Free The Machine by James Smythe Page A

of telling all to a woman who’s nearly a complete stranger.
    Kids? Sorry, I shouldn’t pry.
    No, Beth replies. No kids. Just me.
    Right, so that’s definitely alone then. There’s a hint of something in Laura’s accent, something Irish maybe. Something lilting. Makes everything she says sound somehow vague. How often is he back? she asks.
    Not often.
    Where have they got him?
    Iran, Beth says. He’s out there as one of the last peacekeepers. It’s safest: everybody knows about the chaos that was there, and how many people have died in the last decade. They don’t push when they hear Iran, because it could mean anything. It’s a delicate subject matter to talk about.
    How long have you been married?
    Eight years, Beth says. She’s met people like Laura before. Lots of questions because they like being interested. Not nosy, just stockpiles of information, immediately involved in the lives of their acquaintances. What about you? Beth asks. Married?
    Me, no. Laura says it with the smirk of somebody who’s had this conversation a lot. No no no. I have a boyfriend; Rob. He’s noncommittal and infuriating. No matter how many hints I give him he never picks up on them, or he ignores them and plays dumb. He’s like a trained dog who chooses when he’ll obey. She leans in conspiratorially. Full of promises when there’s a treat in the hand, Laura says. We’ve been together too long now, as well. I think he’s complacent.
    You live together?
    No. No, I won’t. She pulls a necklace out from the neckline of her shirt. A cross, with a miniature Christ figure draped over it. I’ve told him that we should wait, she says.
    Right. And he’s …
    He’s stubborn. Laura finishes her glass of wine. She necks the final inch back in one. So is this all there is to do for fun on this bloody island? she asks.

11
    Laura says goodbye to Beth. There’s no thought of this continuing onwards – Beth remembers when that wouldn’t have even been a question, that a pub shutting didn’t mean you had to go to bed and tuck yourself in and end the night – but Laura’s adamant. She’s drunk and swaying, and Beth asks if she can find her way; if she’ll be all right. She’s insistent that she doesn’t need Beth’s help.
    I can get home, Laura says, I honestly can. She reaches over and grabs Beth’s shoulders. Beth, she says. Beth. It’s been such fun. We have to do this again.
    Laura stumbles off and leaves Beth in the street. She starts home. The walk back takes her ages, as she keeps stopping, leaning against walls. She catches sight of herself in the huge mirrored windows of the porn shop tucked between the kebab house (heaving) and the tiny grocers (which is perpetually empty, and seems to survive only on the occasional sale of a bunch of flowers) and she realizes that she doesn’t look anything like the woman she’s been for the last five years. She’s relaxed, and it’s all over her face. Her posture, even; the comfortable slump of her shoulders. It’s enough to make her cry, and she does, facing the water on the far side, away from the street. She’s never been in one of those shops, but she wonders if they can see out of that mirror: if they’re all watching the strange woman sobbing on the other side of the window.
    For the rest of her walk home – which she extends by taking side-streets, by passing back along the front, by stopping and watching the people drinking in the streets, grabbing each other’s arses, chewing each other’s mouths off – she wants to be discovered. She wants everything out in the open. She doesn’t think about Vic for at least half an hour, and when she realizes that, she feels incredible. Magical, even. He’s everything, but that pause … to take it was so freeing. She passes students and parents and colleagues, but they don’t notice her, or they aren’t looking, or they don’t say anything. She doesn’t know which. She’s drunker than she’s been in years, and she can feel