56 Days

by Catherine Ryan Howard

  “How do you know that?”

  “What?”

  “That he’s younger than us.”

  Oliver raises an eyebrow. “Should I be bracing myself for a bombshell?”

  She lets a beat pass, enjoying this. “I’m twenty-five.”

  “Phew.” He mock-wipes at his brow. “Although I figured. You said you were Class of 2017. I did the maths.”

  “Well done.”

  “On a calculator.”

  They cross Baggot Street by the bridge, passing a man carrying two boxes of beer, one stacked on top of the other, hurrying in the opposite direction.

  Priorities, she thinks.

  “This is the bit where you tell me how old you are,” she says.

  He grins. “Is it?”

  They reach the pub, which is actually more of a sports bar. One elderly man sits in the far corner of an enclosed smoking area at the front of the building, a box of cigarettes and a lighter neatly aligned on the table next to his pint.

  As Oliver pulls the door open he says to her, “I’m twenty-nine. Just.”

  Inside, a long, narrow room with a bar on the left stretches away from them. It’s full of nooks and crannies, of snugs and booths, and all of them are empty. Suspended screens are tuned to Sky Sports. There’s no music to compete with the commentators. If it hadn’t been for the man with the pint outside, she might think they’ve accidentally walked into a place that’s not open for business yet.

  She tells Oliver he has quite the eclectic taste in drinking establishments.

  “Yeah, well . . .” Again the hand on the small of her back, gently directing her to a booth just inside the door, protected from the rest of the bar by a stained-glass partition. “I’ve chosen tonight’s location purely based on its potential infection rate.”

  “Lovely.” She slides into the booth. “But how about we not talk about that? I’m in the mood to stick my head in the sand for an hour.”

  “Fair enough. What can I get you?”

  “A glass of white wine, please.”

  “Any particular kind?”

  “So long as it’s cold and not chardonnay . . .”

  “God, you’re so demanding.”

  He winks at her before turning away.

  She angles her body toward the window so half a minute later she hears rather than sees the barman approach Oliver at the bar. He must have been in the back. After their order is placed, it becomes apparent that he was, and why: he explains that they’re rearranging the interior so they are in line with the government’s new social-distancing guidelines ahead of St. Patrick’s Day.

  Ciara can’t imagine how a bunch of drunk people on the country’s drunkest day of the year will figure out how to stay two meters apart, in a pub, but the barman seems confident. She supposes he has to be.

  “Here you go.”

  Oliver carefully places her glass of white wine and his pint of something on the table and then slides into the booth until he’s sitting next to her, but still a polite foot away.

  “They’re rearranging the tables,” he says, lifting his chin to indicate the back of the bar.

  “I heard.”

  “Some of the booths are already taped off.”

  “Taped off with what?”

  “Hazard tape,” he says. “Black and yellow stripes.”

  “That’s . . . slightly terrifying.”

  “I would say, ‘And surreal,’ but I think I’ve already maxed out my allowance of that word for the week. See also: unprecedented. Anyway . . .” He puts a hand on her forearm, lightly squeezes it. “Let’s talk about something else. Or attempt to. Why did you move to Dublin?”

  She has told him this already, she thinks.

  She says, “Because of my job.”

  “But you knew the job was here before you applied for it. So why did you apply?”

  “Oh, you know.” She looks into her wine glass, picks it up, takes a sip. “The usual. I fancied a change. A new adventure. Fresh start.”

  “Was going on a date with a rando you met in the supermarket part of that plan?”

  Date.

  “It might help achieve its objectives,” she says without looking at him, feeling her cheeks warm under his gaze. “We’ll see.”

  The long silence that follows this is so excruciating for her that she fears she will spontaneously combust.

  “I know what you mean,” he says then. “That’s why I’m here. Why I left London.”

  When she turns to him she sees that his gaze is fixed now on something that isn’t there, some memory in the middle distance, and although she wants to ask him what he’s thinking about, wants to know more about whatever it was that went on in London, she has a very real sense that now isn’t the time, that it’s too soon.

  “Cheers,” he says, picking up his glass. “To fresh starts.”

  Two more rounds later, the barman comes to tell them that he’s closing up early. He apologizes profusely but they tell him they understand. They are the only patrons, they have been since the man outside left more than an hour ago, and it’s obvious the staff needs them out of the way to get ready for opening under very different conditions tomorrow. The hazard tape has crept as far as the booth directly across from theirs.

  The barman has kindly brought one more round, on the house, to soften the blow, but it’s not even nine o’clock by the time they’ve finished it.

  “We could go to mine,” Oliver suggests casually.

  She agrees to this plan with as much nonchalance as her tipsy self allows and then slides out of the booth with as much grace as she can muster. The amount in each case, she suspects, is nowhere near as much as she hopes. But Oliver’s eyes are looking a little unfocused and it takes him longer than it should to put his suit jacket back on, so she has to conclude that they’re both a little drunk or at least well on their way there.

  She hopes his place has food in it, for both their sakes.

  They arrive at his apartment complex arm in arm; she doesn’t quite remember when that happened, or who initiated it, but she’s happy with this turn of events. They’ve walked along the canal for a bit, back toward hers—although she didn’t mention that because she doesn’t want him suggesting they go to her place, not yet—and then turned left, and there might have been a park on the right at some point . . . Now they are outside a modern building shaped like a U, standing at its glass doors while Oliver roots for his keys.

  Gold lettering above the doors says it’s called The Crossings.

  She reads this aloud, adding a question mark at the end. This many drinks in, on an empty stomach, it seems like a silly name.

  “Harold’s Cross,” Oliver says, by way of explanation.

  “Whose what now?”

  He laughs. “That’s where we are. Harold’s Cross. It’s the name of the area.”

  “Oh.”

  He touches a plastic fob to a sensor and one of the doors obediently clicks open. They enter a lobby made of glass; a light comes on overhead, making Ciara blink.

  Through another set of doors opposite them, she glimpses a central courtyard with a little tinkling water feature in its center, surrounded by wooden benches and carefully planted trees and flowerbeds. The apartments rise up around them on three sides, each of their balconies empty, soft lights on behind wispy curtains.

  “Do you have roommates?” she asks.

  “It’s just me. It’s a work thing. Came with the job. Only temporarily, though. I get it rent-free for three months.”

  “And then what?”

  “And then we’ll see.”

  He grins in a way that makes her think he wants her to think she’ll have some part to play in that.

  Christ, she really needs to eat something.

  She follows him past the lifts and down a long corridor of s
paced-apart doors from whose other sides there comes no sound. She keeps a couple of steps behind because there is no way after this much time and that many glasses of wine that her makeup still looks the way it did when she left the house, and the bright white spotlights clicking on directly overhead will only make it worse.

  She’s relieved when he pushes open his own door—1—to reveal a dim, softly lit space beyond.

  “Come on in,” he says, waving a hand theatrically.

  She smiles and accepts the invite, the heels of her boots making a hollow noise as they connect with the hardwood floor.

  He takes her coat and says he’ll give her the tour, which consists of him walking her into the living room while pointing at things—the closed doors of two bedrooms and a third, partially open one which leads to a wet-room-style bathroom with a monsoon shower and subway tiles.

  The living space is open plan, with a glossy kitchen area to the rear. The walls are white and decorated with arty, abstract prints. (“They came with the place.”) A rich brown leather L-shaped sofa faces a faux fire that “burns” inside a black glass box recessed into the wall once Oliver hits a switch. Above it hangs a flat-screen TV bigger than Ciara’s dining table. He pulls the curtains closed across the big windows—no, sliding doors—that face into the courtyard.

  There are no things, no possessions. Nothing personalizing the space except for a lone magazine lying open on the couch. But it’s not a clinical neatness that’s going on here—more like a barely lived-in vibe, as if this is a holiday home he’s just checked into for the night.

  The kitchen has the same odd, cold bareness: the countertops are empty except for a bottle of supermarket-brand olive oil and a roll of paper towels.

  “I could fit my entire place into this room,” she says.

  He walks back to her. “I realize this is very much hashtag-first-world-problems, but it’s actually a bit too big. I feel like I’ve been rattling around in here, all by myself.” A pause. “Alone.”

  Their eyes meet, a spark of electricity connecting the air between them, a fork of lightning in an otherwise dark sky.

  “Well,” Ciara says, hoping she can get the next three words out before her entire face is aflame, betraying her, showing her for the nervous wreck she actually is. “I’m here now.”

  “And I’m glad you are.”

  He has said this softly, and now he reaches for her.

  She lets him.

  He slides his arms around her waist and pulls her close until their faces are touching, cheek to cheek. She can feel the heat of his breath, smell the beer on it. The acute intimacy of this, coming so suddenly, is disorienting, and that mixed with the wine makes her feel loose and fluid.

  Less anxious. A braver version of herself.

  Maybe even a different person altogether.

  He presses his lips against her temple and murmurs, “I don’t want to infect you.”

  She can hear—and then feel—him smile. She slides one hand around his waist until it’s resting on the small of his back. His skin feels hot beneath his shirt. She runs her other hand up his arm and across his shoulder until she is touching the skin on his neck, cupping his jaw, pulling him toward her.

  “I’m willing to risk it,” she says to his lips.

  By her estimation, they have now spent around ten hours together, just talking. But when his mouth finds hers, they tell each other something neither of them could possibly say: that they are two very lonely people hungry for touch, needing it, starving for it. Tenderness quickly turns to desperation, as if they’re both trying to cross the barrier of their own skins.

  She unbuttons his shirt. His chest is covered in a blanket of fine, dark hair. She presses her palms into it and then up toward his collarbone and onto his shoulders, lifting the material from his skin. It’s when he steps back to do the rest himself that she first glimpses it: a thick cord of scar tissue, snaking nearly all the way down his side.

  Seeing her looking, he angles his body to give her a view of the whole thing.

  “I know,” he says. “Impressive, right?”

  The silvery thread of smooth, newer skin is about half an inch wide and curves from just underneath his left shoulder blade down to his waist. Pairs of pale dots appear at neat intervals, one on either side: the skin’s memories of the staples that must have held it in place while it healed.

  She traces it lightly with her fingertips. “What happened?”

  “It’s not a nice story.” He sighs then, as if resigned to the telling. “I got in a fight. On a night out. When I was seventeen. Drank too much, got too brave, looked at some guy the wrong way. Looked at the wrong guy the wrong way. He waited for me outside, broke a bottle off the wall. I know I’m lucky it wasn’t worse, but . . .” He turns back to face her. “I feel like I paid a high price for one moment of madness. Not even madness, just stupidity. And now I have this thing on my body forever that isn’t anything to do with who I am.”

  “I’m so sorry,” she says.

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “It’s not yours either.”

  He looks away. “I don’t know about that.”

  She touches his cheek, pulling his face—and eyes—back toward her.

  There are no nerves now, no overthinking.

  She feels a strange peace; the voice in her head has, miraculously, gone away.

  These last few days have felt like a door being opened very, very slowly. Now, finally, Ciara is ready to step through.

  I can do this, she thinks.

  It was easier than she’d thought it would be, but there is no solid ground on the other side.

  She doesn’t care. She lifts her face to his and kisses him.

  She steps over the threshold and throws herself into the fall.

  56 Days Ago

  “Go ahead,” are the first words he ever says to her.

  They are both on the cusp of joining the line for the self-service checkouts in Tesco. It’s Friday lunchtime and his fifth time this week stopping in for a sandwich, because he comes in here every weekday around about now and has, almost without fail, since he started working at the firm across the street.

  It’s also his fifth time this week seeing her in here, doing the same thing.

  Seemingly.

  He might not have noticed her at all if it weren’t for the bag: a little swingy canvas thing with a picture of a space shuttle on it. It was the bag that initially caught his eye, on Monday. Come Tuesday, he saw it again. When he saw it on Wednesday, he wondered if it was odd that he would see it—her—three days in a row and, on Thursday, he concluded that it definitely was.

  That’s when he noted the way she carried the bag: by its handles, swinging by her side, even though it was clearly empty and would be until she made her way through the checkouts. Why not just keep it folded in her hand, or tucked under her arm, or put away in the little bag with a strap she wore over one shoulder until she was in need of it?

  It was almost like she wanted people to see her carrying it.

  Or, perhaps, just for him to.

  That’s what had started the wheels turning. He wondered: Why had he never seen any other blue-lanyard-wearing employees in these aisles? Like all good tech companies, they probably had free food in their building, good free food, like fresh sushi and an in-house barista, so why would one of their employees line up for a bland, soggy, plastic-wrapped supermarket sandwich that they had to pay for?

  Maybe he had and he just hadn’t noticed them.

  But then how was it that even though he took his lunch at a slightly different time every day, leaving his desk only when there was a natural break in his work, she always happened to be in here at the exact same time as him?

  Five days in a row?

  Today, he’d spotted her standing by the drinks fridge just inside the entrance, waiti
ng patiently for a twentysomething guy in a spray-on blue shirt to make his selection so she could step in and make hers.

  He saw the bag first, swinging empty as it always was, and then the green winter coat she seems to be in every day.

  All this week, he’s been logging details.

  Just in case.

  She’s shorter than him by a foot, about the same age, slim but not skinny; there’s a softness to her cheeks and the line of her jaw. Attractive in a quiet way. Her hair is light brown and cut bluntly at the ends, so the two sides swish like curtains against her shoulders as she moves. Her lanyard hangs from a bright-blue ribbon and displays a barcode, a small passport photo, and the logo of a tech company with a cloud-computing arm whose European HQ occupies an entire building just a couple of minutes’ walk from here. There’s a couple of lines of text on it he hasn’t gotten close enough to read.

  He’s never caught her looking at him, but that’s neither here nor there. She could be not looking at him on purpose, or just really good at doing it surreptitiously.

  Or this could all be pure paranoia on his part.

  He’d walked past her and made his way to the very back of the store, where he’d waited his turn at the deli counter to order his usual: chicken, stuffing, and mayo on rye, no butter. To stop himself from scanning the aisles for emerald-green wool, he’d taken out his phone and focused intently on the latest headlines in a news app. Then he made his way to the checkouts where he saw that she was just about to join the line—perfect timing, but whose?—and he’d hung back so she’d have to do it in front of him, and that’s when she’d stopped and looked up and their eyes had met.

  A flash of something—surprise? Recognition?—crosses her face just as he thinks to himself, I’ve seen her somewhere before.

  Somewhere else, in different circumstances.

  But where?

  When?

  “It’s okay,” she mumbles, waving the bottle of water she’s holding in her right hand. She takes a step back. “I’ve just realized I’ve got the wrong one.”