THE HOUSE AT SEA’S END

Hastings’ mother meant by ‘he never forgot the horror’.
    Hearing Tatjana’s voice had been a real shock. After Bosnia, Tatjana had moved back to the States and married an American. There had been a few Christmas cards. Tatjana and her husband (Rick? Rich? Rock?) were living in Cape Cod. Tatjana was doing some archaeological work and trying to write a book. Rick/Rich/Rock was a doctor, specialising in geriatrics. ‘No shortage in Cape Cod,’ Tatjana had written with typical terse humour. That had been almost ten years ago.
    ‘Ruth.’ Tatjana had sounded unnervingly the same. ‘I had your number from the university. I hope it’s okay?’
    ‘It’s fine.’ The office was not meant to give out personal numbers, but in an age when tutors send their students text messages and communicate via Facebook (not that Ruthwould ever do either of these things), nothing was really private any more.
    ‘So you’re still teaching?’ Tatjana’s accent had almost gone, replaced with a slight East Coast whine, but the inflection was still foreign, the ends of each word crisp and emphasised.
    ‘Yes, I’m a lecturer in forensic archaeology. I teach postgraduates mostly.’
    ‘Did you ever write the book?’
    ‘No. Did you?’
    ‘No.’ Tatjana’s laugh, that sudden staccato bark, brought back the past more vividly than anything else could. The ballroom, the oil lamps, Erik telling stories about vampires, Hank playing ‘Smoke on the Water’ on the guitar.
    ‘And Erik,’ said Tatjana. ‘Do you still see Erik?’
    ‘Erik’s dead,’ said Ruth. ‘It’s a long story.’
    ‘Erik dead. Dear God.’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And you, Ruth: What’s your news? Are you married? Children?’
    Ruth took a deep breath, watching the flickering green light from the baby monitor. ‘I’m not married but I have a child. A baby.’
    Ruth remembers that there was a brief silence before Tatjana said, ‘A baby, well that
is
news. Congratulations, Ruth. A boy or a girl?’
    ‘A girl. Kate.’
    ‘Kate.’
    Another silence and Ruth could almost hear the years rushing past, a whooshing sound like walking through falling leaves.
    ‘I’m coming to England,’ said Tatjana at last. ‘I’m giving some lectures at the University of East Anglia. I wondered, could I stay with you? For a week or two?’
    Ruth thought a lot of things in that moment: her cottage is a long way from UEA, two weeks is a long time, she would have to tidy the spare room. She thought so long that Tatjana said, ‘Of course, if it’s a problem …’
    ‘No,’ said Ruth. ‘No problem. It’ll be wonderful to see you again.’
    But will it be wonderful, thinks Ruth, searching for the key card to open her office. Seeing Tatjana will bring back a whole slew of memories, not all of them pleasant. For many years afterwards she’d had nightmares about Bosnia. Bones gleaming in the sun, a hotel with endless corridors, door after identical door, grand staircases leading into nothingness, the flames of a bonfire, Tatjana’s face in the darkness.
    The last time she saw Tatjana it had been a harrowing occasion. She still thinks about it, wonders if she could have said or done anything differently, if, by some small change, she could have made events turn out another way. She doesn’t know if, even fourteen years later, she’s ready to revisit that scene. She feels too fragile – not enough sleep, too many confrontations with Nelson. But Tatjana is her friend, and over the last year, she’s learnt a lot about friendship. Tatjana must want to see her badly if she’s made so much effort to get in touch. She mustn’t turn her away. She mustn’t let Tatjana down again.
    While she is scrabbling in her organiser bag – it has so many zips and pockets that it’s almost impossible to find anything – she notices that the lights are on inside heroffice. She pushes open the door and finds Cathbad sitting at her desk, under the poster of Indiana Jones, reading
Alice in Wonderland
.
    Although not entirely surprised – Cathbad makes rather a speciality of materialising in unexpected places – Ruth is taken aback to see him there, calm as a Buddha in his lab coat, his long hair in a ponytail, an expression of serene benevolence on his face. Although she sometimes sees Cathbad around the campus (he is a technician in the chemistry department), he rarely comes near the archaeology corridor. He once trained as an archaeologist under Erik and, perhaps for this reason, studiously