The Tied Man

We sat on the bench on the lakeshore and ate hot chips as protection against the cooling night while we waited for Henry to pick us up.   I was just gathering up the last grains of salt with my finger when the distinctive cough of the tiny boat’s engine drifted over the water.

I gave a resigned sigh.  ‘This is it, then.’

‘This is it.  Shame.’ Just as Lilith was about to add something else, Henry yelled out for me to grab the rope to pull him to the quay and she thought better of it.  I grudgingly headed towards the water.

‘Finn?’ she called.

I turned back.  ‘Yeah?’

‘Spunk flavour,’ Lilith mouthed, and we both shuddered with shared, secretive laughter as a horrified Henry caught sight of our bruised and battered faces.

*****

A brisk wind whipped the surface of the lake into white-tipped waves that became as solid as cobblestones against the prow of the boat.  Half way back to the island a wild gust caught us and rocked the little launch from side to side, and Lilith tumbled into me.  I instinctively reached out to catch her and my left hand accidentally landed on a small, firm breast.  ‘Shit, I’m sorry!’

‘S’all right,’ she smiled drunkenly, and settled back on the seat.  Then, so gently that at first I thought it might only be my imagination, she leant into me so that the entire arc of her spine rested against my chest.  I didn’t dare move, partly because I didn’t want Henry to see, but mainly because I didn’t want to lose the warmth of the woman currently using me as a backrest.

A journey that I wanted to last forever took a little under five minutes, and all too soon the wooden skeleton of the island’s jetty loomed out of the darkness.

‘Next stop, Albermarle Hall,’ Henry called out with forced cheeriness, as the boat bumped against the tyres that hung off the little pier.  Lilith reluctantly moved from my arms, and coldness filled the space that she left.

I went to follow her out of the boat, but Henry beckoned me back.  ‘We need to talk, lad,’ he said quietly, and the sadness in his voice only compounded that sudden chill.

*****

I sat sullenly at the kitchen table and deliberately blew as much smoke as I could in Henry’s direction as he brewed strong coffee.  Whatever he was about to say was carving worry-lines into his forehead as he thought about the words, and I didn’t want to have to do reality tonight.  I wanted to do as Lilith had done, to stumble off to bed and try to sleep and capture just some of the good stuff, instead of being made to sit at the table whilst my nose and fists throbbed from the fight.

I was sick of waiting for Henry to find the right place to start.  ‘So what’s all this about, little man?  You want a freebie or something?’

‘Don’t ever say that!’ Henry snapped.

I held my hands up. ‘Joke. Sorry.  But you’re clearly building up to something fairly fuckin’ mammoth, and I wouldn’t mind getting my head down some time before dawn.’

Henry sat across from me and frowned into his coffee as if a script was about to appear on its surface.  Finally he spoke.  ‘You need to be careful.’

‘Half an hour of moping around the kitchen like a wet fart to come up with that?  What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?’

‘You know what it means, Finn.  You and Lilith.’

I had a sudden urge to hit him just for mentioning her name.  I sat on my hands until it passed.  ‘There is no ‘me and Lilith’.  We haven’t broken any rules, Henry.’

He shook his head.  ‘I think we both know it’s not that simple.  Do you know what’s so awful?  In any other circumstance except this, that girl would be the best thing that’s ever happened to you.  I don’t think you ever laughed before she arrived.’

‘Don’t be so bloody melodramatic, you stupid old queen.  Course I laughed.’

‘Well if you did, I never heard you.  And it makes you terribly vulnerable.  Nights like tonight just compound that vulnerability.’

I hated him talking about it.  ‘God, Henry, just for a while back there it was great, you know?  Just sitting and drinking with this beautiful girl, with no agenda – no wondering what she had planned for later.  It was like I had a life!’

‘I know, I know.  But in a couple of months she’ll be gone, and we’ll need to get back to how things used to be.’  He took a deep breath.  ‘And that means the less of this… kind of thing there is, the easier it’ll be for you.  Sometimes the more you have, the more you’ll miss it when it’s gone.’