The Shadows We Cast

Nina

Now
Nina is deep in the sofa when the doorbell rings. Hitting pause on her laptop, she stills. It makes her feel like an intruder. An entire day spent in his flat while he’s at work. Is he expecting someone?
When he left this morning, he hadn’t let her get out of bed. Insisted she stayed there, brought tea and her phone. There was breakfast waiting when she finally got up. How long has it been since she slept a whole night without shadowed dreams? Since the first thing she felt on waking wasn’t sharp panic? “Too independent for your own good,” mum always said. Now she has help. Support. Someone on her side.
The bell goes again. If they see the glow of the laptop through the window, they might not go away. She clicks it shut, paused on the opening credits of Queer Eye. It has kept her buoyed up all day. She hasn’t even got dressed yet. There were a pair of scrappy pyjama bottoms lying on the floor next to his bed and she’s still got her hoodie. She was going to head back to her place, get a change of clothes, tidy up, think about what might come next. It felt like too much after everything that happened at the weekend. Better to rest. It’s not like she had anywhere to go on a Monday morning.
It rings again. This time a hand rattles the letter box. Maybe it’s his sister? He said something about her when they were lying in bed chatting last night. Some career type. She’d hardly be banging the door down at 3:30pm if she were like that.
Nina sits up, letting the blanket fall away. There’s a cluster of crumbs where she’s been slumped and snacking. Some of the old anxiety creeps in. Her skin prickles from the cold, away from the safety of the blanket. This time yesterday she was still in the police station. All those questions. What if she let something slip? She was so tired. Maybe they’ve found out what she’s been doing all this time. But how would they know she was here?
She pulls her feet up underneath her. Unless he was in on it too. They were friends, after all. This could all be a ploy, something to get her to relax, confess.
Her name this time, shouted through the letterbox. She sags with relief. Teachers are slackers, everyone knows that. He must have come home early and forgotten his keys. Shaking her head to dislodge the paranoia, she walks down the hall. A ruffle of her hair is all she has time for – he’s seen her in worse states.
‘Did you get out early?’ She sweeps the door wide. Too late, she realises the wrong face is waiting on the other side.
The sight of him is physical. Nina steps back, the last bit of Hobnob bouncing up her throat.
‘He’s not here.’ She shields herself with the door.
‘I know.’ That face. So much of her energy absorbed by this man. ‘I want to talk to you.’
‘Go away.’ She tries to sound forceful.
‘The things you’ve said about me. It has to stop.’ He steps closer. She remembers ginger beer, rum, his mouth.
‘Leave me alone.’ She pushes the door. It hits against something soft – his foot, wedging it open.
‘You still think I did it, don’t you?’ His face was so close. She looks around the unfamiliar hallway. There must be keys, something she can use as a weapon.
‘If you don’t leave, I’ll call the police.’ She makes the words loud. Maybe a neighbour will hear.
‘Because that worked so well before, didn’t it?’ So self-satisfied.
‘He’ll be home soon,’ she says. Horrible to admit she needs help.
‘Oh yes, I can just see him putting me in my place.’ He shakes his head.
‘You’re a bully.’ If she can’t shut him out she can tell him what she thinks. No violence this time.
‘People think I’m a monster.’ He almost looks convincing. If you don’t know what he’s done.
‘It’s what you deserve.’
His head tips, gaze travelling down her body.
‘I just don’t see the appeal. Smart woman like you.’ What a prick.
‘He’s kind.’ That’s what she needs. Someone to help her out of this mess.
‘Perhaps you deserve each other.’ He moves his foot. Now’s her chance. ‘If you can stomach being with someone like that.’ Something like disgust in his voice.
‘What do you mean?’ Her hand is on the door, ready to shut it in his face.
‘Appearances. Not what they seem, all that crap,’ he shrugs.
‘We’re not all shallow like you.’ She leans forward, her voice a whisper. ‘You will pay for what you did to me.’ She hisses the last word out between a chink of the closing door. He’s too fast. The door lurches out of her hand, bangs against the wall.
‘Now listen here-’ He steps forward, grabbing her wrist.
She needs to fight back. Kick him, run away, anything. But it comes back. That awful paralysis. Like that night, five weeks ago, when she cowered in the dark, waiting for it to be over.
‘Leave me alone.’ It comes out as a pathetic whisper.
‘I’ve had enough of this.’ He barges in, slamming the door behind him. Pushes her up against the wall. ‘We’re going to sort this out.’
Trapped between his hands, she’s taken back to the rumpled bed of a stranger, her throat closing in panic.

Eric
After

He sits on the bed, worrying his hands. The recent exertion has left him breathless, a heavy ache between his legs. That flush when you know your cheeks are pink. His pulse is a train-click.
On the back of the door is a calendar; a dog wearing a Santa hat, the front legs dressed up so it looks like a short fat Father Christmas with a massive canine face. He tucks his shirt back in, pulls the cuffs down. The stretched darkness of winter has always grated on him. That blank, white-skied space before spring arrives. It’s been January for over three weeks. Depressing to be reminded of Christmas. Unless this date will become important. A first, even if it’s not the way he’s used to starting.
The hum of the party downstairs reasserts itself. Anyone could have walked in. He didn’t check for a lock, put a chair behind the door. He looks around the room – like the spare one at Nan’s house, none of the furniture matching. Some fake pine shelves and a white desk with a partitioned mirror on it. A strange place for something like this.
A glimpse of her, behind him in the angled glass. It’s always awkward, afterwards. But usually there’s at least some conversation. It looks like she’s gone straight to sleep. Understandable, it was pretty full-on.
Imagine if someone had walked in. He could have at least tied his belt around the shelves and the handle. He pats down the tuft of hair at the back of his head, trying to dislodge the problem of locking the door. What is he supposed to do now? Nothing was said, it just happened. Maybe there were people that did things like this all the time.
It will look suspicious, how long he’s been missing. Someone might have seen him loping up here, intentions so sound. He’d just come up to check she was ok, that was all. There was shouting after she’d gone upstairs with Will. He’d gone to Mojos, to find a “less mental one,” he’d said. She never came back down. He checks his watch. Only 2:15. How can such a small number of minutes have passed? The back of his neck prickles, there’s sweat on the short hairs.
He scrubs a hand over the skin, trying to remember how it escalated. One moment there was silence and darkness, his hands unsure. The way she was lying, so open and available to him. Then this heat and pressure, a need he didn’t know he had in him. Had she felt it too? Somewhere in it all he got muddled. She’d made a noise, over and over. That was a good sign, it had to be. He’s never been left trembling like this before. Not even with Bea. Could he ask for her number? He can’t imagine how you’d assemble that sentence once you’d already shared so much.
The others will be settled in, those who’ve decided, or been forced through lack of success, to stay. Slouching around sodden ashtrays, concocting drinks with sour dregs. It’s not the place for him, usually. Scuttling out before the drinking dares start, or his friends abandon him. Whichever comes first. Certainly not the one left with the girl. That was always Will.
He makes himself turn around, acknowledge the prone shape behind him. A heap of clothes and hair slumped under a stray coat. It seemed important that she wasn’t cold. Her handbag sits on the floor. Of course, he could ask Will her name, if he had her number. But that would seem weird. She’d been kissing Will earlier in the kitchen, and now this. Maybe she’s pretending to be asleep. It might be embarrassing, that she let those things happen with a stranger. Hopefully, that won’t get in the way of seeing her again. He rummages in the bag and finds a driving licence tucked in a side pocket. He takes a photo. Just so he can find her again, maybe talk to her when it’s less immediate.
He still feels slick in his pants. The sensation wets his mouth – stale beer, something metallic in his throat. It could be the taste of her.
A movement underneath the green fabric; twitching fingers. His hands had been pressed down on them, just a few minutes ago. It made him think of Bea – how angry he’d been when Will told him that she’d cheated on him. All those heartfelt tears a few weeks ago and she’d been carrying on behind his back. With his best mate. How unoriginal. The wind flutters at the curtains – a white shape at the window. So quiet. He’d made noises too, he was sure of it. People might have heard.
He has to leave, be normal, resume his hollow conversation with the sofa accountants. Somehow his legs don’t move, and he sits there far longer than he should, staring at the door handle, trying to think of the best way he could have locked it.

Nina

It’s important to make it across the office without talking to anyone. On the cusp of the swishing doors, she maps out a route. Too far into sales and Harris will berate her with his weekend, but too far the other way and Tom will find a sarcastic way of flirting. A weaving motion through the middle is the only option. Risky, as Dev would sulk for the rest of the day without a greeting, but it’s still pretty early, odds are he hasn’t made it in yet. Head down, she begins her assault on the carpet. Too quick for the HR lot, wallowing around the kitchen like it’s a watering hole. Mondays never start quickly for them. There’s a clear gap between the partitions at this end of Sales. But then, the looming size of Brian. The gap behind his chair is small, but he seems safely amused by something on his phone, either that or he’s checking up his nostrils. Speed is the only way. Nina turns her body at the approach, slips through the gap and is away, taking a sharp left towards the comfort of the other engineers, a missed comment falling to the floor behind her. Last bit. Dev’s space is thankfully empty, a few other milling bodies – they’ve been avoiding her more in the last couple of weeks. Her presence makes them think of deadlines now. That should dissuade conversation. The haven of her glass door is just a few steps away.
There’s a smudge on the gilt of her name plaque, but she can’t bring herself to raise a hand to wipe it smooth. Nina slips through the door, wearied by the smallest part of her day.
Secreted behind her desk, she is safe. Unreachable. Coming here should have made it better, a distraction from the dreams that left her blunt and smudged. She feels like an echo.
She writes the phrase on a post-it, a three-word sentence, then tucks it away in the bottom tray, the place for things that don’t need attention. The desk is unchanged – her gold cat perched on the far corner, waving through the glass wall. The movement through it is detached, like events on a screen.
There must be something different. Being here usually brings relief. Nothing of that lightness this morning. She checks the filing cabinet. Everything is alphabetical, colour-coded, her emergency stash of cola bottles in the bottom drawer. In her rush to get out of the door, she forgot to bring anything for lunch. Another social hurdle – the sandwich van. The smell of coffee and disinfectant wipes from the previous inhabitant is gradually succumbing to her Juicy Fruit chewing gum and Tippex. She touches each item, turning the stapler to the left, unable to find the thing that is out of place.
“Should have gone straight to the police,” that’s what Holly would say. Not something she could face yesterday; a grey Sunday morning, skin prickling with alcohol residue and something else that crawled in her stomach. It’s pointless to go there until she’s sure what happened. Can present a clear and detailed account. Otherwise, why would they take her seriously?
Her reflection is an unwanted ghost behind the screen display. She peels off another slip of paper, adds a detail:
The window was open, two half-empty drinks on the shelves.
It is buried with the other. Now to work.
She usually leaves the door open. It gives the illusion that she wants to listen to others, doesn’t think she’s better. Of course, it also means putting up with the endless clicking of retractable pencils from Tom’s desk and the “actioning” that Sai blurts into his phone, despite her polite reminder that, as a verb, it should only be used in the passive voice.
She pulls up her schematics, looks over the test results. Her creation. That’s the best bit – the mini version in the test area that she puts under a range of pressures, temperatures. This project is deliciously hers, a unique prototype vessel heading out to the arctic. This is different to their commercial stuff. She’s doing something worthwhile. The congratulations card from Dad is still on the desk. She’s a part of something big. Something more than how alone she felt yesterday.
She scribbles a few numbers, a sketch of the boat the way she imagines it – not the functional thing it will be. Her version is a funnelled steam ship, a small figure leaning out over the edge.
Another note, another detail:
My shoes were stacked in a corner, one toe slipped inside the other.