The Stranger, Mark Ayre [microsoft ebook reader .TXT] 📗

Alone, how would you fare? And if you went to prison, how would you cope? How haunting would the nightmares become with you unable to act on your visions? The failures would mount up fast. How long before you broke down?”

Abbie was back on the bed. She had one hand palm down on the pillowcase within which lay The Stand. The other was on her phone, gripping so tight.

“Turns out you did need to dignify the question with an answer,” said Abbie. “Or felt the need to anyway.”

Ben gave no response to this. He said, “What are you going to do? Will you choose employment, or will you choose this boy.”

“You know where I’m staying?”

A pause. “I do.”

“Send me a new phone. ASAP.”

“That’s not an answer. Is this your resignation?”

“You know damn well it isn’t.”

“Wonderful. I think you’re making the right choice.”

“Just piss off, Ben,” she said before hanging up the phone, placing it on the floor, and smashing it repeatedly with a desk chair that looked exactly like the one Danny’s coat had fallen from around the time of his death.

Seventeen

In her change of underwear, top and jumper, and in Travis’ mother’s trousers, Abbie dressed. Leaving the smashed phone on the floor, she rushed downstairs and asked Glenda to borrow a phone. She made a call, received the answer she wanted, and left the hotel.

At seven PM on the dot, Abbie met Bobby outside an independent Italian restaurant, tucked away down a side street a couple of minutes from the town centre. Already smiling when Abbie turned the corner, Bobby’s grin became a beam when he saw her. His face lit up.

“You look stunning,” he said.

In town, Abbie had intended to purchase a replacement pair of jeans. While browsing a boutique on the corner under the watchful gaze of a shopkeeper who disapproved of her boots (from a fashion standpoint rather than because they were flecked with blood), Abbie had spotted a beautiful dress. Though she would have loved it at first sight, whenever she saw it, usually she would not have bought it. Dresses were for people who lived ordinary lives. Abbie needed to, at all times, be in clothes that would not restrict her if she had to run or kick someone in the face. Or stomach. Or balls.

Her anger at Ben, which had pushed her to call Bobby and take him up on his offer of the date, seemed like a hand around her wrist. Seemed to drag her to the dress and tug insistently until she picked it up. Seemed to drag her to a matching pair of shoes and then to the changing room.

When Abbie appeared from the changing room in the dress, the shop assistant told her she looked beautiful, but still glowered. Clearly, the slight of wearing such hideous boots in the boutique was not one the proprietor could easily forgive or forget. Despite the sour look, Abbie had bought the dress, the shoes, as well as a pair of jeans and a new top (now packed in her drawstring bag which she had taken on the date. Had the shop assistant known she was combining the dress and bag, she would no doubt have suffered a heart attack). Should anything kick-off while Abbie was on her date, she could always do like superman and run into a phone booth to change into more appropriate ass-kicking gear.

“You don’t look so bad yourself,” said Abbie to Bobby, who was wearing smart jeans and a tight blue shirt, both of which made him look even more handsome than did his smile, and far more handsome than had his Perfect Chicken outfit.

Pointing at the door, beaming Bobby said, “Shall we?”

“We shall.”

The Italian boasted low ceilings held up by ancient wooden beams. There was soft, instrumental music floating across the air. The kitchen was exposed, and the wonderful scent of good food and the warmth of the oven filled the room.

At a table in the corner, Abbie and Bobby took menus and perused them at first in silence. Each waiting for the other to make the opening gambit.

After a couple of minutes, Bobby said, "So what made you change your mind?"

"Change my mind?" said Abbie. "I said no to drinks. This is dinner. That's completely different."

"I believe on at least one occasion you completely ruled out a date."

"A date? Is that what this is? Oh, in that case—"

She began to rise. Laughing, Bobby placed a hand on her wrist, and she sat. His fingers lingered on her skin. When they retreated, she was sorry to watch them go.

Eyes back on her menu, Abbie said, "I have to say, I still think this is a bad idea."

Also looking at his menu, Bobby nodded in what he probably thought was a sage manner. The smile ruined the effect.

"Yeah?" he said. "Why's that?"

"Tonight is my last night in town. After that, you'll never see me again."

"Why not?"

"What do you mean?"

Bobby looked up from his menu. "Your home, is it in this country?"

An interesting question. But the answer was, technically, "Yes."

Bobby shrugged. "Country's not that big."

Abbie started to respond, but the waiter arrived with a notepad, a pen, and an inviting smile.

"Can I get you anything to drink?"

"What do you reckon?" said Bobby. "Share a bottle of wine with me?"

"I don't drink when I'm—" Abbie stopped herself. She couldn't say she never drank when on a job because Bobby didn't know she was on a job.

"When you're what?"

"At the weekend," she said, which neither fit the end of her sentence nor made any sense.

"A weekday drinker?" he said. "You're an unusual girl. Will you make an exception, for me?"

Making exceptions was a bad idea. Abbie was angry at Ben and had time to kill before meeting with Eddie. Hence the exception of being on a date at all. But drinking was different. It was a depressant. It would make her tired and sluggish. At that point, she wasn't lashing out at Ben—if ever she was—but she might well endanger Eddie.