The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins Read Free Book Online Page B

just spent the best part of an hour driving around looking for you. You’ve really frightened Anna, you know that? She thought you were going to … she thought … It’s all I could do to get her not to ring the police. Leave us alone. Stop calling me, stop hanging around, just leave us alone. I don’t want to speak to you. Do you understand me? I don’t want to speak to you, I don’t want to see you, I don’t want you anywhere near my family. You can ruin your own life if you want to, but you’re not ruining mine. Not any more. I’m not going to protect you any longer, understand? Just stay away from us.’
    I don’t know what I’ve done. What did I do? Between five o’clock and ten fifteen, what was I doing? Why was Tom looking for me? What did I do to Anna? I pull the duvet over my head, I close my eyes tightly. I imagine myself going to the house, walking along the little pathway between their garden and the neighbour’s garden, climbing over the fence. I think about sliding open the glass doors, stealthily creeping into the kitchen. Anna’s sitting at the table. I grab her from behind, I wind my hand into her long blonde hair, I jerk her head backwards, I pull her to the floor and I smash her head against the cool blue tiles.
Evening
    Someone is shouting. From the angle of the light streaming in through my bedroom window I can tell I have been sleeping a long time; it must be late afternoon, early evening. My head hurts. There’s blood on my pillow. I can hear someone yelling downstairs.
    ‘I do not believe this! For God’s sake! Rachel! RACHEL!’
    I fell asleep. Oh Jesus, and I didn’t clear up the vomit on the stairs. And my clothes in the hallway. Oh God, oh God.
    I pull on a pair of tracksuit bottoms and a T-shirt. Cathy is standing right outside my bedroom door when I open it. She looks horrified when she sees me.
    ‘What on earth happened to you?’ she says, then raises her hand. ‘Actually, Rachel, I’m sorry, but I just don’t want to know. I cannot have this in my house. I cannot have …’ She tails off, but she’s looking back down the hall, towards the stairs.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I’m so sorry, I was just really ill and I meant to clear it up …’
    ‘You weren’t ill, were you? You were drunk. You were hung-over. I’m sorry, Rachel. I just can’t have this. I cannot live like this. You have to go, OK? I’ll give you four weeks to find somewhere else, but then you have to go.’ She turns around and walks towards her bedroom. ‘And for the love of God, will you clean up that mess?’ She slams her bedroom door behind her.
    After I’ve finished cleaning up, I go back to my room. Cathy’s bedroom door is still closed, but I can feel her quiet rage radiating through it. I can’t blame her. I’d be furious if I came home to piss-soaked knickers and a puddle of vomit on the stairs. I sit down on the bed and flip open my laptop, log into my email account and start to compose a note to my mother. I think, finally, the time has come. I have to ask her for help. If I moved home, I wouldn’t be able to go on like this, I would have to change, I would have to get better. I can’t think of the words, though, I can’t think of a way to explain this to her. I can picture her face as she reads my plea for help, the sour disappointment, the exasperation. I can almost hear her sigh.
    My phone beeps. There’s a message on it, received hours ago. It’s Tom again. I don’t want to hear what he has to say, but I have to, I can’t ignore him. My heartbeat quickens as I dial into my voicemail, bracing myself for the worst.
    ‘Rachel, will you phone me back?’ He doesn’t sound so angry any longer and my heartbeat slows a little. ‘I want to make sure you got home all right. You were in some state last night.’ A long, heartfelt sigh. ‘Look. I’m sorry that I yelled last night, that things got a bit … overheated. I do feel sorry for you, Rachel, I really do, but this