Ingrid left Emma as she feinted to head home. Theo had left them to meet Talitha and with that on Emma’s mind the company she was keeping was sadly deficient. Ingrid had peppered her with questions, first about Theo and her, then about his new girlfriend which was what Emma supposed she now was, and then Ingrid seemed intent on grinding her down by relentless questions on who she was interested in.

Emma thought back over her final answer, that there was no one she was interested in at the moment, that no one since she’d moved to London a few months ago had taken her fancy. And she thought that that was true. It was only Ingrid’s persistent questioning that caused her to flash back to think if she was interested in Theo on any level at all. With something of a surprise Emma realised that her emotions were something akin to jealousy as she drew out of the recess of her mind and soul the fact that Theo was even now plotting his future relationship with someone other than her.

What made it worse for Emma was that she had been the confident that had aided him on her way. She had been reluctant and her natural conservatism came to the fore as she counselled him against asking her out quite yet. But when she had seized the initiative she pushed him to respond in kind, this was the not the sort of opportunity to let slip by. How often thought Emma do we have the one who we have been pining over for months turn around and declare their love for you? She did not blame Theo for seizing the chance, Emma blamed herself for letting her get so wrapped up without even realising it.

As she made for home she remembered it would be a lonely place, with Kathy away for the next few days, she thought of heading to see Sam, but he too was away. That they both were heading to Liverpool had not occurred to her until that moment, as she wryly wondered if they would have a chance to try again at their failed date.

Emma couldn’t ever quite get out of Kathy why she had waited for so long before turning up. She thought she knew her, Kathy could be difficult and stubborn and passionately independent but Emma hadn’t thought it would be worked out in such a extreme and hurtful manner. Kathy was sometimes the person that Emma wished she was, but more often a thorn that frustrated her and allowed her to silently and subconsciously feel just so very slightly superior.

When Kathy was the person that Emma envied she was at ease in a crowd, she was popular and she drifted from one situation to the next with winsome charm and effortless grace. But the more Emma had dug into Kathy the more she had realised that it was mostly a charade. Kathy was vulnerable and insecure, she had not got a clue what she wanted to do and instead floated around managing to get by in each successive situation for long enough without the trauma that might force the situation to a resolution.

Emma picked at the hardened gum on the seat before her, barely aware of her actions, they whistled over the bridge, as the the rain lashed across the windows and the wind buffeted against the high sides of the vehicle. She doubted that Kathy’s latest idea would come to much. She had declared one morning that she was going to be a missionary to Benin. There was no pre warning, no planning, not a scintilla of indication that this was a potential avenue of exploration. Just a fait a complis announcement with pre departure training, short term trip, and then long term placement if all went smoothly. Next September she would be setting up a life in a country far from home which Emma confessed not to know existed until Kathy read from the guidebook she had studied furiously in the twenty four hours prior to her training which appeared to also double as an interview.

Despite the current intensity and the declarative intent to commit to this course of action Emma expected her to return either carrying the wounds of rejection or frightened off by the realities of life in the mission field. It also seemed a slight over reaction to standing one guy up on a date, because as far as Emma could tell, that was the genesis of all this.

Sam was an idiot she decided, he’s due for a date with a beautiful girl and he naively starts causally chatting to the hot girl next to him at the bar. It caused Emma to laugh because if he had been trying to chat her up it would have gone hopelessly wrong, but in his innocence he probably made fairly comprehensible conversation. It had started as a bit of fun, she never expected anything to come of it and was a bit taken back when both Sam and Kathy had agreed to her proposition. Now that it had so spectacularly failed she had a desired to redeem it and make it work.

Kathy would walk all over Sam, Emma decided, it wouldn’t work, her brother was not sufficiently forthright, or at least he wasn’t unless he was debating theology. Emma wondered how he would deal with the next couple of days, he loved theology but she couldn’t understand why he would put himself in a place where he had to lie about his views, and pretend he was arguing a counterpoint instead of articulating his deeply held beliefs. And still he went to that church, Emma resolved not to try and understand and instead thought she’d see how Theo’s date had gone. But Emma stopped herself before hitting send on the text, it was possible, she thought, that if I texted now, asking about how his evening went it might show that I’m sort of interested. The reasoning she relied on to not send the message was that because she couldn’t decide whether she did feel anything towards Theo it was better not to raise the possibility in his head that she might be. Not least at the very moment when he was beginning a relationship with another girl. Relationships she decided as she turned into her street were not really worth the effort. If only she could also do away with attraction and infatuation, Emma gasped.

Theo spun around as Talitha grabbed him by the shoulder. He had been in a world of his own, thinking about what he would say, thinking about what she had already said. Following their earlier failed attempt to get together, or as his ruefully reminded himself, his own failure to get his priorities right and turn up to the dinner they had planned, he was determined to not miss this chance to be with her. It was not just Talitha that was playing on his mind as the day turned into evening and the headlights shone through the windows to illuminate the mirrored walls that possessed his gaze. He couldn’t get his head around Emma.

He had always assumed she wasn’t into him, but then her caution about asking Talitha out sparked a fresh wave of doubt in his mind. Perhaps, he wondered, she didn’t want us to get together because she wanted me to ask her out instead. And in the fractions of time before his contemplation was brought to a head he reflected that he did quite like Emma, they got on well. Theo even found himself assessing her physical beauty and deciding that despite his lack of specific attraction she was what would be described as good looking.

So as he turned to face Talitha he realised his decision was no longer one dimensional. Theo had found their conversation difficult, it was not the sort of discussion he wanted to have over the phone, he needed to see her face to face, look into her eyes and convey with every ounce of body language his thoughts and feelings, and the struggles and difficulties that had come to haunt his thoughts over the past six months. All he could manage to articulate was that he liked her and had been thinking of little else while she had been away and even more so since she had returned.

Now he was faced with articulating the complexities of his thought process, and knew that he would need every fibre of his communication skills if he was to succeed.

“Hey Talitha, didn’t see you coming, you’d have thought that with all these mirrors I would have spotted you!”

“Well, I crept up on you, I’m like a chameleon, I blend into the background.” Talitha wasn’t entirely sure why she had said that, probably she decided because the tension was unbearable and she found herself uttering the first nonsensical form of words to come out of her mouth. “Let’s eat, I’m starving.”

Talitha couldn’t help but recollect the time not so long ago when she had walked from a bar to a table with a different man by her side. She decided that he really was as straight laced as he’d appeared, and had found the whole episode as awkward as he had made it look. They’d exchanged messages every know and then, she had no one else who understood enough to share in her excitement when he had indicated his assent to her proposal that they explore what it might look like to work out their dreams together.

As Theo played with the food on his plate Talitha decided it was time to move the conversation along, at present they were subsisting on pretty meagre fare, the like of which would have embarrassed them prior to her drawing the curtains back on her feelings and exposing a gaping vulnerability which neither seemed able to bridge.

“I’m sorry if I’ve made it all a bit awkward.” Talitha immediately kicked herself for apologising for her feelings, “but I thought it better if everything was out in the open and then we could see where to go next.”

“And I should have said something before,” Theo interjected into the conversation. “I should never have left you waiting for me. I thought you liked me and I thought I liked you but I just wanted to be that little bit more certain before I made a move.”

“More certain that you liked me, or that I liked you?” Questioned Talitha.

“Both, I think, I was worried that you didn’t like me as much as I liked you, but I couldn’t quite get over the uncertainty as to whether or not I really liked you, or maybe just liked the idea of liking you.”

“Well hopefully I’ve helped answer the first one, and I don’t want to push you. We can take it slowly.” Talitha couldn’t decide for what seemed like an eon whether to say the next part. “Can we have an umbrella of mercy right now? I want to say somethings and I’m not sure that I’m going to get it quite right. Please hear me out.”

If Talitha was hoping for an enthusiastic endorsement of her plan then she would have to wait, instead a dubious inclination of Theo’s head toward her provided the cue for her to go on. Theo was wondering what she was going to say, and thinking if this was the context for him to raise his uncertainties without dashing her hopes, and potentially his all for a misjudged decision to embrace openness.

“Do you like me, I mean, not just like me like a friend, do you like me as I like you?” It was clear as Talitha forced this question out that she was hampered by uncertainty that her affections went unmatched, even after his positive initial response.

He waited and as he was about to commence his response paused again, placed his cutlery down on the side of his plate, dabbed his mouth and chin with the napkin resting on his knees and made to speak. “I really like you. I have thought about very little else all the time you were back in New Zealand, I looked forward to hearing your voice. The week I spent in Munich when I could neither skype or message was agony.

“But that doesn’t answer your question. I don’t know. That’s rubbish, it’s hopeless. It is the epitome of pathetic guy syndrome isn’t it? Hamper you with attention and then say I’m not sure? But that’s where I am and I would be lying if I gave it to you any other way. I hope there is something for us. I want to give it a go, but I don’t know.”

“We can take it slowly, just one step at a time.” Talitha couldn’t quite work this out. He had been so swift to affirm his affection for her when she had told of hers, yet now he seemed distant, detached, to be honest, it struck Talitha as though it was a different person sat across from her that she had shared so many precious moments with despite being separated by oceans and continents.

As Theo waited opposite Talitha to see if there was more which she was waiting to see, he surmised there was so much more she wanted to say but contained it to stop her emotions running wild. He guessed that his reluctance had not been accepted as stoically as she made out. He looked at her eyes, and the fixed stare they held told of how Talitha was trying to hold it all together, he wanted to hold her, reassure her, tell her that he loved her, he wanted to.

But Theo also knew that Talitha was not alone in stirring his emotions. And he knew he was not ready to make a decision to commit to being in love with someone, that surely meant knowing beyond any doubt that they were the one who would make you happy, keep you sane, that they were the one who had a monopoly on your attention and your attraction. Theo felt that he could not give himself whole heartedly to Talitha if the question still lingered in his mind of what lay between him and Emma.

However, Theo knew that he could not leave it like this, he could not bear to watch Talitha fighting back the tears. “Talitha, there is no one who I would rather be with, but I’m a mess, I want to take some time to think about it, work out how it all fits together. All the time you were away I was waiting for this moment, when you and I could be together, when I could look in your face and see you cheeks rise as the smile lights up your face. I pictured your face when you told me your hair had been dyed, I pretended I could see the changes in tone, but longed to run my finger through your curls. Not a day went past when I didn’t wish I could see the depth of your eyes, the bright hues that radiate warmth, but instead send a paltry message instead.

“So when I say that I want some time, I say that because I don’t want to get this wrong.” He left it there, leaving unspoken the conclusion that if it’s right then after time had passed he would walk away, he left that hidden beneath the surface hoping that he had held her gaze, and won her over, and not convinced her that he would flake off at the first hurdle. He held her hand and brought it slowly towards him and gently planted a kiss. Theo held her hand for a moment before helping Talitha drew it back.

Theo walked away from the restaurant, and on from the station where he bade Talitha good night. He threw his head back and looked upon the stars above. They were infinite in their mystery and effervescent in their light stretching down from the heavens and onto his face. And he could not decide what to do and the stars did not help. Theo wondered if some divine revelation might come from the stars as he sat on the bank of the Thames. No bolt of lightening came, no answers to his desperate plea, but as the coldness embraced him he knew that he could not stay this way for long.

 

 

 

Kathy reached across the table to grab her bottle of water as the train lurched around a corner. Sam clearing thought she was reaching towards him as he flinched and shrunk back into his seat.

The silence between them are had grown as the train moved towards the north. The awkwardness was inevitable, but they both clearly wished to avoid it. Sam looked out the window, intent on escaping her gaze which he knew was fixed upon him.

All of a sudden he was thrown forward across the table as Kathy was swung out of her seat and into the aisle. Along the gangway bags littered the carriage, people looked up and saw the shock and confusion etched across faces down the train.

It seemed that everyone turned and peered out the window to see why the train had come to such an abrupt halt. Those who were on the left hand side clearly found something of interest as most of the passengers joined them. The carriage ahead near the front of the train had skewed away from the track, while the one immediately ahead was still on the track but veering towards the left.

The crush of bodies towards the window seemed to force the carriage to lurch, seeing the twisted wreckage ahead people started forcing their way to the doors which remained locked tight. The sharpest among the packages found the hammer behind the glass that was designed and placed to help smash the glass. They started hitting away at the corners, as people became more desperate to escape. The occasional glance towards the forward carriages in the diminishing light of dusk paid testament to the danger that they were in. The gathering gloom suddenly exploded into light as a fire burst out of the windows of the stricken train now on its side on the grass verge.

The camber of the next carriage reached unsustainable levels and as it began its descent onto the embankment the panic in Sam and Kathy’s carriage went from a stable frustrated sense of needing to get out of here, to a mad frenzy.

The moments that had gone before dragged out over an epoch in Sam’s mind, what had happened in less that a minute seemed like a lifetime. And the crowds that forced themselves towards the door in the vain hope that they would succeed in getting free, they achieved little other than escalate the panic still further.

It was clear that the carriage was about to follow the fate of the others as the buckled train lost contact with the tracks and pulled each successive carriage away from the rails like dominoes falling off a table. But it was the fire that scared Sam the most, he could see the fireball ahead that engulfed the first carriage and desperately prayed to God that they would be spared the same fate. It was odd Sam thought in the most inappropriate of moments that his prayer was not for the safety of those in most danger but for himself. His selfishness knew no bounds, as did that of his fellow passengers who thought nothing of pushing each other to the side as they tried to make their escape.

The two passenger too his side were valiantly trying to break the glass to engineer their own exit, but their triumph would not be individual but benefit them all. It was only that as they started to make progress, the veins of a crack began to appear from the corners of the pane, he realised that the train would fall onto that side, making their efforts worthless and any attempt to flee through that window hazardous as the train would likely collapse onto anyone caught beside the train.

He decided that the time had come for action. Sam glanced towards Kathy searching for some vague sense of validation of his impending move but she was petrified, she had nothing to offer him and he knew that he would need to act quickly. He stood up and tried to summon his most authoritative voice, the one he usually reserved for the rare opportunities he got to preach.

“Hey everyone, listen up.” The assembled masses did not comply immediately, so Sam tried again.

“Everyone, be quiet for a minute. We’ve got to work together if we’re going to get out of here. You’ve seen what’s happened up ahead, you’ve seen the carriage fall on its side, and pretty soon we’re going to tip over. We can get out, it’s not going to be that hard to break the windows but we need to do the ones on this side.” His eyes rested on the two men almost through the window to politely suggest his correction. “We’ve got to make sure we’re ready for when the train falls over, it’s going to happen any second, let’s get all the baggage onto that side, so it doesn’t fall on us, let’s move over so we don’t fall, if we all are ready we can the start work on getting out once we’ve fallen over. Hold onto the hammers, or anything else hard that will help us escape.”

Just as Sam was finishing his impromptu speech the tilt on the carriage increased once again to reinforce the urgency of his point. His fellow passengers suddenly threw themselves into action, moving bags, grabbing phones they could not bring themselves to be parted from, parents looking after children, making sure they were as safe as they could be in this developing disaster zone. And with a final lurch the train started to fall, he went to yell for everyone to hold on tight, but Sam could not find the breath in his lungs as he reached across and placed his arms around Kathy to brace her for the fall.

And then they were settled once again. Bags that had not been stowed securely had fallen upon them, a few people were crying in agony and pain, but most were unharmed.

Kathy turned toward Sam, and decided to take over, “Who’s injured, is anyone trapped?” She wasn’t sure what to do next as a few people yelped to indicate their predicament. “Is there a doctor or a nurse anywhere?” As the silence followed she felt more helpless than ever, “If there’s anyone near you who is injured can you find out what’s wrong, and if anyone’s in a really bad way let me know.”

As this stimulated a buzz of activity she had no idea what she would do if anyone were to be seriously injured and she was informed. Kathy turned to Sam, “We need to get some people to break these windows above us.”

“Can we all move away from the windows at each end.” Sam bellowed through the chaos, “If you’ve got anything hard or sharp to use to break the window, help out, but the glass is going to fall on top of us.” The pair of men who had been wielding the hammer so affectively before admitting to dropping their hammer as they had shifted away from the cracking window to avoid the avalanche of baggage.

Sam grapped the rail of the overhead compartment and swung with his full force towards the window that was now directly above him. His feet bounced straight off the glass without making an impact. He gave way to one of the men who now replaced his lost hammer with a fire extinguisher and who’s resourceful but futile effort seemed to have succeeded to break the glass which was now between them and the ground.

The progress on the window was slow and hindered by the height of the window now it comprised the roof. Sam piled suitcases on top of one another as a particularly aggressive young man clambered between the seats to gain purchase before smacking the window with all the force he could muster.

Kathy looked on helpless, yet remembered her thoughts just before the crash. In rash decision she opted for her pink heels, before the chaos that ensued she had wondered what impression she would be giving to her interviewers as she described her passion for reaching the lost of Benin while wear six inch steel tipped stilettos. But Kathy pulled them off her feet and handed them to Sam who was bemused by the sudden unexpected and bizarre gift.

“Do you want me to hold them, can I put them down, we’re trying to break the window.”

“Look at the heels,” barked Kathy, “they can do quite a lot of damage.” Sam flipped them over and shuddered at the preposterous notion that in the middle of a train wreck which they were trying to escape he was learning about ladies footwear.

Sam took one and handed the other to a willing helper and they started work on a second window as the first one was crowded and progress was painfully slow. He swung the shoe with all the aggression he could summon aware that Kathy was watching. As she had handed him the stiletto he had noticed her scent, so fragrant against the crush of bodies around him, in such contrast to the sweat he could feel running down his back.

As he continued his seemingly futile quest to pierce the glass with the shoe he wondered how it could be that not only was he thinking about his new found attraction to the girl he had forced himself to despise, but also that he could find the space to reflect on this attraction and it’s peculiar development. All of life seemed to have been telescoped into a few minutes, if they escaped this probable oblivion what hope was there for romance forged in the desperation of disaster. It would be different tomorrow when life was back to normal so there was no point worrying about the the instant and unexpected infatuation of today. But then again they might not escape, he had noticed the smoke starting to seep into the carriage from the adjoining section, their time was not without limit.

Maybe if they got out there would be somewhere for Sam to take his relationship with Kathy, but for now he just concentrated on giving his best to get her out of this death hole. Sam didn’t look round to see if Kathy was still watching him, but allowed his mind to drift once more and consider if she was awakening to any feelings towards him brought on by the urgent immediacy of the current situation. If he had looked around he would have seen that Kathy was not there. In her stockinged feet she had moved along the carriage to see who needed assistance. As she climbed over seats and bags and identified those in greatest need she realised that her they were not cut off from the world.

It had not occurred to either Kathy or Sam to call for help. After all, this was a train crash, surely someone else would have already dialled 999. But as Kathy found a jumper loose among the luggage to use to bandage a badly bleeding leg she heard a plethora of phone calls going on around her. For many calling for help was the cathartic thing to do. They were clearly being told that help was on its way and they were aware of the situation, but the calls kept on going out echoing the same concerns over and over again. For others it was clearly a call to a partner, or a child, to a mother concerned about a daughter travelling home alone.

Kathy thought to find her phone, not knowing who she ought to contact, but searching for some obscure security in the midst of present danger and imminent destruction. It wasn’t the call button she hit with urgency, she had not thought who needed to know best that she was alive but in a perilous position. Kathy too had seen the smoke starting to fill up the cabin. She starred at her phone, almost waiting for someone to be sufficiently concerned to call to find out if she was safe. In the moments since the crash it was of dubious possibility that anyone would know yet of the carnage wrecked along a stretch of railway near Stoke-on-Trent.

Sam yelled down towards Kathy, “Are you on twitter? Can you check what anyone’s saying about the crash?” It hadn’t occurred to her, she had dismissed the news sites because they couldn’t possible be on site yet, or have any idea what was going on, or whether they were about to be rescued. Kathy searched for train crash and her screen started to populate with tweets from passengers throughout the train, from residents of the nearby houses, and the popularly retweeted message from Virgin Trains informing customers that there would be severe delays and cancellations between Milton Keynes and Crewe including services into London due to a serious crash. A blaze of fury hit Kathy as she read that, were they more concerned about the tardiness of their journey or the risk to life that was currently being battled in her close vicinity.

It did not bring the elucidation that she had hoped, there were tweets from those behind who’s carriages remained upright, from those ahead who were also desperately trying to escape and the harrowing tales of onlookers who could see the blaze which engulfed the front two carriages.

They had made it through the window. It was Kathy’s stilettos which had done the job, her shoes were not fit for wearing, ripped around the ankle, scuffed across the sole, the tips, worn down through repeated hammering on the glass. But perhaps such concern was a little facile given the prospect of escape. People started climbing out and helping each other out of the train. A minor scuffle broke out as two guys tried to force their way from the other end of the coach to get out ahead of everyone else.

Sam later reflected that the ordeal which lasted less than fifteen minutes from crash to escape had shown the best and the worst of human nature. It showed the endurance, the sacrifice as men put themselves at risk to get others out before them, it showed the courtesy of lifting an elderly man up through the window, hand over hand until he was out an able to walk along the side of the train now masquerading as the roof. It showed the fierce selfishness that can come out in intense moments of crisis, paralleled only by the selflessness of the two men who having escaped their own torment set to work on helping people out of the neighbouring carriage.

Sam restricted himself and his generosity to helping Kathy out, easing her out of the window and as they rested on the side of the carriage before embarking on the descent onto the bank and onto safety, he grasped the true horror that had unfolded as the train carriages were sprawled across the rails at right angles with the current carriage and the one ahead tipped onto their side. 

When they made it to the ground, Sam lifted Kathy off her feet without asking, and carried her up the slop towards the line that the police had freshly created to restrain spectators to the macabre scene before them. He collapsed as he reached the steps of the ambulance positioned to receive survivors. He turned to look once again as the raging fires burned aware that there would be too few of them.

The two men who had remained behind to help survivors out of the next carriage were still at the window lifting the frail and able bodied alike to safety when the fire caught hold and they lifted one last lady to safety before succumbing to the flames.

Ingrid regularly popped into the cafe to see Emma and Theo, she had long since decided that as bizarre as it appeared the two of them had nothing going on. She wondered if either of them were gay, but Emma a Christian, and Theo a Jew – albeit lapsed – didn’t make that a likely prospect. Instead she contented themselves that they were obviously sufficiently screwed up with various love tangles of their own that they missed any prospect of romance. Had Ingrid been more astute in the art of match-making, she wondered if this pair would make a suitable experiment.

Instead as she waited for them to finish their shift she admired her handiwork and speculated that few of the customers probably realised that the artefacts which gazed down on them as they enjoyed their meatballs or falafel had formerly been real animals. Maybe it would put them off their food. She had never rejected a commission, her finances did not accord her that privilege, but when Emma had first accompanied her into the office, and arranged the meeting, and Ingrid had presented her ideas and they had become animated, even excited, and passionate about the artistic vision that she portrayed. The invitation to furnish all their restaurants with custom pieces was a dream come true, but it was strange. Why would a chic cafe chain wish to place dead animals of their walls. She did contemplate if it might be all an elaborate rouse, and she would be stung as they switch around one hundred and eighty degrees to make a very public protest against the practice of taxidermy with her as the scape goat. But that was rather unlikely, they had all been friendly, but not that too friendly type of friendly that might have aroused her suspicions.

Emma swung round the counter and suggested that they tagged along with Theo as he had some time to kill before his big date. Theo looked aghast as his private conversation with Emma was broadcast to the public and the person in front of him who he found it necessary to tolerate because Emma seemed to enjoy her presence.

Ingrid was patently aware of the latent hostility that Theo held towards her and the look that he cast as Emma spilled the details of his evening’s plans confirmed this beyond any doubt. Emma was irrepressible, she seemed to rise above all of the traumas that surrounded her but Ingrid was not convinced that everything was as fine as she made out. In particular she suspected that that Emma was less thrilled than she made out that Theo was off on a date. Maybe she just wanted to be right about their romantic prospects but it wasn’t just that, she looked at him a certain way, that one does not normally look towards those who are merely friends. Ingrid confessed in the conversation that was taking place in her head that she had never really had close male friends she didn’t fancy and forced herself to assess once again whether she liked Theo, or if she was just convincing herself that she was not interested to protect herself against the pain of his rejection. It could have been the same story as frequently before, she was either immediately enamoured by them or as long as she wasn’t disgusted at their presence found herself questioning why she was not interested, and whether her disinterest was a facade that she subconsciously erected to guard her emotions when actually she was very interested.

Emma dragged Ingrid out of her spell of introspection by trying to draw her into conversation with Theo, but she remained muted throughout the late afternoon as they wandered towards the West End. It was only after Theo had moved on, to go home before meeting Talitha that Ingrid began to open up.

The coffee cup scratched against the saucer as she contemplated the frequency that she was now inhabiting the role of relationship advisor. All rather ironic Emma thought given the paucity of her romantic liaisons, but that she kept quiet, far easier to preserve and aura of mystery, let people believe that she knew what she was saying when the words flowed freely from her mouth. Emma had not known what to advise Theo when he had presented his dilemma. She had heard from the pulpit time and time again that the guys were supposed to pursue the girls, but firstly, Theo was not Christian, and secondly, no one had been pursuing her so she was ready to scrap that rule anyway.

Not know anything about the other person was hard Emma thought, but allowed her to remain detached from the situation. It seemed a little weird that they had parted at the beginning of the year as vaguely friends but certainly nothing else, yet as she boarded the flight to come to the UK Theo was firmly contemplating asking her out, more working on the how than whether to. Emma for her part had advised caution, she didn’t want to be held responsible if it all went wrong. She suggested to Theo finding some convenient group settings where they could get to know one another without having a exclusive bond too soon, better to scope out the territory before raising the stakes she had told in one of their innumerable conversations as the custom at the cafe drew slack and interspersed the hissing of the coffee machine and the hammering of knives against boards in the kitchen behind.

Theo had not been impressed when Emma had suggested finding group settings to get to know Talitha, there were no such convenient settings, the only time they met without specific arrangements was at very occasional family celebrations. Which was perhaps why building a relationship when she was on the other side of the world was easy, she was there, unable to view the chaos of the world he inhabited. She did not have to know the dysfunctions of his family, or his failure to achieve very much of anything, all she saw was the him who he chose to show. But now there was no way to pursue things without being too obvious about it, and he rued the day he took on the extra project which meant he had to pull out of dinner. Theo had expected that to be the last that he heard of her, he fully anticipated that having experienced his fickle time management she would walk away. Instead she was the one who made contact with Theo, she was the one who had asked him out, suggested they meet tonight. He felt slighted by her initiative but compelled by her intent.

Emma turned back towards Ingrid and knew that she had to explain what was going on. It wasn’t fair on her to let her see half of a story and then deny access to the rest. Ingrid sat in rapt attention throughout Emma’s retelling. Only speaking at the end, and it was not to enquire any further into Theo’s romance, “So Emma, who do you like?”

This was not a question Emma was prepared to answer. As she thought about it, it was not a question that she was able to answer even if the propensity to do so suddenly hit her. Instead she found ways of suggesting no one in particular, without actually uttering the words. She waited until the silence had stilled beyond the expectation of an answer before she decided it was safe to change topic and move on.

Sam scrambled through the carriage searching for his seat, he’d desperately been hoping as he stumbled onto the train that the reservations were in operation. The last time he’d got on a crowded train he ended up in an argument with the passenger in his seat and starred up to see the flashing display board kindly informing him that reservations had been cancelled. Heading all the way to Liverpool crouched in the aisle or sat by the toilet did not fill him with glee. Fortunately this adventure provided no such torment, as his forward facing, window seat, at a table and with a power point. It was the little things in life that provided the greatest pleasures he thought as they pulled out of Euston station, well maybe not the greatest pleasures, but in the grand scheme of things they rated pretty highly.

Ever since he had started working at Holland Park, this was what he had looked forward to. Although teaching had given him his fair share of challenges, Sam reflected that it did not stretch his brain. Now he would get to study again, each month he got to spend a few days away from the tedium of mundane tasks that filled his day, directed at the whim of the Reverend Doctor. He pulled out his notes and started going through the reading he had rushed to finish last night.

While the theology was the best bit of his work, it was also the most anxiety inducing. He didn’t like to think like other people thought, he had a penchant for the provocative, enjoyed sparking a lively debate. It gave him the chance to hide his uncertainties behind the role of Devil’s Advocate, with everyone else assuming he held to the same views as everyone else but was sufficiently confident to play with alternative arguments to test the strength of other people’s beliefs.

In actuality Sam did not think the same as everyone else. He was not wedded to the same doctrines, or at least he saw no reason why he should be if he felt that they did not stand up to scrutiny. He pondered the questions to be discussed over the next two days, and wondered whether he could get away with advocating some of Rob Bell’s views without everyone realising how close they came to his own. On the first day at the church he had read over the church compact with a heavy heart before placing his pen to paper to cement his deception. He could not say with all integrity that he agreed with all the statements, but nor did he have the courage to speak out and lose his job.

He thumbed through Love Wins and found the pages he would need in his arsenal when assumed his now expected position of provoker in chief. He almost wept as he realised he would have to lie through his teeth to retain any credibility.

Kathy realised he had no idea who he was sat opposite, obviously he hadn’t made as close a study of her facebook page as she had of his. But she wasn’t going to say anything, they had several hours of close confinement ahead and if he was in blissful ignorance who was she to shatter the illusion.

She hated trains, almost swore to herself and out loud as someone barged past and their coffee lurched dangerously close to coating her with steaming liquid. Kathy had tried to persuade her parents to let her take the car, it would be cheaper than the train she pleaded, until they booked her tickets and disputed that claim, it is more convenient, it is safer, but her request fell on deaf ears.

It had been a very impetuous thing to do. And strangely ironic now Sam sat across from her, but the night after their ill fated and never requited date she had decided she was going to be a missionary and head to Africa and escape having to deal with the never ending quest to find guys who liked her and were not freaks. Benin she picked, and not without good reason, there had been a fascinating feature on the country in that week’s Sunday Times magazine. And they spoke French which was an advantage.

What she had not expected was the interrogation from first her parents, then the church, and now she was on her way to Liverpool for the official interview. Kathy thought they would be crying out for people to go and help in one of the most deprived countries in the world, but it seemed they just wanted to throw obstacles in her way. She could speak the language, and she wanted to help, what more could they want?

Kathy tried to partially shield herself behind her notes as she finished her preparations. She didn’t want to give Sam any more chance than he had already garnered to establish her identity. She would then have to plead ignorance to recognising him, because why else had she said nothing. Then she recalled that she had told Emma about seeing him and mystery girl in the restaurant and was sure the message had been passed on because she had come back with his absurd tale of miscommunication and misunderstandings.

What had shocked Kathy was when he pulled out Love Wins from his bag. From everything that Emma had said Holland Park was a stickler for correct doctrine and couldn’t imagine that they would tolerate that sort of reading material. She was pondering whether to strike up a conversation about the book, but realised eventually she’d surely need to disclose her identity, or would so accidentally somehow. And well she weighed her options her phone nearly vibrated off the table.

“Hello”

“Hello, it is Sebastian,” the heavily accented voice at the other end of the line responded.

“Um, who is this, I think may be you have got the wrong number?”

“Is this Kathy? It is Sebastian from Avignon.” As Kathy heard these words her heart filled with dread, her palms started sweating and she prayed for a tunnel to approach which would terminate her dilemma.

“Hello Sebastian, yes I remember, do you want to speak in French?”

“No, I have been learning English, I must practice.” Kathy sensed the pause before it materialised, and wondered where this was going. “Kathy, would you like to have brunch on Saturday, at near Waterloo, I would very much like to see you again and get to know you better.”

Kathy now was the one to pause, she leaned out the window and no tunnel was in sight to rescue her in time, she could fake it and just end the call, plead ignorance if he every called back and pray to God that he wouldn’t. But that would not really match up would it, asking God to cover over her deception, Kathy thought.

“Er, I, er, I’m not really able to talk right now.” Remembering that he must have got her number from the card she had so stupidly handed him as she tried to get away from him when they waited for their flight. “Er, email me.”

As she put the phone back down Kathy saw Sam looking at her inquisitively. She returned to the guide book to Benin as she tried to swot up on the political and social history of Benin.  Kathy was immediately embarrassed by the conversation which she became convinced that the entire carriage had overheard both sides of. What had she been thinking, she rebuked herself,what sort of response is ’email me’? Kathy was furious that she could have found the words to be articulate in her rejection, clear and compassionate. Leaving him knowing in no uncertain terms that she would not go on a date with him, but at the same time letting him know what he was missing, detached but alluring, that was the pitch she was going for. But she knew she has missed by a long shot, soon her phone would bleep with the email which would necessitate the requisite rejection, exposing the frailty of her postponement only moments earlier.

But for know that wasn’t the principle concern that Kathy encountered, that would wait for another time, it would creep up on her unaware, but it didn’t need her attention this moment. What did need her attention was Sam still staring straight through her guidebook which failed to cover her face as it had sunk into her lap from lack of attention. May be if the book had been the right way up the cover might have been a bit more convincing. He knew, she was certain of it.

“Sam Engle, I think I should introduce myself, I’m Kathy, I live with Emma.” The immediacy of her intervention had caught him unaware, it seemed he had been caught in a cycle of deliberation about whether to speak up and discover if his suspicions were correct, or stay mute and endure continued ignorance.

“Er, yes, I was just wondering if it was you.” He knew she had known who he was all along, but any attempt to address it would seem overly confrontational. “I’m sorry for not being very observant, I didn’t notice until you were on the phone just then, for some reason I knew I knew you, but couldn’t quite get it. I think you look different than the photo’s I’ve seen.”

That sounded weird Sam decided, “Photos of Emma, that you happen to be in. It’s not. I don’t. You know, I don’t make a habit of looking at photos of you, because that would be, well, that would be a bit weird.”

Kathy felt sorry for Sam as he stumbled into and out of that particular hole. “Don’t worry, I had a look at your facebook before we were supposed to meet, I wanted to recognise you.”

“Oh, that would probably have been a good idea, I didn’t really have any idea who I was looking for. I spent a while wondering if it was this girl sat along the bar, but she was from New Zealand and I knew you weren’t.”

“What happened Sam?” Kathy decided once again on the blunt approach. “Last month, when we were supposed to go on that date, what happened, I was just about to come into the restaurant when you turned and walked from the bar to the tables beside another woman.

“I’m sorry but in just about anyone’s form book that’s pretty off colour behaviour. You were supposed to be meeting me for a date, and you ending up with someone else. I’ve got a pretty bad view of men, but that’s just crazy. Emma said you were a quiet kind of guy but turns out you’re a complete arse!”

“I waited for you for over an hour.” Sam didn’t like the fact that he was the one that was considered at fault when she had stood him up. “And I wasn’t hitting on anyone else, I wasn’t ‘with’ them, and if you’ve got a bad view of men then it’s probably because you few them with the same default suspicion and interpret their action as the worst possible scenario.

“It might suit you to think of us all as jerks,” Sam couldn’t bring himself to swear with the same casual abandon Kathy showed, “but to be honest, if you always think of guys like that what about being innocent until proven guilty.” Until same drew the sentence to the close he thought he was on the cusp of a profound and thundering point that would make Kathy change her view of men, but in the end it all rather petered out.

“I wasn’t with that girl, we had coalesced around a shared experience of being stood up. We chatted and decided we both needed to eat, there was nothing else too it, it was as simple as that.” Sam waited to see if she was going to come back at him, he braced himself for the torrent of anger he anticipated. He knew that it might have looked a bit dodgy, but he couldn’t stand being misunderstood. He hated the idea that this girl’s first impression of him was based on such a false premise.

But no response came, it was as though she was waiting, wondering, perhaps she was as confused as he was. “I’m sorry Kathy,” and as he said it realised it was the first time he had spoken her name to her, “I shouldn’t have had dinner with Talitha, it was the wrong thing to do, and I’m sorry that when you saw us you got the impression that you did. There is nothing between her and I, she’s interested in someone else.”

“And you, are you interested in her, or in someone else?”

Sam decided to deflect that one, not willing to open up to another stranger after the trouble that his loquaciousness with Talitha had caused. “After the stunning success of Emma’s first effort at finding me a date, and my conspicuous failure on my own to date that’s not much of an issue.”

Kathy swallowed hard and knew she had to reciprocate the apology, “and I’m sorry too. I waited outside while I watched you sat at the bar on your own. I walked around the building and you were still alone, on the third time you were talking and on the fourth as I finally mustered the courage to come in I saw you walking to your table.

“I was furious, furious with you for stealing this from me. Furious with myself for waiting until it was too late, if I had come in just as you were walking out it would have been just as bad, you’d have given up on waiting, and I was waiting for I don’t know what. I’m furious for getting mad at you, and I’m furious that you had dinner with a beautiful woman, who has found some place in your head, even if not where you expect.”

During the patient silence between them Sam saw Talitha had replied. They’d been in touch a little over the weeks, and today was the day she had decided to tell Theo how she thought. This most recent communique was short and to the point. ‘Done it, he thought the same’. And Sam wondered if it was worth giving this blind date a second chance in the light of day.

Why was it that the wrong things always seemed so right, thought Alex as she walked towards her impending error. She knew that she should not be doing what she was about to do. She could find all sorts of ways of excusing it, of dismissing it as perfectly normal, she could convince herself that it was harmless and meaningless. That it was just one person having dinner with another person.

Except Alex knew that she would not have been this apprehensive had it been as simple as that. She would not be encountering the butterflies that gave lie to her anxiety if it were as innocent as she wished it was. When the call had come she engaged in the mindless chatter that came so easily, drifting into and out of casual enquiries and questionless propositions. But all of a sudden the conversation shifted from the safe sands of small talk and onto more considered and serious grounds.

Dinner sounded like a good idea, she was desperate to be asked out on a date, but she forced herself to accept that this couldn’t be a date. He was not available. But where exactly this left her she had no idea. The safest thing would have been to say no, to run away, leave the church and find a place a world away from here that would embrace her anonymity with abandon. Yet as with so many things Alex decided, being good was never any fun. She had never known someone who made her smile with such little effort, someone her made her laugh with their most inconsequential of remarks, or whose appearance was so instantly appealing.

All in all, as she rang the bell, Alex knew she should not be here, however, she had decided to let go of her reservations and enjoy herself. She knew he would not take it any further, she granted herself some solace in the depressing reminder that there was no future for them, but which guaranteed it would not get out of hand.

As he opened the door and led Alex through the corridor and into the expansive open plan kitchen and dinning room she pushed it all to one side, trying to hide it altogether under a mountain of glee that his presence created. Alex slowly ate to prevent the evening going too quickly as well as mask her uncertainty with activity. She needn’t have worried, her reservations stilled as soon as they moved passed the awkwardness of opening exchanges.

“Alex, I think you’ve got real potential and I think you should do a lot more in the church. I see that the student team are looking for someone to lead the women’s student Bible study. Maybe you could do it?” He carefully segued from the casual conversation from the now evident purpose of their meeting.

“I’m not sure I’m really good enough to do that, I’ve not been to Bible college, or had any kind of theological training, I’m sure there are many better people, what would they think if it was just me, some of them probably know far more than I do.” Silently Alex was thrilled at the prospect as opportunities for doing things in church were pretty limited as the leadership put a very definite cap on what women could do. Leading a women’s Bible study was about as much as she could hope for.

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” he reassured her, “I could give you some help, help you prepare and go through the study plans. I’m not sure any of the woman have any formal theology training, so it will be good for them to learn from you. And you’re a natural teacher, you said last week how much you’re enjoying lecturing.”

As they sat down after eating Alex was concious that he was sitting unnecessarily close to her. And it was not a bad thing. He could have chose the separate armchair she thought, it would have facilitated easier conversation, and wondered if when she found a reason to stand up, may be for the toilet, she’d return to that chair instead of the couch she now shared. But it wasn’t a bad thing because she liked him beside her.

As the sirens whistled past the house, and the music came to an end, his arm stretched behind her. And she knew that this was always going to have happened. From the moment she answered the call and he asked her to come around. Through the prevarication of casual conversation and faux formality of church organisation. After the prelude, and the interlude, after acts one and two, came the climax. Alex looked at him and his hand froze, almost as though he was ready to remove it from her shoulder but not until she actually asked him to.

In an instant she relaxed into his arm, leaning towards him, giving up the fight that she knew she would always concede. He clearly was unsure about it, but had been so deliberate in his actions Alex thought. As she clasped her hand in his she wondered why other guys were not like this. Why had none of the eligible bachelors made such a move, why were they so hesitant, so unsure. Why were they so satisfied with platonic companionship, or so afraid of putting themselves on the line that they settled for that pleasant but limited alternative and repressed their true feelings.

He leant towards her, but backed off to choose to rest his head against hers instead of the kiss she thought had been his intent. Was she kidding herself to imagine that maybe at least some of the guys who were so ostensibly content with friendship would actually desire more?

Her mind whirred so that she barely noticed when he stood and suggested that perhaps he should be getting to bed, the cue for her to take her leave. Perhaps he had rediscovered his senses and realised the road that he had embarked on needed to be squashed before it got out of hand.

Alex walked towards the door sensing everyone of his steps as he followed her. And at the door as she donned her coat and opened it to leave he closed it before she could exit onto the street. He took her arm and spun her in the way that had appealed to her every time he did it.  He drew Alex towards him and hesitantly moved to kiss her. In an instant he withdrew and bid her goodnight before ushering her out of the house.

Alex was rooted to the spot as the door closed behind her. She knew it was not what should be happening. She resolved to have nothing more to do with him. The winds forced the trees from side to side as the bus refused to arrive leaving her lingering in the street dredging her mind for any semblance of sense. But she found that only sensibility was there. Attraction had ruled over her better side, it had pushed it into oblivion and now here she was following it into the steep descent. She should be joyful, excited, passionate, but instead she started to cry.

It was late when Alex left the campus, she was exhausted after marking essays all evening and wondered whether it was really a good idea to be taking on all this extra work. It wasn’t as though she really needed the money but was worried that if she wasn’t seen as having to work to pay her way through her studies her friends might start to ask questions about how she afforded it all.

The day had begun in a very strange manner when she realised that her day was going to be disrupted by the student protests that were taking place throughout the city that day. So as Alex sat wading through the undergraduates’ rather torrid, and in all but a few cases, rather poor accounts of union and government relations during the inter-war years. It seemed as though everyone thought that they had something unique to offer to the tomes already written about the Jarrow marches while copy and pasting from Wikipedia.

Alex had put the final essay back on the pile and decided that she wasn’t going to head over to see Sam this evening. They had been due to meet at the church after he finished but she had to postpone as her deadline loomed, it felt to her as though she had not moved on from the last minute culture that had plagued her life to date.

Sam had been very understanding, but then, he always was understanding, she knew that he wouldn’t mind when she fired off the text, but also knew that should she choose to turn up later he’d also have the door wide open. The bus didn’t turn up for a while, and when one did it went via the church so as she jumped on she gave Sam a call.

“Hey Sam, are you still at church”

“No, I’ve just got home, are you coming over?”

“Maybe in a bit, I just jumped on a bus, I thought you might still be at work so I’ll be coming the long way round as I’m nearly at Holland Park.”

“Alex, could you do me a huge favour? I’ve left some stuff I need tomorrow morning at the church, the building should be still open, it’s Christianity Uncovered, there’s a brown paper bag with a bunch of paper on the desk”

“Okay, no problem, I’ll head over to yours when I’ve got it”

Alex jumped off the bus and headed into Holland Park Baptist Church (continuing), carefully avoiding the hordes of people now assembled in the main hall. She thought it strange that of all the things that Sam was involved with he didn’t have anything to do with the thing that he liked most. All the time they had known each other Sam was always looking for ways to talking to people about Jesus. And it was the thing that he was least looking forward to about working for the church, that he would no longer have contact with non-Christians.

She resolved to ask him about it when she saw him, because he’d not had anything to do with it so far, and this she thought was strange. Before she left the church Alex lingered around and talked and all in all delayed her inevitable departure and then arrival at Sam’s. Maybe because she felt guilty about bailing on him earlier, but more likely because he knew that he just wanted to talk about his blind date and all that had gone wrong.

It wasn’t hard to avoid leaving, there were people spilling out of the hall and she allowed herself to be held up several times. Including twice by someone she knew she shouldn’t stay near.

By the time she got to Sam’s house Alex had rotated the conversation and interaction that had just occurred several times in her head. She knew that she had be injudicious in her selection of conversation partner, but it hadn’t really been her choice. He had come over to her as she returned from the office and cut off her path to the door. He was as friendly as ever. But it was the way, after several other superficial conversations had passed by, that he had walked out of the kitchen, and clasping her elbow in his palm turned her around to face him and say goodbye. He was all too close, and has his had left her arm he flicked the hem of her sleeve with the lightest of intentional touches.

It was nothing, Alex told herself, it was nonsense, she was reading something where there was nothing to read, she was chasing phantoms in the dark, looking for a mountain where only molehills were present, she conjured clichés out of the air to dismiss her thoughts but still they prevailed. It was impossible, it was not going to happen.

As Sam started to regale her of his torment of waiting for Kathy in the crowded restaurant her mind constantly drifted, replaying in her head the split second contact that had gone before.

“It was absolute torture, I was sat there nursing my drink waiting for this girl I’m sure I wouldn’t recognise. I’ve never felt so self conscious, I’ve been left waiting for people – you most of the time! But this was a whole different level, I don’t like it ever, but when you’ve thrown everything on the line, when you’ve asked someone on a date and then they don’t show up.”

“Sam, you didn’t ask her on a date, your sister did.”

“Well I guess, technically, you’re right, but it was still a first date, and this was maybe even worse because I had nothing to go on, when I’m waiting for you I know you’re probably still coming. With Kathy I just had to wait, I didn’t even have her number and Emma was stoically refusing to pick up when I called.

“She says Kathy was delayed, and then when she got hit by a bout of nerves, and by the time she’d decided to come in she saw me sitting down to eat with another woman. I’m sure that’s not how it happened, reckon she just decided to go elsewhere and spare herself the agony she instead inflicted on me.”

“You were sitting down to eat with another woman? Did she see you? She must have been there.”

“Maybe, I guess she was, but then why didn’t she come in.”

“Because you were with someone else. Sam, when did you become such a player?”

“I’m not a player, it’s not like that, it’s not anything, it was nothing.” Sam felt it necessary to be emphatic with his denial, Emma had not seemed fully convinced, and now Alex was casting sceptical glances in his direction and he knew he would have to explain.

“While I was waiting at the bar, I got talking to a girl, she’d been stood up on her date, and we got chatting, really we just comparing notes on our derisory evenings, and the other parties who had dishonoured us.” Sam paused as he rued his melodramatic streak, but ploughed on regardless, “She was waiting for a guy she thinks likes him, but has been sending all the wrong signals, I thought it sounded like your situation, I could see that she needed the company. And it gave me the chance to have a bitch about Kathy.”

“So instead of having dinner with someone who had been waiting outside, you were inside with another girl, giving her advice, and tearing shreds out of the poor girl’s character?” Alex felt that this flush of managed anger was acutely appropriate to the insensitivity and relational blindness of the guy sat opposite.

“Something really strange happened tonight when I went into church to pick up your stuff.” Alex decided to change the subject before she could cause any more offence and decided it was about time some attention was paid to her rather than the pity story which Sam had written himself into.

“This guy at church has been pretty friendly with me recently.” As Alex went on Sam internally wearied as he anticipated a severe encounter of de ja vu. “It’s not the same as before,” she immediately corrected, “I’ve never been more sure that someone is interested in me, but I know it’s trouble.

“He’s just not the sort of person that I need to be with, I know that he can’t give me what I want.”

Sam was getting more and more confused, “Can you stop talking in circles, who is it? And what’s wrong with him?”

“I shouldn’t say, we’ve just been flirting with each other. This evening the way he took my elbow, was so sensual.” She could see Sam wince at the mention of the word. “I just wish we could be together.”

“How long has this been going on with the mysterious man, you seem awfully sure that it’s so perfect, yet oh so wrong. Sorry to put it bluntly, but it rather sounds like we’ve transported into the set of Eastenders.”

“It’s not perfect, otherwise we would be together. It will never be perfect and we’ll never be together.”

“If he’s interested in someone else that he’s a tool for flirting with you, and to be honest, so are you for letting him.”

“I know, I know, that’s why I dreaded it when he cut me off at the bottom of the stairs, I’d seen him and I tried to avoid eye contact and make a quick exit. But he lured me in with his charm.”

“Is he going out with someone else Alex, because maybe someone needs to have a word with him?”

“In a way he is, he’s certainly not available.” She withdrew from the room to get a drink, or some food, or to go to the toilet, Sam wasn’t sure as he shock his head in bewilderment at this enigmatic turn of events.

Sam sat and decided that maybe there was a way of addressing it without finding out who the person was. Perhaps a sermon, or a discipleship course. People in the church, or so he had heard, kept saying how they wanted more teaching on relationships. And if one self-evident pointer – not trying it on with someone when you’re taken – had gone amiss then this shouldn’t be left to chance and the awkward spoils of fate and occasional indiscretion to determine the potential future happiness of the congregation’s eligible young bachelors.

While his mind had gone off on countless tangents Alex reappeared, “Tell me a little more about this girl you met on Saturday, do you think there’s any chance the two of you could, well you know, have something going, they say ever cloud had a silver lining?” Alex made a mental note to brush up on some new phrases because too many she was currently deploying were far too tired and stale.

“I doubt it, she is totally hooked on this guy Theo, she’s been out of the country for six months and the pair of them seem like love struck teens who just can’t quite get it together. Basically I told her that if he’s not manning up then maybe she will have to.”

“I think you’re covering. You like her and you’re smitten with her, and there’s just this little thing in the way called her supposed ‘friend’, she could have made it all up you know, just to seem less threatening.”

“I doubt it, not sure she seemed the mendacious type.” Sam suddenly was examining his motives and was now doubting his earlier confidence that he wasn’t interested, or was he just thinking that because Alex had planted the thought, and before long he was doubting his doubts and convinced only that he was over thinking the whole malarkey.

“Have you got her number? Give her a call.” Alex fully expected him to say no, it had taken him six months to work out how to get hers without it sounding like he was interested. By that point Alex was sure that he was fixated on him, and was nearly cruel enough to give him a wrong number.

“Yes, it was really strange, I asked without thinking about it, then realised, and almost tried to stop her.” This certainly sounded like Sam to Alex, managing to make a smooth and slick move into the epitome of awkwardness. “She’s from a Jewish family.”

“You mean she’s Jewish, and what’s that got to do with anything?”

“Well it’s yet another reason, as if I needed to keep listing them for you, why there is nothing between me and a girl I met for the first and in all likelihood last time on Saturday.”

“Jewish, you say, that’s not like being an atheist, she’s more like us than most people.”

“For centuries we collectively held her people responsible for killing Jesus, and in case you have forgotten it was in the name of our God, in however distorted and mediated a manner, that a psychopathic dictator rounded up and killed millions of Jews. I hardly think that the threshold between the two religions is inviting. Turning up at a synagogue with a rainbow guitar strap and hand printed copies of Shine Jesus Shine is not going to go down to well.”

Sam relaxed and realised that although with a hint of inquisitive seriousness Alex had been stringing him along. “It’s so much fun to watch you squirm, if you’d actually liked her I don’t think you’d have been anywhere near as good company, I’ve not heard you as animated in ages.”

After what seemed like an age Alex asked the question that had lingered in the air, “Do you think you’re going to give the date with Kathy another run?”

“Emma would like us to, and maybe I would be seems like I’ve permanently blotted by copybook with Kathy, so don’t think I’ll be seeing her any time soon.”

When Alex had left Sam pulled out his phone and found Talitha’s number. ‘Hey Talitha, it’s Sam from Saturday, hope everything is well, how are things with Theo?’

Kathy sat upright in her chair, waiting for the basket to come her way, she had dutifully leant forward and spoken the couple in front and glanced around to check that her neighbours were not needed her attention and now just wanted the collection basket to have passed by so she could relax and fade once again into anonymity.

This was a difficult Sunday, usually she preferred to enjoy church shut off from the rest of the world, relaxed in the knowledge that no one was watching her, no one cared if she was there or not, paying attention or drifting to sleep. But today she had to be on her best behaviour as to the left was Emma, and to her left was Theo. They had met a couple of times, but today was the first time he’d stepped foot in a church in years, he said since he walked out of his parents’ temple ten year before.

Kathy’s suspicious side assumed it was all a ploy because he was interested in Emma, their connection seemed abundantly obvious but Emma repeatedly refused point blank that there was any trace of romance between the pair. Which led Kathy to assume that Theo was gay but she had denied that too. The two of them were frequently thick as thieves, she’d find them walking home together, speaking quietly on the phone, as though waiting for the moment when they could truly be alone. Theo did not seem as interested as Emma, and Kathy worried for her friend. She worried that Emma had bought the line that Theo was not interested, and on the surface accepted it. But deeper down she enjoyed his company and at the moment was prepared to go along with the friendship angle if it ensured that they got to spend more time together. It also Kathy, supposed, made the dilemma of whether to go out with a non-Christian a moot point for the interim.

Emma shifted uncomfortably in her seat as she waited for the conversation Theo had struck up with his neighbour to come to a close. She had intently avoided embarking on a fresh line of enquiring with Kathy so she could ensure that she was alert to what he was saying and reading to respond if the situation became unsustainable. Who ever thought bringing friends to church was to tough, she thought, Emma was paralysed with worry that either Theo would say something out of place, or the person who had in such a well meaning manner been so polite to talk during the regulation two minute break might stumble upon the truth that he wasn’t a Christian and somehow undo all the good work she had invested over the past month.

As she listened she realised that Kathy was sat still beside her, not talking, or interacting, or even making a show of being involved in another conversation with someone close by. Nor had she taken the usual step of slipping out to the toilet to avoid the obligatory conversation with a neighbour. Emma had not quite got to the bottom of last night’s activity. She’d heard from both Samuel and Kathy, and it was possible that both their descriptions were accurate, in which case she was furious with them both. But she suspected that neither were being fulsome in their disclosure, because it struck her that something was missing.

Emma could not imagine Sam casually hitting on a girl he’d met just moments before, after all she’d received a barrage of texts asking where Kathy was. And Kathy can’t have been that late. Sam still didn’t know what Kathy had seen but he’d made no attempt to deny that he’d met another girl and they’d had dinner, which would have been odd had he been trying to hide anything. Kathy having seen them through the glass doors assumed the worst and refused to be talked down when Emma relayed Sam’s version of events.

In fact, Kathy thought that it was slightly preposterous, the idea that you walk into a restaurant and stumble upon someone else who has also been stood up and strike up an immediately platonic friendship. Yet Kathy was also confused because everything that she had heard from Emma about Sam did not line up with the sort of player she had supposed she saw through the doors. And an innocent friendship was a lot more amenable if there was ever to be anything between them which she now severely doubted. Kathy had decided as the basket passed her by and the minister began to resume the service that she would now be going out of her way to avoid his presence.

Theo was glad that the unconventional interval was coming to a close. He was not a fan of small talk, especially with someone he assumed he would never meet again. Suddenly, as he looked up to the stage to wait for the minister to begin the sermon, instead of turning to speak to the entire congregation his finger struck down the centre of the aisle.

“You may have come for our wallets, but God has come for your soul!” The Reverend William ‘call me Will’ Sutton, bellowed towards the solitary individual lurking suspiciously beside the collection baskets gathered at the rear of the hall. He shirked, and turned away, making a quick get out before the police were called. “You might think you can escape the police’s pursuit, but God will never stop pursuing you.”

Maurice did not expect to receive a lecture in return for pocketing a couple of notes out of the baskets. A quick bundling to the ground, a few screams, maybe a call to the police, or an over eager parishioner chasing him out the door perhaps. But a sermon directed straight at him from the pulpit left him utterly bemused. He slipped the notes out of his pocket, and out onto the floor, before a final glance at his accuser as he fled the scene.

Samuel could barely believe he had agreed to this, it went against all his instinct, it was really quite a bizarre situation when he chose to think of it the morning after Emma had cajoled him into a blind date. He had been stung from behind, caught off guard, Samuel thought that his sister had rather unfairly taken advantage of his vulnerability. He had carefully allowed his emotions to seep out rather than maintain their confinement, which was usually where he let them fester. And Emma had grabbed them, interrogated them and decided that what he needed best was a date with her best friend.

Having never been on a blind date before Samuel was slightly flustered as to what to expect. He had booked a table for dinner at a restaurant where he knew he could afford to pay for them both, it wasn’t very fancy but decided that it was better this way than going somewhere a little more up market but then inducing the possibility that he’d either have to pay more than he could, or politely find a way of encouraging her to pay her way. Probably not the impression to give Samuel reflected as he weighed up his next dilemma. He starred straight into his wardrobe and for all the good it was doing him he might have well been starring through glass and out the other side. Samuel was faced with a suddenly myriad set of combinations for what to wear, all composed from the meagre contents of his wardrobe.

He plucked for the smart but not too smart option and hoped that he would neither be over or under dressed. At every turn Samuel was faced with the option of bailing out. He thought of phoning the restaurant and cancelling the booking, of calling Emma and asking her to tell Kathy he wouldn’t be coming. It was his sister that stopped him from pulling the plug. He wondered if she would actually pass on the message, if out of some tortuous learning game Emma would let Kathy turn up all alone and Samuel would become hated by a tiny subset of the female population he had never known and was now likely to never know.

Samuel decided that this was the longest he had ever spent in front of a mirror and all for a girl he had never met. It didn’t occur to him until later that despite his sustained and unrelenting interest in Alex he had never put in such effort when he knew they were to meet. He had always argued with himself that he didn’t want everyone else to know that he was interested, so scaled back any moves that might uncover his motive. On this occasion he had even bought some aftershave, the first time in a decade since an ill fated experiment at the end of school prom, the torments which ensued had plagued his memory since. As he dabbed the strong scent his senses kicked off some memory receptors in a reclusive corner of his brain and he was overcome with another wave of doubt and almost at this last minute bailed, and thought perhaps he’d just not turn up.

In another bedroom in London Kathy was preparing. When Emma had first broached the subject she had not quite been sufficiently fulsome in explaining that it was a date she was setting her up on. Kathy’s initial assumption was that she was being invited by Emma to keep her company at a something her brother had in turn invited her to. It had only been the day before last that the truth had murkily emerged.

“What’s this thing we’re going to with your brother?”

“Well, it’s not really a thing, and I won’t be there, because that would be a little bit odd.”

“Odder than me going to some social event with your brother and you staying at home, is there something that I need to know, I’m usually pretty keen for most things and I don’t really need an excuse but I’ve heard that the Holland Park bunch can be a bit stuffy and I’m not sure I can face an evening full of discussion of imputation.”

“I thought I said,” Emma hesitatingly began, “it’s just with Sam. You’ve said you wanted to get asked on more dates, and we were chatting last week and I thought you’d make a good couple.” Emma stopped speaking knowing that she had been less than honest when the date had been arranged. She had always intended on telling the full truth but had pulled out at the last possible moment and swiftly concocted an alternative plan which seemed less offensive and which she was now having to deconstruct before her supposedly best friend.

“So basically, I’m going on a blind date with your brother?”

“Well it’s not really blind, he’s my brother.” Emma realised that this was a rather weak response as Kathy’s eyes glowered into her. “Okay, well it is a blind date, I know you’ve never met, but it’s not as though he is a complete stranger, is he? You can just imagine you’re on a date with a female version of me.” Emma stopped speaking, accepting she was rambling and not making sense, and also because she was not entirely sure she approved of the descriptor she had just ascribed to herself.

Kathy was silently fuming, and visibly annoyed but made an ostensible show of acceptance as she agreed to the date. Now as she prepared she was having doubts yet again. If the prospect of an evening with a group of stuffy Christians talking theology was her nightmare, what hope did she have one on one with someone who was working for the church.

As she left the house and checked where she was going she texted Emma to say that she was on her way to meet Sam. That was another point of rather confused discussion, whether to call him Sam or Samuel, he had apparently always been Sam until he got the post at the church and seemed to have been coerced into using it’s full form. For Emma and those who had known him for years apparently he didn’t make too much fuss over it, but to all new people he met he was now always Samuel. Kathy couldn’t decide which to use, everything she had ever heard about him was about Sam, but then she thought, perhaps if I start with Samuel I’ll make my own mind up rather than filter everything through Emma’s anecdotes and frequently critical asides.

Samuel waited at the bar. The table was ready but thought he should wait for Kathy at the bar, he also didn’t want to be seated alone at a table in a restaurant so conspicuously full of couples. He worked out he’d been waiting twenty minutes, he’d been ten minutes early, so he couldn’t hold that against her, but as each further minute went by he was frustrated at her tardiness and lack of consideration for his nerves. But he reckoned that this was still within the scope of acceptable, in fact anything up to around 30 minutes he thought was able to be categorised as ‘running late’.

He couldn’t help himself but overhear the phone call taking place just along the bar, or the half of it he was privy to. The New Zealandn girl was trying to remain measured and calm but was clearing frustrated that someone she was meeting was going to be late. It made Samuel angry that he didn’t even have that recourse, Emma had insisted that all arrangements were done through her, and only if the date was a success could they choose to exchange numbers. It meant that he couldn’t call to find out where she was, but instead stayed clasping the bar as he nursed his drink carefully not to have finished it before she arrived.

“Are you waiting for someone?” The girl from along the bar enquired. This was not a conversation Samuel wanted to get into. He suddenly visualised him talking to her when Kathy walked in, and he turned and she saw them together and immediately walked back out. A bit Hollywood perhaps, but this was dangerous territory.

“Yep,” he thought he’d keep this brief and resisted the natural reaction of shifting closer to make conversation beneath the din of the restaurant more plausible, “I’m waiting for someone. They should be here soon,” he felt it was necessary to add.

“So am I.” She paused and Samuel thought that might mercifully be the end of it. “He’s going to be late,” she added with purposeful emphasis on the masculine pronoun.

“At least you’ve got that comfort, I’m waiting for someone I’ve never met, whose number I haven’t got whose face I just about think I should recognise.”

“A blind date! How fun.” Samuel immediately gave away with his eyes raised to the ceiling that he disagreed with this optimistic assessment. “I’m Talitha,” the girl along the bar slid a little closer and offered her hand in a polite greeting.

“I’m Sam,” pausing before deciding not to extend it, worried at how natural it had become in just a few months to have to force himself to only go by the name he had used for the previous twenty six years. “I’m not convinced it’s going to be fun, my sister’s set me up on a date, and now I’m here waiting alone.”

Awkward silences penetrated the staccato conversation that ebbed and flowed as it ranged from polite pleasantries to abstract discussions about the protests taking place across the street outside St Paul’s cathedral. One such silence was suddenly disrupted by her phone buzzing on the counter when Samuel was trying to decide what else he could say to this complete stranger.

“Well, looks like I’m done here.” Talitha stood and made to leave before turning back, “how long have you been waiting?”

“Er, just over an hour, I’m sure she’ll be here soon.”

Talitha moved back towards him, “I don’t think she’s going to come. Do you want to get some food?”

“I should wait a bit longer, I don’t want her to arrive, and me not be here.”

“Or having dinner with a complete stranger?” Talitha read his mind and he nodded his ascent. “It’s okay, we’re just two people both jilted at the alter, well, at the restaurant anyway. If I go home now I’m going to be on my own and I’ll just get more and more frustrated that Theo’s left me waiting for him.”

As he weighed up his options Sam grabbed his phone to see what time it was, and check for the twelfth time that hour to see if Emma had any news of where Kathy was. “Okay, let’s eat, but I’m pretty sure I’ll be rubbish company, mopping over a failed date which I didn’t really want to go on.” Talitha laughed in an almost hysterical tone and they made their way to their table.

Kathy walked past the entrance for the seventh time, carefully staying out of sight, hiding beneath the shadows of the trees. For the past hour she had circled the restaurant, sat on a park bench, ignored numerous calls from Emma undoubtedly enquiring as to her presence. And she was finally about to go in when he saw him pick up his coat and not make for the door as she had thought he was about to do. The challenge of walking in as he was about to leave was obliterated with the revelation that he was about to sit down to eat with another girl. Devastated she walked away, heading over Millennium Bridge towards the station, and home to face Emma, and to decide before she got there exactly what she would say. The truth she thought was probably the best option, that she was bottling it, but when she made to go in her wonderful brother was already making moves on another girl.

Meanwhile Samuel, oblivious to this perception that Kathy had taken home to share with his sister he sat down confident that he would now have to pay for only his dinner. “I hate dates,” he declared with a flourish as he sat down, “far too much pressure, completely destroys any chance of actually getting to know the person.”

“How else do you get to know people? Anyway I wasn’t really waiting for a date, Theo’s just a friend.” Samuel almost got up and left as he felt he’d been coerced into having dinner with someone in the same position as him, and Talitha sensed this and moved to fill in the details. “We’re not exactly going out, it’s, well, it’s confusing.”

Samuel was partially reassured that she did not have designs on him that she had obfuscated to secure this outcome. “It’s okay, I don’t need to know, I was just venting my frustration.

“Everyone else who I’ve ever been interested in I’ve met through church. I get to know them, become friends with them and decide whether I like them more than that. But it usually is a bit more impetuous than that, I suddenly realise in the middle of a conversation that I’ve become obsessed with her, and clock how much time she’s been consuming in my brain.”

“But you’re going on a date tonight, or were supposed to be, with someone you’ve not met before. You not interested in anyone else at the moment.” Samuel felt her investigations were gaining ground on his reservations, it was odd for him to be talking more to a complete stranger than he usually would to a close friend. “Sorry I don’t mean to pry, I’m just thinking about it a lot at the moment, you’re right dating rituals are all a bit odd.”

“It’s okay,” Samuel found himself saying against his better judgement to bitterly resist opening up any further, “it’s complicated, the person I like doesn’t like me, we went on a few almost dates, and I thought it was going well but she turned me down when I actually asked her out.”

“So your sister set you up on tonight’s date to compensate?”

“Yes, guess it’s not really that complicated!” Samuel laughed, and surprised himself as it was more than the regular dutiful laugh that he had grown accustomed to imitating at necessary intervals, but a laugh that came from the soul as this stranger’s insight cut straight to the heart of the issue. And Samuel realised what chaos he caused himself when he wrote melodrama into his life in every conceivable way. None of which properly justified the extent to which he elevated them. Perhaps Samuel wondered as he decided to switch the conversation around, perhaps life was easier when lived out loud than ruminated in silence.

“So tell me about Theo, is that a complicated arrangement?” Samuel decide it was about time to turn the tables and while openness might be a good thing, he thought to himself, you can have too much of a good thing.

“Me and Theo are friends, and I’m not sure if it’s ever going to be anything more than that. I’ve come back from six months back home in New Zealand, and I know that it’s not the same as when I left. And just when I think he’s really into me something like this comes along. He’s been working like crazy, he kept saying he’d be along soon, but soon sure enough turned into never as another crisis erupted at work.

“So we kept in touch while I was away, actually we’d skype most weeks, message most days and I started to feel my day had not been complete if it went by without having contact with him. I even tried to shut down all contact, just for a week or so. I wanted to see what it was like, how I’d cope without speaking.”

“How long have you been back in the UK? Have you had any sort of indication from him of how he feels?” Samuel felt slightly voyeuristic peering into someone’s life who a little over an hour before he had never met. He was also uncomfortable talking about relationships with anyone, never mind a stranger, but somehow this was different. Cathartic maybe.

“I’ve just been back a few days, we’ve seen each other, just not alone, there was some family function which I rather surprised my father by going to, it was his cousin’s birthday, but I knew Theo would be there.” She paused as though to pose the same thought as had gone through Samuel’s mind, but seemingly decided that she was content to share this story with him. “We couldn’t talk too much there, I’ve never seen anything like our families for a goldfish bowl. All I would have to do is spend fractions of a second alone, or have two separate conversations with him for some aunt or another to start interfering and deciding on how we should get married three weeks on Friday.”

“I know I’m being pretty impatient, but I was so sure that he was into me, and then he goes and blows all cold all of a sudden. You decide what to prioritise in life. If he had wanted to be here, if I had really have mattered to him he would have let his work sort itself out and come and had dinner with me.”

“It’s not dinner you wanted from him, it was a declaration of love.” Samuel wondered why he said that, and even as he pondered it later couldn’t decide if it was profound or pointless. “You wanted him to come here tonight and say to you that he loved you and wanted to go out with you. And how do you think he felt about that. How hard would that be?

“I’m not trying to make excuses, he’s acted like a jerk, but that’s not it. He’s faced with seeing you in the flesh. Your relationship is going to be very different than it has for the past half year. He’s got used to you being at the other end of a screen, mediated by technology, available to turn on or off. To access at his whim, decide when he wants you and when he can remember you are on the other side of the world.

“But now he’s faced with you here, with him, as a person that he has to interact with. Someone who demands all of who he is and not just the part he can transmit across the airwaves.” Samuel paused to wonder if skype worked on airways or not before continuing in his new found vein of rhetoric which surprised him with each word he spoke. “He’s got to decide if he really likes you, or just likes the idea of liking you. And you have to. This is not just his decision, you can’t leave him to do all the hard work. If you like him, and know that you like him then there’s a responsibility on you to say something about it.”

“Not sure my parents would be too keen about that, they’re hardly the most devote Jews but women are meant to take the back seat in this line of work.” Talitha wondered how she had ended up here, in a restaurant half a world away, taking dating advice from a guy who had to be set up by his sister, and even that didn’t work out.

It was later as they left the restaurant after each paying their share that Samuel thought it completely natural to ask for her phone number. Just as he did and she pulled out her phone to check her new UK number he realised he’d never been quite so forward. Talitha caught the sign of what he had realised as he started to hesitate and put his phone away, correcting him she punched her number in and walked away.

The tube quickly became very overcrowded as it made its way into the centre. Kathy was on her way to meet Emma after work. Since they’d moved in together she’d hardly seen each other, after a summer together on top of their time at Durham Kathy had assumed they would be inseparable as they carved out their new life in London. She liked having time on her own, but on top of spending most of her day teaching English she was not fond of returning home to an empty flat each evening.

The forced loneliness was not something that she would have expected. Her family were in London, the church was the same as she had attended all her life. But everything seemed different. When she had returned during the summer and holidays while at university she dropped straight back into the same formula of friends returning, catching up, going away together and then dispersing to the respective corners of the country for another term. Kathy had expected that moving back would be like that in extended form, but the people were not the same, and those who were had their  own friends. People who had never left London had a whole life of their own which she was not a part of.

In short, as Kathy walked into Leon she realised that she was probably more alone than Emma. Emma had moved into London on a whim, and seemed to have thrived off the novelty. Kathy had not wanted to ask too many questions of her plans, especially when it came to money, art was unlikely to pay the bills so she had guessed Emma would find some other work. She had been a bit picky about the jobs Emma was looking at, to be honest she would not have wanted to work in a cafe, but then her job was hardly what she dreamed off she she choked back her complaints and congratulated along when Emma got the job. What had surprised Kathy most was just how much Emma seemed to enjoy it. When their paths occasionally crossed in the kitchen before she headed out to work she would always have a story about someone who had come in, or a colleague, or something otherwise designed to interrupt the monotony of the day. For herself there was very rarely interesting diversions from conjugating verbs and teaching lists of vocabulary.

*  *  *

Ingrid was in deep concentration as she finished mounting the stuffed otter on the wall. This was one of the oddest commissions she had ever received, but also a bit of a coup. The life of a taxidermist was rarely glamorous, but she had made it her niche to turn it into a minor art form. It had been a few weeks back at a small gallery opening that she had exhibited a few items of work alongside some, perhaps, more conventional artwork.

As she tidied up her work and made ready to leave she saw Emma and Theo behind the counter, it had been the pair of them who had suggested that she might be able to get a wider audience for her work. Emma had been exhibiting at the same gallery and Theo, who Ingrid assumed was Emma’s boyfriend, encouraged her to bring her work into the head office.

Emma saw Ingrid looking over at them and was glad she’d been able to give a fellow artist a bit of a leg up. She couldn’t, however, help but be slightly frustrated that it was Ingrid’s work now adorning cafes across London and not hers.

When she saw Kathy walk in she knew that it was about to all come to a head, she had tried so hard to ingratiate herself with those she worked with, and felt a slight smug satisfaction that she had settled into her new life so swiftly. Suddenly her credibility would be affected by Kathy and Kathy was a hard person to predict. She’d persuaded both Ingrid and Theo to join her and Kathy and come along to the boat party St Bart’s was organising. It could all go wrong if Kathy decided to be difficult thought Emma, she was also very conscious that she didn’t want anyone to think that her and Theo were together, she’d still not quite got her head around being friends with guys. Particularly guys who asked for a lot of advice about their potential relationships.

As they all left the cafe Kathy seemed to have taken an immediate shine to Theo, the pair were chatting away in a very animated manner as they made their way towards the river. Ingrid was probing Emma about the church, in particular whether there would be any strange rituals at the party. This Emma could provide some reassurance of, however, if they came along to church as she hoped they might it would be a different story. Emma remembered her first impression of church when she had gone along with Sam to a service in Manchester. It hadn’t been anything like St Bart’s but it was still so very different from the church she’d attended for school carol concerts.

Emma hadn’t really got the measure of Ingrid. She seemed fascinated by all things religious but very unwilling to actually talk about her views. Maybe it was the South African mentality, maybe it was just her personality, but the questions never seemed to stop, there was always something else that she wanted to know. It was only on their second meeting that Ingrid had started probing her about Theo, and what was going on between them. And the answer of nothing didn’t seem to suffice. Emma had to be careful because Theo had talked a lot about his potential romantic liaisons, and it wasn’t her place to let anything slip to Ingrid, not least because she didn’t want to either give away that he wasn’t really available, or conversely, provoke her to start pursuing him.

Theo was not really there throughout the evening, and only Emma really knew why. And that made it hard, he was in an unfamiliar setting, Emma was his only point of contact, yet it was clear to Theo that she was trying to keep her distance. Now wasn’t the time for them to talk but there needed to be time, Theo felt there was so much going on in his life at the moment and could only process so much at once. He needed Emma’s advice and if coming along to this boat party would help guarantee it then he was willing, but he just hoped there was no preaching. Suddenly memories of his families strict Jewish practice came flooding back, not that this party even faintly resembled anything of that heritage, but it was still religion and he had done is utmost to avoid all hint of religion for the past decade. It was not until his sixteenth birthday that Theo was allowed to stop attending synagogue with his parents. And that wasn’t a moment too soon.

The problem for Theo was Talitha. She had completely confused him. Before she went back to South Africa there had been nothing between them, but that didn’t really seem to hold true any more. But Theo had no idea what was true, she was also a far better Jew than he was, and that made life harder. If anything was going to happen he’d need to sharpen up his act, which perhaps was why he equated his friendship with Emma and his acquiescence to attend this evening with some strange religious development which might make him more prepared to step foot in a synagogue once again. Even on a boat full of people who he should have been attracted to his eyes had nowhere to go. In everyone he looked at he saw a feint relic of Talitha. In every conversation that was of interest he was reminded of something she said. Each time he felt lonely in the midst of the crowd he wondered what she was doing.

Emma knew that Theo was lovestruck, and therefore did not see him as a threat, and despite Ingrid’s suspicions knew that because they were spurious it did not matter what she or anyone else thought. She watched Ingrid and Kathy chatting away, and was glad to have introduced them before the waves of familiar faces meant that Kathy was far too busy to look out for the new arrivals. Ingrid seemed to adapt to any new situation with a chameleon like ability to shift style and morph into a person suited to that scenario.

Snippets of conversation which Emma had overhead proved this once again, she would take about religion and the experience of the mystical in vague terms, perhaps conscious that her definition of embracing mystical experiences was perhaps rather different to that of those she was being introduced to for the first time. The details were kept scant to avoid any conflict. Ingrid seemed to float between groups of people, talking with excitement and moving serenely from group to group without a care that each group was a bunch strangers, each person relating to their own friends which she had chosen to intrude in and grace with her presence for a few moments of her precious time.

And through it all Emma sat and watched. She felt alone among a crowd, she seemed lost amid friends, she was aimless while travelling down the river. Emma felt as though her existence was now tied to those she related to. Not out of any personal ambition, but that these were the things that mattered. Not having a job which was a career was in some way liberating. She heard the stories of stress and overwork and was glad that she was able to switch off at the end of the day. Emma was grateful for the people who she had met, those at Leon, her colleagues, the customers, the regulars who came in at the same time each Sunday, just as the breakfast menu was coming to an end and ordered their porridge and sat in the corner to write. She was grateful for the church, even though it was hard to know where she belonged. She looked around and saw people she knew and many she didn’t and wondered whether this would ever feel like home.

The music carried on playing and she walked onto the dance floor, found Theo, Ingrid and Kathy dancing together. Emma realised that the Christian format of dancing was perhaps a little strange, Theo and Ingrid were doing their best to behave, but Ingrid’s inhibitions lowered she started to pull Theo towards her and he turned and walked away, found solace on the upper deck as the boat drew into it’s dock he was ready to get off. Talitha was not here, so he didn’t want to be.