Sebastian
At Dad’s. Where do we keep the flashlights?
“Is that your boyfriend?” Rowan asks. “Is it Orson Grey?”
“I thought you were my boyfriend, Rowan,” Viola says, the wine hitting recklessly. “You’ve seen me naked and everything.”
“And wasn’t it glorious.”
Maybe she could get to like Rowan after all. Niamh holds out her cigarette and she realizes she has been staring at it unconsciously. Niamh wouldn’t make a feature of it, that smoking isn’t something Viola does all the time. Softly, gradually, that’s her way. Like wading into a pool of water. It’s tempting. But it’s a distraction.Stick to the plan, rings a clear voice through the muddle of wine.
“I should go,” Viola says.
“Home? Already?”
“No. Going to try to meet someone.”
Niamh looks wounded. “But the wine.”
“Go on, darling,” Rowan advises. “Don’t let Niamh bully you. She’s probably jealous.”
The moment yawns between them, the possibility of Niamh’s attraction, the threat of a lust that could topple a friendship. Then it dissipates with a cheeky wink, a kiss on the cheek, and Viola off into the dark.
She heads toward the Union Bar, the night slipping off her back. The evening is unusually warm for October, and students and townies are mingling more than usual, pubs spilling out into the street. Somewhere, distantly, someone is setting off fireworks. Outside, she wonders loosely whether she has watched too many films, devoured so many happy endings that she can no longer see them for what they are. She crosses the street and pushes open the heavy oak door into the glow of the bar.
The room is teeming with a different mix than she might have expected, fewer jackets, more skirts. Music playing and wine flowing and Orson Grey nowhere to be seen. Is there relief in this? Maybe it was foolish after all. What would she have said?Hello, we met once when I was a child. Don’t you recognize me?Stupid, really.
Sebastian
power is out help
Viola
flashlights
where the phone basket used to be
He’ll get it. Incredible that he manages to maintain the ignorance of a stranger in that house. Since the night he hit her, they speak only in short, functional bursts. She wonders how often he is going there, whether he is trying to tell her something else with the text. Whether he has found anything else.
“Viola!”
At the bar, her tutor, Dr. Maitland, is merrily sipping a bright pink cocktail. Viola sidles up as he gestures to the bartender.
“What can I get you?”
“Oh, really, I was just—”
“Nonsense. This one is called an ‘Old Cigar Shop,’ beet and cinnamon vodka, really very unusual.”
“Anything but that.”
Maitland is a creature of his institution, with small, gopher-like features and a wardrobe that consists of a single tweed jacket and innumerable white-collared shirts.
He orders her a gin. “Where’s your other half?”
Sebastian?“Niamh?”
“Who else?”
