I can’t see him properly, whoever he is, this person who’s come between the two of us so suddenly. I only know that his effect on her is instant, her face and neck flushing pink, her eyes wide and bright. She listens to what he says, then laughs and glances away, but only for a moment, as though her eyes can’t quite help being drawn back to him. And then he sits down next to her, so close that their arms touch. He says something and she shakes her head, a smile still hovering on her lips, and I don’t know what it is, this strange heat that’s there in the crackling, held-breath space between them; I only know that it has no place for me.
As quickly as it began, it’s over. He leans in close and murmurs one last thing in her ear that makes two red spots appear high on her cheeks, gets up and walks away and I have a clearer look at him now. He’s dressed in tracksuit bottoms, a zipped-up jacket with a hood. He’s twenty or so and very handsome, I suppose, though I don’t like his face at all, its roughness and its smile that shows he knows she’s watching him still. I wait for a few moments more, in the shadow of the shop’s doorway, before I take a breath and go to her.
When I’m there, standing in front of her, saying her name, she looks at me so strangely at first, as though she hardly knows where she is, tearing her eyes from his retreating back and blinking up at me. “Edie?” I say again, and the moment lengthens until at last her expression clears and she smiles and she says, “Oh, hiya! Heather, right?” and my heart somersaults with relief.
Photo by Philippa Gedge Photography
Camilla Way has been an editor and writer for magazines in the UK and is the author of Watching Edie.
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