Page 36 of Mirrors of the Past

‘It was a phase. An art student phase.’

‘Really?’ She raised her eyebrows ironically.

‘Yes.’ He followed her gaze as it swept across his black outfit. ‘I am allowed to like black clothing, you know. There’s nothing weird about that!’

‘Hmmm. Anyway, it’s all ancient history and it was all fine, because I went out that night and drowned my sorrows. Stupid manager.’

‘Ah. Yeah. You did. So did I . . .’

‘Did you? I wouldn’t know.’ Tegan turned away and busied herself with her notebook. The conversation about that night was, Ryan realised, at an end.

But his mind flew back to that night, and even if Tegan didn’t want to remember it, or, less likely given her current demeanour, couldn’t remember it, he did.

He remembered sitting at the bar, on his own as usual, and a movement catching his eye at the door.

Tegan had swept in, looking defiant and confident and swishing that damn ponytail around, as if she was looking for someone.

Whoever it was she was looking for, clearly wasn’t there though, as she sat down alone at a table. Within minutes, an inebriated guy had stumbled up to her and was talking to her, swaying as he did so, indicating the bar and waving a credit card around.

Tegan gave him a confident, dismissive smile and shook her head. Ryan watched as the man seemed to become more animated and implied that he would definitely like to buy Tegan a drink, and here was the card to prove it — right up in her face.

Tegan shook her head again, more firmly, and shifted position so she was turned away from the drunk. The drunk, however, staggered around the table so he was facing her again.

‘What the hell?’ Ryan heard himself say. Regardless of what argument he and Tegan had had that day, watching the behaviour of that guy towards her was unacceptable. He dithered for a moment — Tegan was, as he knew, eminently capable of defending herself; but this guy was going too far for comfort.

By now he was up in her face, as well as his damn credit card, and Tegan was no longer looking confident, but a bit scared.

Which was unusual for her.

So — no more.

Ryan couldn’t sit and watch that.

‘I think that guy needs to be thrown out,’ he said to the barman. ‘He’s causing a bit of a nuisance.’

‘Who? Phil? He’s harmless.’ The barman grinned over in his direction. ‘One of our regulars. He’ll give up in a second.’

‘What?’ Ryan was appalled. ‘He’s bothering that girl!’

‘He’s fine.’

Ryan stared at the barman in horror. God, was he going to have to do something himself? Okay — he would. He had to.

Without giving himself time to think, he got up and started to head towards Tegan. He wasn’t sure what he’d do when he got there; maybe tell her that her taxi was here; maybe sit down and pretend he was the guy she’d been waiting for all this time . . .

However, he was within a few steps of Tegan, when there was a commotion at the door. Three girls practically fell through it into the bar.

‘There she is!’ hollered one of the girls, and ran unsteadily across to Tegan.

‘Tasha!’ cried Tegan and stood up. Neatly, she circumvented the drunk who was swaying, apparently confused now as to why his prey had disappeared, and ran over to Tasha. ‘Great to see you! Come on — let’s go somewhere else. I’m bored of this place already.’

She’d linked arms with the girl and they’d turned and hurried out of the bar, the other two girls running after them.

She’d passed Ryan with inches to spare, but apparently didn’t see him, as she didn’t acknowledge him at all.

Ryan stood there in the middle of the bar, staring after her as she left. He felt like a bit of a fool. He was only intending to do something to help her — but she clearly didn’t need his help after all.

And that made him feel rather stupid, and also made him wonder if he’d misinterpreted the whole thing and Tegan had the situation under control the whole time.

He guessed he would never know.

Regardless, he left the bar and knew he would never go back — not if the barman was happy to let people like Phil wander around unhindered.

Tegan turned up at work the next day, seeming absolutely fine, full of her usual confidence, and it made him doubt his perception of the evening all over again.

Ryan often wondered if she’d seen him coming towards her, but he never knew. And it didn’t seem the time or the place to bring it back up today.

Instead, today, in the gothic rose garden, he said: ‘You were right to leave. That manager — he was an utter dick.’

Tegan suddenly smiled. ‘He was utterly a dick.’ Then she looked up at him. ‘At least our managers here aren’t dicks.’

‘No.’ Ryan looked at his hated man-bag. ‘Even though mine makes me carry this thing around.’

‘But it has some really cool stuff inside it,’ replied Tegan.

And that, he couldn’t deny.