I have been lying in bed thinking about karma. Silly, I know, but that postcard has really gotten under my skin.

I keep having these mixed-up dreams. Anna on the train. The noise of Sarah and her bloke in that wretched toilet cubicle. And then the shock over Luke and his girlfriend.

I’m not one for popcorn psychiatry normally, but you can’t miss the irony, can you. And it just feels – I don’t know – as if everything in my life is trying to teach me some terrible lesson and my brain just can’t cope.

Some nights it gets so bad I get this tight feeling in my chest. Then I have to get up and make a cup of tea and then, of course, Tony gets up too – worried sick – which is the last thing I want. Spreading the guilt. What I try to do is go over it in my mind when I am on my own, playing rewind to think over and over and over about exactly how responsible I am for whatever happened to that poor girl. Wishing so much that I could go back and play it differently.

And then? The problem is, hand on heart, I still cannot go back there in my mind’s eye and be anything other than appalled at the thought of that girl and that man having sex in that toilet so soon after they met.

I wish that I could bounce this off people properly. Ask them openly what they would have done. Whether they would be shocked or upset to be confronted by what I heard. The problem is that the police have only ever released information that the ‘witness’ overheard the girls being chatted up by the guys just out of prison, and that the ‘witness’ was shocked at how quickly they became close. How quickly they made unwise plans together. Dangerous plans.

I’ve been judged for that and that alone. For not stepping in because two country girls were being so clearly targeted by two guys with records. That’s what all the social media and tabloid press has been about. What would you have done? Would you have minded your own? Two sixteen-year-old girls. Two guys just out of prison.

The police have never released the detail of the sex in the toilet, and asked me to keep it quiet for reasons of evidence, so I have only ever been

able to tell Tony. He says I was right to be shocked – and that people would keep their noses out of it if they knew all the facts.

We’ve talked it over again since this business with Luke and his girlfriend, and Tony says it’s very different – a young girl having sex with a virtual stranger in a public toilet, and Luke and Emily making a mistake in a caring relationship. I know he’s right, but I still feel a bit hypocritical now for judging Sarah so very harshly.

He’s gone into work early today, my Tony. He’s in retail himself, but a very different sector – selling cereals to supermarkets. He’s acting regional manager and is up for the job permanently if his sales figures hit their target. I’m terribly proud of him, though it’s a lot of pressure and I wish he didn’t have to do so much travelling.

For now, with him away so much, I have promised to juggle my working hours so that I am not alone at the shop out of hours too much. At least not until we hear from the police and feel a bit steadier.

So this feels odd for me. A second cup of coffee in bed. It’s 8 a.m., which for a florist amounts to a lie-in. I am having a really good think.

About karma.

Also, whether I am a prude. I mean, I certainly hold my hands up to being a bit out of touch. Naive to imagine that my seventeen-year-old son wouldn’t be having sex yet. More and more I keep testing myself, worrying that I am a hypocrite over what happened on the train. Was my judgement about gender? Because my first thought was that Sarah clearly wasn’t as ‘nice’ a girl as I had imagined, which is why I stepped away from the whole situation. Yet if it had been Luke? No. On reflection, maybe not so hypocritical, because I would still be totally appalled and shocked if a son of mine, or any young man, had done that with someone they had just met.

Maybe the truth is that I just like some boundaries. Because don’t get me wrong, this is not about sex, per se; Tony and I get along very well in that department ourselves, thank you very much. I just think it’s private. Sex. Not something casual; something to be talked about with strangers at dinner parties. And certainly not something to share with a complete stranger in a train toilet.

As for karma . . .

But now my mobile is ringing – the display confirms it’s Matthew Hill. I check my watch. Ten past eight.

‘Hello, Matthew. I was going to ring you, actually. To let you know that the London DI has postponed; he’s coming round later now. Has had to stay on in Cornwall for a bit. Some development with the inquiry, he said, which I am hoping means progress.’

‘Well, I hate to disillusion you, but I’m afraid you can hold that thought. I’ve just spoken to my contact down in Cornwall and apparently the

investigation is suddenly all over the place. Going right up a blind alley, from what I hear. But never mind that. Big news. I just got the call. My wife’s gone into labour. I’m on my way to collect her right now. Feels a bit surreal, actually, but I just wanted to check in to let you know I may be out of the loop for a few days.’

‘A few days?’ I laugh. ‘You may just have underestimated this, Matthew. But what lovely news. Please do let me know how it goes. Do you know if it’s a boy or a girl yet?’

‘No. Goodness. We don’t mind . . .’

‘OK. Good luck. Drive carefully and try to calm down.’ ‘I’ll be in touch.’

And then I put the phone down and find that I am stilled. Matthew Hill clearly does not have a clue what is coming, and maybe that’s not such a bad thing.

Because once you become a parent, you learn that love can involve more fear than you had ever imagined, and you never quite look on the world in the same way again. Which is precisely why I cannot cope with my part in Anna’s disappearance.