The Year of the Ladybird by Graham Joyce

able to do that
to me just by looking, like a moment of witchcraft. And then just as quickly everything was normal again.
    I turned away with the drinks I’d bought for the girls. Did my hand tremble? When I looked again at her she was still gazing back at me. She almost huddled into the corner of the bar, as
if she was trying to make herself small. Her arms were folded and she was shrunk into herself. She wore a simple black dress, somewhat low cut and reaching halfway down to her knees. The reason I
was so struck by her dress was that this was the first time I’d seen either her bare arms or her bare legs. The lustrous dark hair that she always wore tied back now fell forward in a loose
wave across one side of her face.
    I went over to her, just as if pulled by a magic thread. As I approached she dropped her eye contact and looked away, squeezing herself with her folded arms. ‘I thought you’d been
banned,’ I said.
    ‘No.’
    ‘Or that you were suspended?’
    ‘Not me.’ She averted her face, as if she’d found new interest in the band. Anyone looking at our body language would assume that she was bored but trapped by my conversation.
She wore large gold ear-rings and a gold bangle that reminded me of something Luca had said about women.
    ‘I saw Colin today. At a meeting.’
    That surprised her. She flickered a glance at me and then looked away again.
    ‘Not that I’m one of them,’ I said.
    ‘So why were you there?’
    ‘It was a mistake.’
    ‘You went to a p’litical meeting by mistake? Not very bright, are you?’
    ‘Did I claim to be bright?’
    At last she looked at me. Her eyes had a feline flame, but with a dissolving quality, an intelligence behind them as if she processed and documented every detail that came before her. She wore
eyeliner and a little lipstick, again something I’d never seen on her before. Some instinct told me I should back away. Instead I said, ‘Can I buy you a drink?’
    She looked away again. ‘No, you can’t.’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘Because everyone will see you buy me a drink.’
    ‘Do you want me to go away?’
    ‘Of course not. Why do you think I’m here?’
    The remark left me open-mouthed. ‘So . . . I can’t buy you a drink. I can’t talk with you because you won’t look at me. What am I to do?’
    ‘You figure out a solution. You’re the one who is supposed to be clever.’
    Not
that
clever, is what I wanted to say. I asked her where Colin was and she said that following the meeting he had gone back to London. He would be staying down in the capital while his
suspension was in force. When I asked why she hadn’t gone with him she said that they simply couldn’t afford for her not to be working. I flashed on what Colin had said in the pub that
afternoon and it occurred to me that this, at least, might give me permission to be seen talking to her. I would also be keeping any predators away.
    But even that was no use if she couldn’t look me in the eye. I felt emboldened and I said, ‘It will be dark in an hour. We could go for a walk on the beach.’
    ‘Up to the dunes? Bit obvious, aincha?’
    ‘That’s not what I meant.’
    It really wasn’t. For one thing the idea of the dunes at night didn’t appeal; secondly you would be in serious danger of tripping over any number of fornicating couples in the
dark.
    She unfolded her arms. On the bar and in her glass of gin-and-tonic was a pink plastic straw. She took a sip through the straw and set the glass back on the bar. Still without looking at me she
said, ‘Do you know where the wreck is?’
    ‘Yes.’ Way up the beach in the other direction a very old shipwreck lay offshore. At low tide the masts and the rotting prow of the boat were exposed, festooned with lime-green
seaweed.
    ‘Meet me opposite that. There’s a break in the wall.’
    She didn’t wait for an answer. She just left me and her unfinished gin-and-tonic without a backward glance. I was still watching her go when I