《Eyes of Decision》Julia - 2

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‘Julia’ she says when she sees me. I smile, but don’t show any teeth. I recognise her face from the school yard, picking up Nathan’s kids - and something else that I can’t quite place.

We are standing in the library car park, next to the Pay and Display. I don’t want to be here, and don’t want to talk to her. A bag of shopping cuts into my fingers, and my feet hurt from my work shoes. Sunlit, fluffy clouds float balefully in a blue sky, and everyone seems uncommonly happy with the spring air.

‘It’s been ages. How’s -?’

My breath is drawn out of me by a vacuum. I look into her face, to see if she is being cruel. I drop my shopping, and duck to pick it up.

‘Julia? Are you alright? You’ve gone white as a sheet?’

I remember her, like my memory found the missing file, read it all, and shrugged it shoulders at the gaffe. She is Davina, a social worker friend from your last job. She is pretty and middle-aged, but she has lipstick on her teeth and her masque isn’t quite blended around one side of her jaw.

I grasp the handle of the carrier bag, straighten, gulp. ‘He, um, died.’

She steps back, hand to her mouth. Now it’s her turn to wish she wasn’t here. Though on the outside I’m all white-faced and grief stricken, inside I’m laughing at her. She had to stick her nose in, had to ask the wrong question. She probably knew in some round-about way, maybe she heard something but wasn’t listening, or paperwork, or the radio, diverted her from knowing what not to say when you see Julia. But right now she has to extricate herself from this situation as gracefully as she can.

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And I’m not in the mood to make it easy for her.

‘Oh,’ she managed. ‘I’m sorry.’ As if it’s her fault. ‘Was it quick? I mean, I don’t mean to -’

‘He killed himself,’ I say. ‘Hung himself from his prison window.’ I’m showing my teeth now, dying to snarl in her face. My nails dig into my palm as I wait for her to go on.

She knows better, sees the trap waiting for her. She takes a step back, then another. ‘I’m so sorry, Julia. I didn’t know.’ Her face slackens, her shoulders droop. Behind her blossoms fall from conker trees, kids stroll about feeling all grown up. I can smell her mature perfume and the horse-chestnut blooms, and the scent tears at my sinuses like vinegar.

A single sob escapes my lips, an admission, a signal. I am not angry at you, I am angry at everything. This tarmac and that car, that library building and that sky. How dare you all still exists while I hurt so much. How dare -

She backs away and is gone, mumbling apologies I don’t listen to. I stand there for long moments watching her retreating shape. My eyes blur and my fingers finally unclench.

I need to go back to work, but all I want to do is find her car and put a great big scratch down it, because she wasn’t listening when someone told her that you had died.

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