Page 57 of 59 Minutes

MRS DABB

‘I couldn’t get my key out,’ Mary says, shuffling into the kitchen, arms filled with Tupperware and tinfoiled plates. ‘Is Bunny back?’

‘No, she’s not, Mary. What the hell am I going to do?’

‘Oh, darling.’ Mary struggles over to the old oak table and dumps her cargo. Every anniversary, the same routine. A mountain of favourite food to mark the loss, most of it left uneaten. Usually, Bunny would be taking slabs of cake to school for a week after. Usually.

‘It’s nearly time, Mary. It’s nearly …’

Mary pulls her in and rubs her back. ‘Come on, it’s okay, she’ll be here.’

She shakes her head, burrowing deeper into Mary’s soft shoulder and her old wax jacket. ‘I think she found out about her biological father, I think he’s got to her.’

‘But …’ Mary starts, and then sucks in a breath. This is the one topic they never touch. ‘You must have known this could happen if you didn’t warn her?’

‘What?’ She recoils from Mary like she’s just been shot. ‘Are you serious? Bunny is missing, I don’t have a clue where she is and instead of helping, you’re blaming me? Me? For trying to keep her safe?’

‘I don’t know if it was optimism or denial but this was a ticking time bomb,’ Mary says.

‘It was always going to happen. You couldn’t keep the truth from her forever and now it’s blown up in your face.

’ Mary covers her eyes, the wording so poor that neither can address it.

Instead, Mary starts to lay out the plates and open the Tupperware, as if that’s the most important thing to do right now.

‘It’s not just you that …’ Mary starts, peeling back foil on a plate of bright jam tarts.

‘It’s not just me that what?’

Mary shakes her head, shoulders bunched, tugging off the last lid: coconut snowballs, far too festive for November.

‘Leave the bloody food! It’s’ – she looks up at the kitchen clock – ‘five fifty-five, it’s minutes—’

‘You think I don’t have a clock in my head, counting down to it …’ Mary never shouts but she is now and her voice, unused to the volume, cracks and gives out.

White light fills the kitchen. The noise of a helicopter, suddenly close. They look at each other then.

The sound recedes a little but the kitchen still glows an unnatural white from the searchlight. The food on the table is lit like a neon tableau, a ridiculous still life. The light creeps away, the kitchen dims again.

‘I’m sorry,’ Mary says, ‘it’s just too much.’

‘It’s far too much,’ she manages to say, reaching for Mary’s hands.

A noise outside.

‘Did you hear that?’ Mary says but she doesn’t answer, running instead to the front door and grappling with all the bolts and locks.

It’s the sound of fast footsteps, of a young girl’s voice calling out in total panic. She pulls the door open, and a blur of school uniform rushes inside.