Free Fire by Deborah Challinor Page B

that Sonny wouldn’t be there. But he was, standing just outside the Civic Theatre. It was nearly dark now, but not so dark that she couldn’t see that Sonny was grinning broadly at her. It wasn’t even remotely cold but she caught herself shivering.
    ‘Hi,’ he said.
    ‘Hello.’
    Sonny took his hands out of his pockets. ‘You look nice.’
    ‘Thank you. So do you.’
    Out of his work clothes, he looked very smart, if slightly ill at ease. He was wearing grey trousers, a blue shirt without a tie, a dark grey sports coat and highly polished black shoes. He was freshly shaven and close up he smelled of something that reminded Allie of wood smoke, but sweeter. Cedar?
    ‘We’re twins,’ he said, nodding at her own blue and grey outfit.
    ‘So we are,’ Allie said.
    And so they stood there, awkwardly saying nothing as people walked around them heading into the theatre.
    Sonny looked at his watch. ‘Film starts in ten minutes. You want to go in?’
    As Sonny paid for their tickets, Allie thought take that, Dad, you narrow-minded old bugger.
    She loved the Civic Theatre with its exotic Moorish-themed foyer and perpetual promise of fantasy and excitement. She was staring up at the domed, ornately decorated ceiling when she realized that Sonny was talking to her.
    ‘Pardon?’
    Sonny nodded towards the refreshments counter. ‘Doyou fancy an ice cream or chocolates or anything?’
    ‘No, thanks,’ Allie said. ‘We had a big tea.’ Untrue, but she was far too nervous to eat anything now.
    ‘We’ll find our seats, then, eh?’
    Allie waited while their tickets were torn in half, then followed Sonny up the carpeted stairs into the auditorium, marvelling as she always did at the lofty midnight-blue ceiling sprinkled with hundreds of glittering stars.
    Apologizing and squeezing their way past people, they found their seats and sat down, looking down at a stage that seemed to be miles below them.
    ‘Hope there isn’t a fire,’ Sonny remarked, ‘we’d never get out.’
    Allie laughed.
    There was another short silence, then they both spoke at once.
    ‘Sorry,’ Sonny said, ‘go on.’
    ‘I was just going to say, do you like cowboy films?’
    ‘Yeah, they’re OK. Do you?’
    ‘They’re OK,’ Allie echoed. She cast about for something else to say. ‘What about war films, do you like those?’
    ‘Not really. Load of rubbish, most of them.’
    Allie wasn’t sure how to respond to that. Normally she was good at conversation, even with people she didn’t know, but she was making very heavy weather of it at the moment. Eventually she said, ‘Busy at work?’
    ‘Flat out. Everybody wanting things for Christmas and for the queen so there’s lots of stuff coming in and going out. What about you?’
    ‘The same.’ She waited a beat before she went on. ‘So when did you start at Dunbar & Jones?’
    ‘Beginning of October.’
    Allie nodded with satisfaction. ‘Yes, that’s about when I first noticed you.’
    Sonny turned to her, looking very pleased with himself. ‘Ah, so you’d already noticed me, had you?’
    Wishing that the lights had already gone down so he couldn’t see the blood rushing to her face, Allie said, ‘The first time I saw you, I mean. In the caf’
    ‘I noticed you the day I started, sitting there with your friends with that beautiful big smile of yours and that lovely hair.’
    Allie was so startled she could only stare at him.
    Sonny laughed. ‘What? It’s true. You’ve got fantastic hair.’
    ‘Well, um, thank you,’ Allie said, thoroughly unused to such compliments, particularly from men. ‘I get it from my mother, even though she’s Irish. Most people think Irish women have dark hair, but my mother’s really fair. Or she was—it’s fading a bit now she’s getting older.’
    Aware she was prattling, Allie stopped, though Sonny seemed to be quite absorbed by what she was saying. This close she could see he had a line of small, pink scars marking the brown skin of his face,