Beginnings and Endings (Short Fiction)
01st August 2006
In: Short Stories
Lara took her time walking down Duke street because she didn't want to arrive early. It was barely five o'clock and already the late afternoon shoppers were being joined by office workers hurrying out of the Coulthard's Building, lighting up cigarettes as soon as they were through its heavy glass doors, their thin streams of smoke spiralling into the chill November air.
They'd agreed to meet at the depot where his bus was due in at ten past the hour. "Ring me," she'd said, "if you can't make it." He'd nodded and confirmed he would. The phone hadn't rung and there were no messages but still the thought niggled that he probably wouldn't turn up. He'd done it before - broken an arrangement without warning and afterwards, when he eventually got in touch with her, the explanation was offered in such a casual, offhand way that she'd felt her carefully saved up feelings of hurt and indignation suddenly drained by his display of apparent apathy.
"You didn't wait long, did you?" he'd asked, his tone flat, barely interested.
"No," she'd lied, determined not to make anything of the incident. Let him think I'm not bothered either, she thought. It had actually been two hours before she'd eventually given up and gone home, creeping through the back door in the hope her mother wouldn't hear her and want an explanation for streaked mascara and returning so early. Mother didn't like him, which was a little irrational seeing as they hadn't actually met, but she insisted she didn't like the sound of him, just the same.
Cathy, too, was disapproving but, having worked with him, at least her friend's opinion was more informed. "Can't think what you see in him - always reminds me of a weasel with his long nose and beady eyes!" She was, Lara realised, only half joking.
She glanced at her watch - still only seven minutes past so she went into a nearby Boots, tried the testers on the perfume counter and emerged again in a fragrant cloud of Charlie with an undercurrent of Je Reviens.
The pavement was more crowded now, the commuter homeward run building up, the bus queues increasing as the first few drops of rain began to fall. Lara sheltered in the doorway of the Halifax, glanced up the road and saw his bus turn the corner at the top end. It crawled through the heavy traffic, already several minutes behind schedule. If she hurried she could reach the depot just as it drew in but she held back, reluctant, watching the now sleety rain in car headlamps. It wasn't worth the effort, she was sure he wouldn't be there.
The library was a warm hum of activity as visitors parked their dripping umbrellas in the stand then funneled through double doors into the small lecture room. Lara stood by the radiator beside the main notice board and dried off. Eventually the speaker arrived - an earnest-looking bespectacled young man carrying a large suitcase - the poster advertised that he was giving an illustrated talk on the craft of bookbinding. "Are you going in?" The voice beside her made her jump. A library assistant was pointing towards door. "They're due to start any minute."
Lara made a split second decision. "Yes ... thank you." Well, she thought to herself, it was a way of passing an hour or two until such time she could go home, hopefully without attracting a barrage of questions from Mother. Paying her entrance fee to a woman just inside the door, she quickly slid into a seat at the back, resigned to the fact that she would probably find the subject matter a little dry. She looked around the room, surprised to find it three quarters full, and watched the young man who had now removed his suit jacket, rolled up his shirt sleeves and was energetically emptying his suitcase onto a display table. There seemed something vaguely familiar about him. The way his thick dark hair flopped forward over his forehead as he concentrated on arranging the items. Curious about him, she wished she had the courage to move to one of the few remaining seats nearer the front but stayed where she was, trying to place when and where she might have seen him before. His name - Michael Lee-Davenport - failed to ring any bells so she decided it must simply be that he reminded her of someone else.
The talk turned out to be much more interesting than she'd imagined, due mainly to the speaker's enthusiasm and lively presentation. His audience, in turn, showed far more than just polite appreciation and gave him a round of very solid applause. Lara was rather sad when it was all over, lingering beside the display and leafing through a pamphlet on local evening courses.
"Please help yourself to any of the literature."
She turned to face him and smiled. "Thank you, I will." She tucked a copy in her bag before continuing. "I really enjoyed that."
"You sound as though you didn't expect to, but thanks. Especially for coming along on such a miserable evening." His tone was gently teasing and she felt a guilty blush creep up her neck. "I'm running a workshop at the WI hall in Market Square next Thursday evening, if you're interested. Just bring any hardback book that's in need of repair and restoration and get some hands-on experience. I hope we'll see you there, perhaps. Anyway, it's been nice meeting you." He held out his hand and she took it, self-consciously.
"I'll have to see if I'm free that evening." The words had an empty ring to them. She was almost always free so why bother to pretend otherwise.
Outside, the rain clouds had cleared and the pavements were beginning to dry up. She looked for a taxi, found the rank deserted and after a few minutes slowly pacing up and down, decided it would be better to walk. It was two, maybe three miles so should take her the best part of an hour if she took it at a leisurely pace. But that would still get her home far too early to be convincing - so where else could she go to waste another hour or more? Maybe a she'd have a coffee somewhere or even a hamburger.
The noisy crowd of kids in Burger King put her off and she turned back, dawdling past the Coach and Horses and glancing casually into the saloon bar. There were several free tables. She could go in, order a drink and make out she was waiting for someone. Ironic, considering that quite often had been the case.
"Hello, again." She hadn't noticed him when she'd walked in, her eyes fixed on the barman, her hand already in her handbag searching for her purse. "Can I get you a drink?"
"Thank you, but no. It's all right, I'm waiting for someone," she raised her eyes to scan the room briefly. Even as she'd said it, she could have bitten her tongue off. Why shouldn't she have a drink with him? It wasn't as if... She fought shy of pursuing that line of thought and frowned, feeling ridiculously transparent.
Michael Lee-Davenport looked at her over the top of his spectacles and nodded. "Perhaps some other time, then." He finished the last of his pint, picked up a raincoat from a nearby stool and lugged his suitcase awkwardly towards the door. "Goodbye."
"'Bye." She ordered a Martini and lemonade and kicked herself, annoyed that she'd bungled such an opportunity. He probably wouldn't ask her again because, whether he believed her lie or not, she'd almost certainly given him the impression she wasn't interested.
The walk home was accompanied by a steady drizzle that matched her mood. Lifting her face to the rain and letting it rinse the salt from her cheeks, she gave in to a mix of emotions and allowed them all to wash through her as she angrily sploshed through the puddles until her feet and legs were drenched.
She stood on the doorstep and carefully turned the key in the lock. The click was subdued but her mother must have been listening for her return and headed Lara off before she reached the foot of the stairs. "Stood you up again, did he?" The I-knew-he-would note of triumph in her voice changing to a softer one when she saw her daughter's expression. "You're soaked through. I'll make you a hot drink." Lara meekly followed her into the kitchen.
Gordon rang her the next day. "Sorry about last night. Couldn't get away. I had a client with me until gone five - foreign chap, big order at stake so I had to give it my best shot. D'you understand?" He sounded uncharacteristically anxious that she did, in fact, appreciate his predicament. She considered for a long moment. "Lara?"
"It's okay." She paused again and sighed noisily. "I suppose I should be getting used to it by now but you could have phoned and left a message."
"Easier said than done, I'm afraid. It gets awkward. You know how it is."
She rather doubted that she did and let another silence lengthen until he felt forced to break it.
"Tell you what," his voice brightened in tone, almost jollying now, "there's an Alan Bennett play on at the Majestic - if you fancy it I could get tickets."
"Yes, all right." Then, fearing she sounded unforgiving, "that would be nice" she added graciously. "Let me know which night."
He had to pick Thursday but, as he'd booked the tickets, she felt obligated. She tried to put thoughts of Michael out of her mind as she got ready but a shadow of regret persisted and continued to nag at her even as she walked into the theatre foyer. It was no great surprise to find that Gordon hadn't arrived yet but, as there was still twenty minutes to go before curtain up, she bought a programme and settled herself on a bench near the door. Ten minutes went by and then she heard her name being called over the tannoy. Would Miss O'Brien please go to the box office. Her heart sank. It could only mean one thing - he couldn't make it for some reason or other.
He'd left the tickets at the desk, almost as if he'd expected this. She took them both and gave them, along with the programme, to an elderly couple waiting in the queue. They were good seats - front row centre of the balcony - and it was gratifying to know that they wouldn't be wasted now. The old chap offered to pay her something for them but she refused to take anything, insisting they had cost her nothing which, of course, they hadn't. Gordon was the anonymous and unwitting donor and the action satisfied her sense of rough justice. She wished the couple an enjoyable evening and went out into the street.
The workshop was already in progress by the time she arrived and she felt rather overdressed in her black figured silk dress and jacket. Michael came over to her and she began apologising for her lateness. "No problem, I'm just glad you could make it. Have you bought anything with you to work on?"
"Yes." She opened her handbag and, its title not without personal significance, brought out a very battered copy of Graham Greene's novel The End of the Affair.
THE END
They'd agreed to meet at the depot where his bus was due in at ten past the hour. "Ring me," she'd said, "if you can't make it." He'd nodded and confirmed he would. The phone hadn't rung and there were no messages but still the thought niggled that he probably wouldn't turn up. He'd done it before - broken an arrangement without warning and afterwards, when he eventually got in touch with her, the explanation was offered in such a casual, offhand way that she'd felt her carefully saved up feelings of hurt and indignation suddenly drained by his display of apparent apathy.
"You didn't wait long, did you?" he'd asked, his tone flat, barely interested.
"No," she'd lied, determined not to make anything of the incident. Let him think I'm not bothered either, she thought. It had actually been two hours before she'd eventually given up and gone home, creeping through the back door in the hope her mother wouldn't hear her and want an explanation for streaked mascara and returning so early. Mother didn't like him, which was a little irrational seeing as they hadn't actually met, but she insisted she didn't like the sound of him, just the same.
Cathy, too, was disapproving but, having worked with him, at least her friend's opinion was more informed. "Can't think what you see in him - always reminds me of a weasel with his long nose and beady eyes!" She was, Lara realised, only half joking.
She glanced at her watch - still only seven minutes past so she went into a nearby Boots, tried the testers on the perfume counter and emerged again in a fragrant cloud of Charlie with an undercurrent of Je Reviens.
The pavement was more crowded now, the commuter homeward run building up, the bus queues increasing as the first few drops of rain began to fall. Lara sheltered in the doorway of the Halifax, glanced up the road and saw his bus turn the corner at the top end. It crawled through the heavy traffic, already several minutes behind schedule. If she hurried she could reach the depot just as it drew in but she held back, reluctant, watching the now sleety rain in car headlamps. It wasn't worth the effort, she was sure he wouldn't be there.
The library was a warm hum of activity as visitors parked their dripping umbrellas in the stand then funneled through double doors into the small lecture room. Lara stood by the radiator beside the main notice board and dried off. Eventually the speaker arrived - an earnest-looking bespectacled young man carrying a large suitcase - the poster advertised that he was giving an illustrated talk on the craft of bookbinding. "Are you going in?" The voice beside her made her jump. A library assistant was pointing towards door. "They're due to start any minute."
Lara made a split second decision. "Yes ... thank you." Well, she thought to herself, it was a way of passing an hour or two until such time she could go home, hopefully without attracting a barrage of questions from Mother. Paying her entrance fee to a woman just inside the door, she quickly slid into a seat at the back, resigned to the fact that she would probably find the subject matter a little dry. She looked around the room, surprised to find it three quarters full, and watched the young man who had now removed his suit jacket, rolled up his shirt sleeves and was energetically emptying his suitcase onto a display table. There seemed something vaguely familiar about him. The way his thick dark hair flopped forward over his forehead as he concentrated on arranging the items. Curious about him, she wished she had the courage to move to one of the few remaining seats nearer the front but stayed where she was, trying to place when and where she might have seen him before. His name - Michael Lee-Davenport - failed to ring any bells so she decided it must simply be that he reminded her of someone else.
The talk turned out to be much more interesting than she'd imagined, due mainly to the speaker's enthusiasm and lively presentation. His audience, in turn, showed far more than just polite appreciation and gave him a round of very solid applause. Lara was rather sad when it was all over, lingering beside the display and leafing through a pamphlet on local evening courses.
"Please help yourself to any of the literature."
She turned to face him and smiled. "Thank you, I will." She tucked a copy in her bag before continuing. "I really enjoyed that."
"You sound as though you didn't expect to, but thanks. Especially for coming along on such a miserable evening." His tone was gently teasing and she felt a guilty blush creep up her neck. "I'm running a workshop at the WI hall in Market Square next Thursday evening, if you're interested. Just bring any hardback book that's in need of repair and restoration and get some hands-on experience. I hope we'll see you there, perhaps. Anyway, it's been nice meeting you." He held out his hand and she took it, self-consciously.
"I'll have to see if I'm free that evening." The words had an empty ring to them. She was almost always free so why bother to pretend otherwise.
Outside, the rain clouds had cleared and the pavements were beginning to dry up. She looked for a taxi, found the rank deserted and after a few minutes slowly pacing up and down, decided it would be better to walk. It was two, maybe three miles so should take her the best part of an hour if she took it at a leisurely pace. But that would still get her home far too early to be convincing - so where else could she go to waste another hour or more? Maybe a she'd have a coffee somewhere or even a hamburger.
The noisy crowd of kids in Burger King put her off and she turned back, dawdling past the Coach and Horses and glancing casually into the saloon bar. There were several free tables. She could go in, order a drink and make out she was waiting for someone. Ironic, considering that quite often had been the case.
"Hello, again." She hadn't noticed him when she'd walked in, her eyes fixed on the barman, her hand already in her handbag searching for her purse. "Can I get you a drink?"
"Thank you, but no. It's all right, I'm waiting for someone," she raised her eyes to scan the room briefly. Even as she'd said it, she could have bitten her tongue off. Why shouldn't she have a drink with him? It wasn't as if... She fought shy of pursuing that line of thought and frowned, feeling ridiculously transparent.
Michael Lee-Davenport looked at her over the top of his spectacles and nodded. "Perhaps some other time, then." He finished the last of his pint, picked up a raincoat from a nearby stool and lugged his suitcase awkwardly towards the door. "Goodbye."
"'Bye." She ordered a Martini and lemonade and kicked herself, annoyed that she'd bungled such an opportunity. He probably wouldn't ask her again because, whether he believed her lie or not, she'd almost certainly given him the impression she wasn't interested.
The walk home was accompanied by a steady drizzle that matched her mood. Lifting her face to the rain and letting it rinse the salt from her cheeks, she gave in to a mix of emotions and allowed them all to wash through her as she angrily sploshed through the puddles until her feet and legs were drenched.
She stood on the doorstep and carefully turned the key in the lock. The click was subdued but her mother must have been listening for her return and headed Lara off before she reached the foot of the stairs. "Stood you up again, did he?" The I-knew-he-would note of triumph in her voice changing to a softer one when she saw her daughter's expression. "You're soaked through. I'll make you a hot drink." Lara meekly followed her into the kitchen.
Gordon rang her the next day. "Sorry about last night. Couldn't get away. I had a client with me until gone five - foreign chap, big order at stake so I had to give it my best shot. D'you understand?" He sounded uncharacteristically anxious that she did, in fact, appreciate his predicament. She considered for a long moment. "Lara?"
"It's okay." She paused again and sighed noisily. "I suppose I should be getting used to it by now but you could have phoned and left a message."
"Easier said than done, I'm afraid. It gets awkward. You know how it is."
She rather doubted that she did and let another silence lengthen until he felt forced to break it.
"Tell you what," his voice brightened in tone, almost jollying now, "there's an Alan Bennett play on at the Majestic - if you fancy it I could get tickets."
"Yes, all right." Then, fearing she sounded unforgiving, "that would be nice" she added graciously. "Let me know which night."
He had to pick Thursday but, as he'd booked the tickets, she felt obligated. She tried to put thoughts of Michael out of her mind as she got ready but a shadow of regret persisted and continued to nag at her even as she walked into the theatre foyer. It was no great surprise to find that Gordon hadn't arrived yet but, as there was still twenty minutes to go before curtain up, she bought a programme and settled herself on a bench near the door. Ten minutes went by and then she heard her name being called over the tannoy. Would Miss O'Brien please go to the box office. Her heart sank. It could only mean one thing - he couldn't make it for some reason or other.
He'd left the tickets at the desk, almost as if he'd expected this. She took them both and gave them, along with the programme, to an elderly couple waiting in the queue. They were good seats - front row centre of the balcony - and it was gratifying to know that they wouldn't be wasted now. The old chap offered to pay her something for them but she refused to take anything, insisting they had cost her nothing which, of course, they hadn't. Gordon was the anonymous and unwitting donor and the action satisfied her sense of rough justice. She wished the couple an enjoyable evening and went out into the street.
The workshop was already in progress by the time she arrived and she felt rather overdressed in her black figured silk dress and jacket. Michael came over to her and she began apologising for her lateness. "No problem, I'm just glad you could make it. Have you bought anything with you to work on?"
"Yes." She opened her handbag and, its title not without personal significance, brought out a very battered copy of Graham Greene's novel The End of the Affair.
THE END