She stops, and says in a different voice, ‘Oh, Olivia, I’m so sorry.’
I am running, rowing with horror. The aftershock of pain still rolls through me. Her words hurt more.
‘Please,’ she calls. ‘I’m sorry. I just get so angry, sometimes.’
I know how to hurt her back. I know the place she fears more than anywhere else.
I leap into the chest freezer and hook my claws into the lid, pulling it down over us with a crash. The dark closes over, welcome, and I close my ears to Lauren’s screams. I let soft nothing take me. I go away into the deep.
How many times can someone bend before they break for ever? You have to take care, dealing with broken things; sometimes they give way, and break others in their turn.
Ted
I go back to the bar with the lights in the trees where I met the butter-haired woman with the blue eyes. It is a warm day so I sit out back at a long table and breathe the smell of barbecue and think of her for a while. There’s country music playing from somewhere, mountain music, and it’s nice. This is the date we should have had. The real one didn’t go well. Don’t think about that.
Around me, men mill and flow. They are focused, energy comes off them, but no one’s talking much. Once again there are no women here. I wish I could keep that part of my brain turned off, to be honest. I feel bad about what happened with the butter-haired lady. The day is warm and calm begins to steal through me, almost as if I were in a waiting room. I drink six or seven boilermakers. Who’s counting? I will be walking home later. ‘Didn’t drive here. That would be irresponsible!’ I realise I am speaking aloud, and people are looking. I sink my face into my beer and keep quiet after that. Plus I remember now, I sold the truck a while ago.
As dusk falls more men arrive. After their shifts, I guess. There is a lot of to and fro but people leave me alone. I begin to understand why there are no women here – it’s not for them. What would Mommy have said if she saw me in a place like this? Her mouth narrowing with disgust. It’s against science. I shiver. But Mommy can’t see you, I remind myself. She’s gone.
I don’t realise how drunk I am until I get up from the bench. The lights in the trees burn like comets. The dark hums and time stops moving, or maybe it’s going so fast I can’t feel it any more. That’s why I drink, I say to myself, to control time and space. It seems the truest thought I’ve ever had. Faces tip and slur.
I wander through the pools of light and dark, across the patio, past the tree. I’m looking for something I can’t name. I see an outbuilding squat against the sky, a lighted doorway. I go through it, and find myself in a mineral-smelling room with plank walls and lined with urinals. It’s full of guys laughing. They’re passing something small from hand to hand and telling a story about a friend who has a horse. Or who is a horse. Or who does horse. But then they go and I am alone with the peaceful dripping and the bare bulb swinging in the air. I go into the stall and bolt the door so I can sit down in peace with no eyes on me. It’s the butter-haired woman’s fault, coming here has reminded me of her and that is why I’m upset – normally I am cautious, I only drink this much at home. I have to get out of here, I have to get to my house. But just at this second I can’t figure out how to do that. The walls pulse.
Two people enter the bathroom. Their movements and words have furry edges, they’re very drunk – this is obvious even to me.
‘They belonged to my uncle,’ a voice says. ‘And were my grandfather’s before that. And his father’s. And his father wore them in the War of Northern Aggression. So just give them back, man. The sleeve-links, I mean cufflinks. I can’t replace them. And they were red and silver, my favourite colours.’
‘I didn’t take anything from you,’ a voice says. It’s familiar. The tone sets my sluggish synapses firing. There is an idea in my brain but I can’t seem to have it. ‘And you know I didn’t. You’re just trying to make me give you money. I see straight through you.’
‘You were sitting beside me at the bar,’ the cufflinks guy says, ‘I took them off for just a second. And then they were gone. That’s a fact.’
‘You’re unstable,’ the familiar voice says, sympathetic. ‘I understand that you don’t want to believe you lost those cufflinks. You want someone to blame. I understand. But deep down, you know I’m not responsible.’
The other man starts crying. ‘Please,’ he says. ‘You know it’s not right.’
‘Please stop visiting your delusions on me. Go find someone else.’
There’s a thud and a crack. Someone just hit the tile. I am curious by now, and that feeling is cutting through the drunk. Plus, I am nearly certain that I know who the second voice belongs to.
I push open the stall door and the two men look at me, startled. One has his fist pulled back, about to hit the other, who lies on the floor. They look like the cover of a Hardy Boys book or a poster for an old movie. I can’t help laughing.
The bug man blinks up at me. He has a smear of dirt across his nose. I hope it’s
