside smoking a cigarette as people rolled around in wheelchairs. There were amputees from the war, women with huge bellies, people in standard hospital dressing gowns, all smoking cigarettes and talking.
    I peered past them into the entrance, where a wooden desk acted as a booking in area. The woman behind the desk looked friendly so I went in.
    ‘Hiya. I’m looking for my son, Thomas Swain. He’s not been home last night, see, and I wondered . . .’
    ‘How old is he?’
    The woman was staring at me and for the first time I felt scared.
    ‘Seventeen. He set off for work yesterday and never got there. We wondered if he’d been in an accident?’
    ‘Have you told the police?’
    It was a perfectly reasonable question and I suddenly thought that I should have called the local bobby, Sam Mackie. Everything felt as if it had gone wrong all at once and I started to cry.
    ‘No, no I didn’t. Me and his dad, we thought he might have fell off his bike. Except he wasn’t on it because it was at Phillip’s. Or maybe he went under a bus? Can you check?’
    ‘Yes, love. Go an’ have a sit down over there, would you? Wipe your eyes, love. I’m sure he’ll turn up. Funny at that age, aren’t they?’
    I sat and thought. Yes, they are funny at that age. I had a baby at his age. He was grown now and here I am sitting scricing in the infirmary about him when he’s probably with a lass. I’m thinking the worst. Getting all excited over nothing. Colin had gone to work and no one else seemed overly concerned.
    I tapped my foot on the floor and waited. Eventually she returned and waved me over.
    ‘No one here by that name, love. No young men admitted in the past twenty-four hours as an emergency.’
    ‘That’s good news. Thanks.’
    I hurried out of the reception and lit another cigarette. So he wasn’t in the hospital. He wasn’t at work. He wasn’t at Philip’s. He wasn’t at home. Where the bloody hell was he?
    I was angry again now. I caught the bus back to Philip’s and walked the route he’d have to take to work. I caught the same bus, an old charabanc, walked the same pavements, and finally arrived at the joinery.
    I could see Thomas’s boss and the other two apprentices working away, engrossed in their labour. I’d been here before, to bring his lunch. I stood awhile, wondering if he was in there now, if he’d just gone straight from where he had been to work.
    I pushed on the door, then hesitated. If he was there I would be able to see him. I turned to walk away and caught the bus home. He was probably at home. I hurried up the street, stopping at the shop too, bought twenty Park Drives, and ran into the house.
    ‘Tom? Thomas?’ Nothing. Probably asleep. Sleeping it off. Little sod. ‘Tom? Wake up.’
    I went into his room, but he wasn’t there. His bed wasn’t slept in. I stared at the candlewick tufts, at the pattern he has picked away as a child. A map of England. I looked around the room at his possessions: trophies for football, a cup for cricket, cycling proficiency certificate. His best suit hanging on the back of the door.
    Nothing appeared to be missing, except the clothes he had on when he left for work. I knew his clothes by heart, the pile of his sweaters, the collars of his shirts, even his socks—items I took care of as an extension of