Wide Open

Nathan inspected the other Ronny’s form.

‘You want a watch?’

‘Yes. I believe I lost one.’

‘Here …’

Nathan began to unfasten the strap to his own watch. The other Ronny stared, unblinking. ‘He said he hadn’t seen you in over ten years. He’s got alopecia.’

Nathan unfastened the watch and held it out in the palm of his hand. It was a gold watch, an old watch.

‘He was driving a green Volvo.’

‘Take the watch.’

Nathan proffered the watch. The other Ronny took it.

‘It’s gold.’

‘Yes.’

‘It must be worth a lot.’

‘It’s mine. I want you to have it.’

Nathan glanced up and over towards Laura. She was momentarily occupied.

‘You’d better go.’

‘You don’t believe me, do you?’ The other Ronny was frowning. ‘You don’t believe I actually met him.’

Nathan shook his head. ‘No.’

‘Maybe I dreamed it.’

Nathan shrugged. ‘Maybe.’

‘Thanks for the watch.’

The other Ronny smiled again. He took a step backwards. He’d deposited his cardboard box on Nathan’s counter. Nathan scrutinized the box.

‘What is this?’

‘Nothing. Look after it for me. Try not to open it.’

Nathan stood up and touched the box. ‘What’s inside?’

‘Everything.’

Nathan scowled. ‘Don’t be stupid.’

The other Ronny turned to leave. Nathan couldn’t stop himself.

‘Where will you go?’ he asked.

The other Ronny scratched his nose. ‘Manchester.’

‘Why Manchester?’

He just shrugged.

Nathan took a deep breath, then expelled it nervously. He wished he hadn’t asked. Now he’d be obliged to tell Margery where the other Ronny was, if he was going to be honest. And he wanted to be.

‘Thanks.’

The other Ronny limped out. Nathan snatched up his form, screwed it into a ball and pushed it into his jacket pocket. Then he picked up the box – it was heavy – deserted his post, walked into the men’s toilets, dumped it down next to the latrines, walked a few steps, rested both his palms on the sink, stared at himself in the mirror and retched. He retched again but nothing came out. Just air. Just gas.

A retch, he thought, is like a dry fuck.

Oh Christ. Oh Christ. Where did that come from?

3

‘The water’s flat and brown. The sand’s made of shells. It’s been raped by those whelk farmers. The sea, I mean. Raped by those fucking seafood fishermen.’

Lily pointed towards the sea. The man she spoke to was fat and smelled of fish, but he had a good tan and a big prick. He was on his way to the beach.

Lily sat astride her mountain bike. She was seventeen. She was conducting her own little war, but she didn’t know what she was fighting about, not yet, at least. She had widely spaced eyes. At school they’d called her Miss Piggy, because of her strange eyes and because her parents ran a farm. They kept wild boar. Although, as Lily often observed, wild boar actually had eyes that were quite extraordinarily close together.

Lily had wide eyes and a flat nose and a gap between her front teeth. It was as though her face had hardly bothered fitting together. But the skin had been persistent. It had stretched and stretched until it finally joined up, until it met in the middle. It had touched bases. It was one of those faces.

Lily pointed. ‘That’s the Swale. It’s a nature reserve.’

‘I know.’

The man looked uncomfortable. He made as if to surreptitiously cover over his genitals with his hands. Lily noticed. ‘You’ve nothing there that I haven’t seen countless times before.’

He grimaced.

She rubbed her arms. ‘Fuck, it’s cold. You must be freezing.’

‘I’m just going in for a quick dip.’

‘Like I was saying,’ Lily continued, ignoring his response, ‘that’s the Swale, and that there’s the Blockhouse. Right over there, beyond where you can see is the Ferry Inn and the church. Harty church.’

‘I know.’

Lily scowled. ‘Would you stop saying “I know” all the time?’