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Adam Thorpe
52
spending too long making
out with the jigging
female. Suzie feels her
stomach sort of fire up,
sweat happening on her
temples, her belly going
shiny with it. Crazy! He is
a sociable guy, that’s all.
Says who? Another peal of
laughter breaks its bubble
on the train’s ceiling. She
stares at nothing out of the
window, feeling like the
outside’s mist of greyness.
Which may in fact be on
its way to turning black.
It’s getting dark way too
early every day these days.
Going backwards, again.
England, going backwards.
Eventually he swims back
down the aisle (she always
sees it as like that, like
swimming, the way people
steady themselves with
their hands on alternative
head-rests) and slumps
into her old aisle seat.
He is somewhere else.
He does do this phased-
out thing, and not just
when he’s done a bit of
chem: he drifts now and
again, like he is swivelled
round in his own body
and contemplating the
interior. But it isn’t the
same, this time; he is
excited. His long eyelashes
meet each other and his
eyes are rolling about
beneath the lids and his
sharp straight nose – his
mother’s nose – is a little
rucked up, like a cushion
you want to smooth out.
He is breathing almost
heavily; anyone’d think
the trip to the toilet was a
run around the block.
‘What’s up, Jazz?’
He doesn’t open his eyes.
Instead he says, quietly,
‘I’ll pick up a deal.’
‘Eh?’
‘Earphones. The mobile.
Have a hunt on the £2