PART SIX

Damon liked order, and not because it meant he was in control. No, Damon liked order because it meant there was something – some chaotic force or belligerent individual – for him to tame first. Perhaps that was why he liked Kristi so much. She was a force to be reckoned with, a woman who knew her own mind, and carved a path for herself with viciousness and sneer. While Kristi never would have described herself in such a way, Damon felt he could see the ambition rising from her like steam.

He had seen it the first time they had met, over the crowded, busy bar at Foxy’s. She was on the other side, seventeen trying to pass for twenty, and he was the excited new business owner trying to make the girls feel special so that they’d keep coming back when they were legal, and they could get into places with more discerning bouncers.

She led the giggling pack, stepping forward to give their orders, and Damon could remember how he licked his lips as she did. Fresh meat. He served them, playing along with Kristi’s game of pretend, and made sure she knew her drink was on the house.

She kept coming back after turning eighteen, and sometimes Damon would take over on the bar and serve her especially. On the odd occasion when her friends had left her to dance or to congregate around the wall-length bathroom mirrors, he would slide into the booth beside her, let his knee press against hers, and they would talk as best they could beneath the din. Kristi was going to be on the West End, she had declared, and he had believed it.

One weekend, she stopped turning up. Damon would linger at the door that led back up to his office and peer out at the crowds to see if he could pick her out, but he would be disappointed that weekend, and the weekend after that, and the many weekends that followed that one. She had moved on, a chaotic element that he had been unable to pin down. Still, Damon knew Kristi would be back.

When that day arrived, Kristi looked worse for wear. She came into the club, crumpled CV in hand, eyes sunken into her skull, weighed down by a hundred sleepless nights. Her greasy hair was pulled back into a loose ponytail and she had lost the glow that had lit up her spot on the dancefloor. Something else had tamed Kristi, and it wasn’t him. Damon was almost disappointed.

And then she had taken a seat at the bar and started crying in front of him. It was the middle of the afternoon, the door ajar to let in some cool air and a couple of visiting day drinkers – extra profits for Damon to soak up in the quiet hours.

“Hey now, what’s wrong?” he asked, leaning against the bar. He plucked the CV – printed out with the last of the toner from her mum’s printer – from her hand and scanned it, pretending to read. She looked up at him, face blotchy and reddened. Kristi wiped the tears from her face and apologised with a croaky voice.

“Listen,” he put the CV down and put on his best charitable look, imitated sincerity on the face of a man undeservedly handsome given how deep the rot ran. “I actually do have something. You could start next weekend. How’s that?”

Kristi had started to cry again, and Damon pursed his lips to one side of his face, an attempt to look sympathetic. He could already imagine his youngest bartender, Harley, crying like this when he let her go for some imagined infraction, giving her one week’s notice before he could pass her locker onto Kristi.

“Here,” he said, pouring her some water from the tap and passing it to her. “Or, something stronger?”

Kristi sniffed and nodded. Damon poured them both a vodka on the rocks and when Kristi hesitated, the alcohol burning her lips, he tipped the glass forward with his index finger, so that they both swallowed their respective drinks in one gulp. He felt his lips tingle and the fresh, hot rush of spicy vodka on the back of his throat, but he never let it show. Damon could even tame himself at times.

“Thanks,” Kristi smiled, weakly. It was pathetic. And for a reason he couldn’t understand, Damon loved it. He loved the way she looked like she could cry again at any moment, and then stop her from sobbing with barely an inch of effort. This was control, order. It was, he knew in that singular moment, real power.

Damon ran his fingers gently across Kristi’s scalp, letting his digits tangle in her hair as she dozed. The rhythmic, repetitive motion had soothed Kristi enough to sleep, and Damon once again found himself hard at this incredible ability of his to take Kristi’s pain away. He shifted his crotch quietly, easing the discomfort, and decided it was best to leave her to sleep; it had been quite the day.

Downstairs, Claire had withdrawn into the corner of the sofa, huddled under a blanket with her knees drawn close to her. She eyed Damon with suspicion as he descended the stairs, making sure to return her gaze to the television before he reached the kitchen and could catch her glaring.

“She’s asleep, so I’m going to head off.”

He spoke with such levity, as if he had merely stopped by to watch over a child fall asleep; there was no indication that he had ever threatened Claire. She wanted to say something about it as he casually threw on his jacket but thought better. If they argued, they might wake Kristi up, and then he would stay even longer. Claire just wanted him out of the house.

“And hey, kiddo. What I said before?”

Claire craned her neck to where he stood in the doorway, fingers gripping the handle, half pulled down. She willed for the handle to slip all the way down, opening the door so he would drift out of it.

“I meant it,” he said. She believed him.

As soon as the door closed, Claire bolted off the sofa and pulled the deadlock to, then the chain, and finally she locked the door with the key. Visions of Damon reaching through the letter box or pushing the door open and clawing at her with a look of utter derangement flashed before her eyes as she secured the house. Catching sight of the patio door, Claire moved swiftly to lock that too, pulling on it to ensure it wouldn’t budge.

Even though the doors had been secured and she could breathe again, Claire still felt unease swirling in her stomach. Every hair was on edge, and she could feel her body ready to flee at any moment should the slightest occurrence surprise her.

Settling back onto the sofa, Claire pulled the blanket over her for comfort rather than warmth. As a child, their mum had draped such a blanket over Claire when she was unwell, bundling her into a cosy embrace. Claire felt the sentiment in the action and the softness of the blanket, but there was a hollowness where the rest of the memory should have been.

Trying to retrieve just a fragment of that feeling, Claire pulled the blanket tighter to her, sniffing it deeply in case there was a trace of her mum’s perfume still lingering in the fabric; there wasn’t. It smelt musty instead.

Holding the blanket close to her regardless, she tried to blink the sleep from her eyes for a little bit longer but succumbed to sleep anyway.

Claire began to dream about being a child again. Back then, her favourite game was to pretend she and Kristi were actresses in a play of their own making. Of course, being seven years older than her younger sister, Kristi was more an unwilling prop than a partner on the stage; she tired of the game quickly, not long after their debut performance, played out in front of their parents at the insistence of a well-meaning babysitter.

Kristi didn’t humour her sister for too much longer, though she had discovered an appetite for the spotlight. Claire continued to play pretend while Kristi joined a local drama club. Soon, she was sandwiched between her parents, forced to sit still and watch Kristi perform and clap on cue. They couldn’t do the same for Claire, couldn’t indulge in her imagination, but they could do it for Kristi.

In her dream, Claire was nineteen and nine all at once, watching Kristi bow for a performance in a show that she had never heard of before. She clapped, but her hands never seemed to touch, no matter how hard she tried to force them together. Her mother turned to her, a stern look on her face, and snapped.

“Stop being selfish! Come on, support your sister!”

Still, despite the insistence, her hands wouldn’t ever reach one another. Claire, exercising the dream’s flexible rules, tried to clamber onto the stage to show her sister her appreciation. Behind her, the audience had vanished, leaving their claps behind. Claire approached Kristi, still bowing and now holding a bouquet of roses – when had she been given those? And by whom? – only to notice something was different about her face.

Claire woke up suddenly. There was a lone tear, struggling to form, in her eye. It blurred her vision, turning the glow of the lamp beside the sofa into a thousand rain smeared stage lights. The tear melted away on the back of her hand, disappearing as suddenly as it had arrived.

***

“I’m sorry, Kristi. It’s still not good news.”

Kristi had learned not to rely on Aled for good news – not since the day he’d called to let her know the dream was over. This is my least favourite part about being an agent he had said at the time, in an attempt to blunt Kristi’s fury. It hadn’t worked, and she had screamed and cried and thrown a tantrum audible on the phone. Once the storm had died down, Kristi found herself surrounded by devastation and responsibility.

She had reached for the phone – tossed into the corner of the room – and called Aled back. He answered straight away.

“I’m sorry,” she said, voice trembling and cracked.

“This isn’t the end for you,” Aled had reassured her with his gentlest voice. “People forget and breaks happen all the time, promise.”

That had been over a year ago, and there had been no good news since. Kristi would wake some days determined that it would be different, dropping her agent a text while she made coffee or waited for the toaster. The routine was always the same. The first text would go with a smile, the phone left alone while she busied herself.

She would then go on to check it with the same frequency – after stuffing a load of washing into the machine, after getting dressed for work and while brushing her teeth, and then on her break, sometimes while she was at the bar on quiet nights.

Each time, the smile would diminish a little more and the hope would be swallowed down like a lump of broken glass in her throat.

By contrast, the replies came infrequently and without warning, though they were always predictable in their content: there were no new offers and there was no new hope. Kristi would end the day deleting the message thread, dragging herself into bed, and blindly believing that the next day would be different.

This day did indeed feel different, if only for the fact that Aled had called Kristi immediately after she had texted, prompting a scramble for her phone. It was, he had hoped, easier to deliver the news as a blanket, long-term position: nothing was happening, and her career was stalled indefinitely. Perhaps, he had suggested – calmly and kindly – it’s time to pursue other options.

Unknown to Kristi, Aled had winced on the other side of the phone, the explosive reaction from a year earlier still fresh in his mind and his eardrums. There was no explosion, however. There were no words, either. Kristi just sighed, leaning against the kitchen island while Aled spoke from the loudspeaker.

“I’m sorry, Kristi,” he added, a salve for her wounded ego. She knew he meant it.

“Thanks, Aled. For your honesty…for everything, really. You’re right. I know you’re right.”

Aled exhaled with relief; he had been sweating throughout.

“You know, not many clients say that.”

Kristi laughed, teary-eyed and tired. If anything, she was most disappointed in herself – for the mistakes, for the dedication, for the hope. Her ribs and face still ached, the weight of her lie sitting heavy in her stomach, and there was no more fight to give to anything further than what was in reach.

“I’d better go. Thanks again, Aled.”

“Anytime. If anything changes, I’ll let you know,” he added, hastily, though Kristi knew that would never be the case. Still, she thought to return the lie in kind, simply to appease.

“Appreciate it.”

With a trembling finger, Kristi ended the call. At the sink, she splashed her face, tied her hair back, and took a deep breath. Reality had hit, but it had brought an unexpected relief when it did. Kristi’s dream of stardom had always kept her poised, ready to escape her hometown. Now, the lofty dream was untethered, and she was watching it float away from a place with firm ground beneath her feet. The cracks, however, were growing.

It was lunchtime when she arrived at Foxy’s. The smell of stale beer greeted her, playing out over a soundtrack of a quiet radio. Damon spotted her from behind the bar and threw the once-white towel over his shoulder.

“Come on now, you shouldn’t be here,” he chastised.

Kristi shook her head, ponytail swinging behind her.

“I’m not here to work, don’t worry. I just really need a drink,” she sighed, dropping her house keys and handbag onto one of the bar stools, while she took the one to its left. Kristi slumped herself on the bar, waiting for a drink to be pushed in front of her. When it came, it was water. Her disappointment was obvious.

“What’s this?”

“Water. What does it look like?”

“It looks like vodka, but it doesn’t smell or,” she took a sip, “taste like it. Please Damon, I could really do with a real drink.”

Damon leaned against the bar, bringing his face close to hers. He had a charming grin painted from cheek to cheek. Kristi knew it was a look to be wary of, only a slight slip away from being an animal baring its teeth.

“You, missy, might have concussion or God knows what. But you wouldn’t go to the hospital, so I guess we won’t know until you drink too much and pass out, never to awaken. Besides, all the painkillers you’re on…”

“Should make for a good time,” Kristi muttered, bitterly. She raised the glass to her lips as Damon stood up tall over her.

“I’ll get you a drink.”

They were both surprised to see Victor appear beside Kristi. He had been at a table on the far end of the dancefloor, nursing the same pint of cider for the last hour; Damon had disregarded him not long after his arrival.

“I’m not serving,” Damon said, firmly. His mouth shrunk to a thin, angry line, and his eyes seemed to darken.

“I never said I’d get it from this dump,” Victor replied. Although he was far more confident than the last time he had butted heads with Damon, even with the bar sitting between them Victor didn’t want to linger longer than he had to. “Are you coming?”

Kristi looked Victor up and down, uncertainty carved into her furrowed brow.

“Don’t. You don’t know what he’ll do,” Damon said, his words coiled tightly. He hadn’t taken his eyes off Victor.

“I’ll take my chances,” Kristi replied, grabbing her bag from the stool before looping her arm through Victor’s. “I’ll see you later, Damon.”

Damon’s grip on the bar tightened, his hands becoming fists, which came down hard on the bar as he let out a frustrated, guttural roar. This wasn’t what he wanted.

To her surprise – and to her concern – Victor didn’t steer them to another bar along the seafront, or one in the town. Instead, he ushered her into a taxi and asked the driver to stop at a convenience store along the way. It was a small shop on the corner of a row of buildings in the town centre, and at night its garish sign would flood the street with a sickly yellow glow.

“I’ll be back,” he said, getting out of the taxi and half-jogging into the shop. Kristi caught the driver’s gaze in the rear-view mirror. They both looked down at the meter, continuing to run. He didn’t look impressed.

Within a few minutes – just as Kristi was beginning to worry that Victor wouldn’t be returning – he was back, the bulging plastic bag of bottles clanging as he cradled them. Precariously hanging between two fingers by its top was a large bottle of cheap lemonade, the label written in Polish. Victor got into the front of the car, avoiding the driver’s disapproving looks as he readjusted the goods on his lap so that he could pull the seatbelt across his body.

Some part of Kristi was thrilled. It was the middle of the day, she had no idea what lay ahead, and the drink made her hopeful that she might be able to recollect her youth for an afternoon.

The taxi pulled up on a side street that branched off from one of the main roads in the town centre. Kristi didn’t recognise the area. Behind the façade of a route she had walked so many times before was a whole cluster of small houses and their brick-walled gardens.

Victor paid the driver and collected his purchases. Kristi offered to take the lemonade at least, but he shook his head to decline.

“I’m up here,” he said, gesturing his head in the direction of a black metal staircase.

It stood out for its placement among the garden walls, winding at ninety-degree angles from street level up to a door on the first floor. She realised that the flat was above a sandwich shop that faced the main road; all this time, Victor had one of the best views – no shapeless, repetitive sea, but people in their many varieties walking by with no knowledge of being watched. She followed him up the stairs, eager to see what kind of dwelling could house a man like Victor.

“Gran is out, so we’ve got the place to ourselves,” he said, balancing the booze while he got his keys out. Not accepting any refusal, Kristi took the keys from him and let them both into the flat.

The door opened onto the kitchen, a neat space that preceded the living room, and another door beyond that. It was clear from the mixture of decorations – framed movie posters and porcelain figures; a smart home assistant and an eclectic collection of fridge magnets; the heavy aroma of lily of the valley and a collection of beer cans in the recycling – that two people of very different generations occupied one space.

Kristi had never met Victor’s grandmother. She knew very little about him, all things considered – except, of course, that he often made her sister feel small or sometimes even scared. There had been no sign of that Victor so far.

The plastic bag spilt open on the counter, having barely been able to contain the heavy glass bottles within. Victor tore it the rest of the way, splitting the bag wide open and exposing the bottles of spirits and the copious packets of crisps.

“I don’t think we can drink all this,” Kristi joked.

“We can try,” Victor replied, seriously.

He reached for the glasses in the cupboard while Kristi stood back and watched him pour their drinks. She was glad to let somebody else make a drink for her for a change.

From her vantage point, Kristi observed Victor a little more than she so often did. He was handsome in a way that seemed less confident than Damon; his facial hair was a little less well-groomed than Damon’s, and his fringe still rounded into something of a boyish curl. Kristi accepted her drink gratefully, her mind still listing the small compromises in his appearance as he touched his glass to hers, staring down sternly. He wasn’t as tall as Damon either, but he was taller than her; his plaid shirt was ill-fitting and his jeans too tight, but he did suit the outfit.

“What’s going on up there?” he asked, breaking the flow of her thoughts, his index finger lifted from the glass and pointing towards her temple.

“Nothing,” she said, holding the glass close to her, wondering if she was the only one to feel the heat swelling in the gap between them.

Victor wordlessly wandered through to the living room, and Kristi followed without instruction. She took a seat on the only sofa – a pale pink, facing a wall-mounted television – and waited as he fumbled with the stereo in the corner. Music came tumbling out of the speakers, gaining momentum as Victor turned the volume dial up. She had expected something classical or a wartime ditty, given the oversized cosy that had been placed on top of the stereo.

He joined her on the sofa.

“So, what happened?” he asked, inspecting her face closely. The bruises were still visible under her make-up.

“It’s a long story.”

“We have a lot of alcohol to drink.”

Kristi let out a short, sharp laugh, let loose by the alcoholic relaxation. She felt her whole body start to loosen, the tight knots releasing themselves as the vodka made its way into her system.

“I swear you’re never usually this fun.”

Kristi curled her legs up on the sofa and rotated her body so they could more comfortably talk. Victor let his arm rest on the back, palm flat against the cushion. They were closer than they had perhaps thought they’d ever be. For a while, they drank in silence, Kristi letting her eyes stroll about the room, investigating the evidence of another, invisible influence on the room. She spied a collection of photo frames huddled together on a small table beside a plush chair and its matching foot stool. The table also hosted a vase of dried flowers, collecting dust and sitting rigidly to one side, and beneath it was a basket of worn magazines and balls of yarn. From this, she deduced a little bit more about this unusual matching of co-habitants. Kristi could imagine the scene with clarity: nights spent in front of the television, Victor with his arms crossed gruffly on the sofa, his gran knitting in her chair only half-watching the programme she had chosen for them. As much as it amused her, there was also a pang of sorrow for Victor. He must have been lonely, she thought.

Kristi turned her head back to him and caught Victor watching her intently.

“Do you think we should talk about the other day?”

“Sorry?”

“Well, you haven’t told me what happened to your face, so maybe you feel like that’s hanging over your head.”

“I don’t feel it hanging over my head,” Kristi replied, amused at the suggestion. True, they had come close to kissing in her kitchen as his flowers wilted in a vase, and her sister wilted upstairs beneath a duvet. But nothing had happened – not for lack of trying. It was Victor who had pulled away, tearing the moment open. “But we probably should talk about it.”

“I should’ve kissed you.” It was a bold statement, and they both found themselves surprised to have it roll off Victor’s tongue so easily when it fell between them so heavily. “I know you felt it too.”

Kristi squirmed from her end of the sofa. It was true, in the moment something – the hot weather, frustration, desperation – came over her, and she had felt herself pulled to somebody who so often repulsed her. She had been present for Victor and Claire’s entire relationship, watching as her sister clung to something that had died much earlier than she had ever cared to notice.

Victor’s hand lifted from the back of the sofa to touch Kristi’s shoulder. She winced from the expectation of pain, but his touch was gentle and left the bruise that lay beneath it undisturbed.

“Victor…” she glanced down at the empty glass, sticky with residue of sugar-laden lemonade, “I need to be so much more drunk for this conversation.”

In response, Victor collected her glass and his own, and took them to the kitchen. She could hear him pouring sparing amounts of lemonade into generous measures of spirits – they had to ration the mixer, after all – and felt her pulse quicken. Did Kristi really feel so bold? No. But she felt sad, alone, and at the end of a road she had been trying to stretch out for so long that she couldn’t remember where it was supposed to lead her anymore – out of this town, yes, but where after that?

Victor returned and handed Kristi a fresh drink. She spluttered as the taste of poorly proportioned vodka stung her tongue and throat.

“So, you won’t talk about your bruises, and you won’t talk about us…”

“There is no us,” Kristi corrected.

“What should we talk about?”

“You and Claire.”

It was Victor’s turn to look uncomfortable as he slumped back onto the sofa.

“What’s going on there? Are you happy?”

Bubbles fizzed and popped on the surface of his drink, before being drowned as Victor swirled the liquid round and round in the glass. He watched the bubbles rush and dash, panicking as the tide pulled them in.

“You’re her sister.”

“No judgement here,” Kristi promised, raising her hands. He took a sip of the drink, extinguished bubbles taking the fizz with them.

“No. No, I'm not. I never thought I'd get to say that out loud... I feel like Claire needs so much and I can’t give it to her and think about myself as well. But what am I supposed to do? Her mum died.”

“And?” The response was so quick, so truthful, that Victor almost reached for his face to feel the slap it delivered. “Our mum dying doesn’t mean a damn thing if you’re not into being her boyfriend. You can still be there for her without the baggage – if you want to be, that is. You don’t owe each other anything.”

The bitterness that tinged Kristi’s words intrigued Victor. For the first time since their mother had died, he felt that there might be a kindred spirit among the twisted caricature their lives had become. It almost made Victor feel bad for what he did next.

Carefully, his grandmother’s disapproving scowl haunting him, Victor placed his glass by the foot of the sofa, before he shuffled his whole body closer to Kristi. He reached out and his fingers found their place on either side of her face. Their eyes fixed upon one another. A gentle thumb caressed the softness of Kristi’s cheek, and he glanced down at her lips for a signal. She nodded, her own glass sitting awkwardly in both hands as he pulled her closer. Their lips danced, pressed against one another. Occasionally, their tongues would meet, two lovers in flight, and the sensation sent a shudder down Victor’s body, down to the throbbing in his crotch. For Kristi, the heat built in her chest, growing as Victor left her lips and began to kiss her neck.

“Upstairs?” she whispered breathlessly as his lips continued to make their way across her neck.

He looked at her and Kristi nodded, reiterating her proposal. They both stood and Victor opened the door on the far side of the living room. Afraid to leave the moment for fear of lucidity, Kristi left her glass on the nearest surface and followed Victor through to a hallway and another door that led upstairs to a bedroom, hidden among what was once the attic. It was light and neat, wooden beams painted darker than they once were, arching over their heads.

She stormed into the room, throwing her arms around Victor, letting his hands wander lower and lower until they cupped her buttocks and pulled her whole body closer to him. He suppressed a moan as she pressed against his hardness.

Still kissing furiously, desperately, they fell onto the bed. Their clothes slipped off, one article at a time, until their bare skin – sticky with sweat and passion – made contact. Kristi looked down at Victor as she lay on top of him, her hair loose and dangling. Her hands rested against his chest, stroking the sparse hair on his torso. As a finger meandered to his nipple, his panting intensified, and she could feel him throb between her legs.

He fumbled for the drawer of the bedside cabinet and Kristi leaned over to grab a condom. She grabbed him with one hand and rolled the condom down with the other, before guiding him inside. Victor gasped and they rocked together, Kristi on top until they found a rhythm. Victor sat, wrapping an arm around Kristi’s back, speeding up the clumsy upward thrusts, before rolling her over onto her back. Above the bed, the room’s only window cast a sunspot on their writhing bodies, warming their embrace.

When it was over, the air cooled between them. Breathless, Kristi reached for the duvet, discarded in the midst of their tangling limbs. She pulled it up to cover her chest, while Victor swung his legs out of bed. He rubbed his temples in regret and retrieved the black boxers by his feet. He slipped them on and returned to his place on the edge of the bed.

Kristi heard a yawn from his side and not much else. It was a strange sensation to care so much about what Victor of all people was thinking, but she couldn’t help but wonder. Did he feel as…strange as she did?

“People think Havannah’s boyfriend did that to you, don’t they?”

Kristi froze, clinging onto the duvet as if the bed might suddenly tip and deposit her into a hole. For a brief few hours, she had been able to outrun that inconvenient lie.

“He did,” she said, with so little conviction that she didn’t even believe it herself.

“No, he didn’t. Claire told me.”

An ice-cold sensation splashed beneath Kristi’s face. Unsurprisingly, her sister had spoken up, and unsurprisingly it had been to her on-again, off-again boyfriend.

“Women like you are dangerous,” Victor said, coldly. Kristi watched his vertebrae rise and fall with his breathing. He slumped forward, holding his head in his hands. She wanted desperately to reach out, to beg him for his silence, or at the very least for them to return to the lie that they had been playing out moments earlier. “I won’t say anything.”

Should she thank him for being burdened with the truth? Kristi didn’t want to ask aloud. She took the opportunity to gather her clothes, pulling on her knickers and jeans, and clasping the bra behind her back. Out of the corner of his vision, Victor could see the patches of bruising from where the bike had made impact. Maybe that was why she didn’t want to go to hospital, Claire had said. He never replied to any of the messages, but he read every one of them over and over again.

“I’m going to call a taxi and head off. Thanks for…this,” Kristi said, gesturing around the room with her hand, top still dangling between fingers. She left through his bedroom door, pulling the garment on as she made her way hastily down the stairs.

Victor heard her leaving, the slam of the door echoing about the flat. When he knew he was alone, he got to his feet and walked over to the bookcase that stood sentinel beside his desk on the far side of the room. The middle shelf was the perfect height to observe right across the room, and it was here – balanced precariously behind a cluster of short books – that Victor had slipped his phone. He retrieved it and stopped the recording. In his ears, the sound of his heart pounding, drum-like, deafened him to the small voice coming from downstairs.

He pocketed the phone and pulled a t-shirt on before opening his bedroom door and hurrying down to the hallway below.

“Everything OK, Gran?” he asked, his voice softening at the sight of his beloved grandmother clinging to the wall with one trembling hand, while her other held onto the curved handle of a wooden walking stick.

“Did you have someone over, darling? You should’ve said, I would’ve made something for you to eat.”

“It’s OK Gran, they’ve gone now. But thank you,” he said, taking his grandma by her elbow and kissing her on the forehead. “Do you want help getting back to bed?”

“No, no,” she replied, waving a hand to stop him from fussing, though she knew her legs were too weak to take her all the way to her destination by herself. “How about the living room? We can watch the soaps together,” she suggested, and Victor nodded.

Gently, with all the care in the world, he helped his grandmother step-by-step to her chair by the television.

“Have you been drinking? I can smell it on your breath.”

“Just the one, Gran. Don’t worry about me.”

The frail woman sank back into her seat and reached for the remote sitting on the table beside her.

“You’re a good boy, Victor, but I’ll always worry about you.”

“No need, Gran,” he smiled back at her, though his eyes betrayed his real feelings.

“You can talk to me, you know," she said, quietly, pausing as the television flickered into life.

“I know. But you don’t want me talking through the soaps, do you?”

He grabbed Kristi’s half-empty glass from a nearby shelf and his own from the floor, and then made for the kitchen with the promise of putting the kettle on.

***

Damon hated Patrick’s office. The pier’s main building was an audacious spectacle, a diamond on the palm of an arm that stretched out into the sea. In the office, however, there was no trace of the grand architecture which Patrick had spent so much money on refreshing. Instead, his office was tucked away with only a small window that looked out along the water. The ceiling was low, the light was dull, and piles of paperwork crowded the many surfaces. He was surprised that a man with such a disregard for organisation could have possibly made his fortune building a business empire, while he – who filed everything away and kept his office bright – struggled.

The difference was how the men conducted themselves. Patrick had taken this room and saved the glass and the natural light for the pier’s visitors. He had made his office cosy too, a great Ficus Lyrata spreading its greenery from one corner, while photographs – of his family, of the pier, and of the town – almost covered the wall closest to the door.

Damon, on the other hand, had left Foxy’s to become dim and faded, the light restricted to what the door let in. His office, painted in bright white with black furniture and a whole row of windows – their frames also black – gave a different impression.

“Thanks for coming, Damon. Have a seat.”

He entered hesitantly, already overwhelmed by the discord; he could see the dust frosting the picture frames as they clung to the wall. Patrick’s own chair faced another across from it, a hard, wooden thing that Damon struggled to sit on without his leg numbing.

Regardless, he took a seat and folded his one leg across the other’s knee, clinging to the back of the chair. He looked uncomfortable, but he had found it to be the only way to cope sitting on a chair that felt almost mocking in its humility.

“Not at all, Patrick. What can I do for you?”

He noticed the concern on the older man’s face, the usual sharpness in his eyes dulled by tiredness and worry. Patrick removed his glasses and massaged the bridge of his nose tenderly, a small effort to loosen the tension that had been building in his body for weeks.

“Havannah raised some concerns the staff had. They haven’t been paid. You were supposed to put that money back, Damon. It was a loan.”

Patrick replaced his glasses and folded his hands together on the desk.

“A loan to our venture, Patrick – which still hasn’t kicked off yet.”

“I’ll have to replace the money myself, but we can’t progress with some of the more costly repairs needed. From here on out we need to be far more sensible in how we proceed. I need guarantees that everything is under control.”

Patrick spoke like a father on the verge of expressing his disappointment, offering one last reprieve before delivering such a blow. It had not gone unnoticed by Damon that his words had been pushed aside, batted away like a child’s excuses.

“I understand. I’ll handle it.”

“Thank you, Damon. I’d hate for this venture of ours to sink before it’s even gotten off the ground.”

“Like I said, I’ll handle it. We just need a cash injection. I just need you to trust me.”

Patrick let his stern, fatherly exterior crack, the light of a smile escaping.

“I trust you, Damon. I suspect we’re onto something good here.”

“Pleasure doing business with you, Patrick,” the younger man said, getting to his feet and offering a hand. Patrick mirrored him as they exchanged a firm handshake over the desk.

A knock on the door interrupted them. Damon let go and straightened his collar.

“Come in,” Patrick said, lowering himself back onto the leather chair that had once belong to his father.

Havannah appeared in the doorway, bringing with her a trickle of brightness from the corridor.

“Is this a bad time?” she asked, looking to Damon.

“Not at all. Damon was just on his way out.”

“Good to see you, Havannah. Patrick – I’ll see you later with good news.”

Damon left them alone, glad simply to be leaving the claustrophobic room behind. He closed the door and took the light with him.

“What can I do for you sweetheart? And before you ask, we've solved the pay issue – an error on the system. You know what that new-fangled software is like. It was much easier – and more reliable – when people did your books for you.”

Havannah didn’t match her dad’s levity. An aura of dismay hung heavy on her shoulders.

“It’s not that, dad. It’s Ronan.”

“Ronan?”

“My…friend. I told you about him. He and his brother run the ring toss game.”

A spark of recognition lit up Patrick’s face. He was never very good at remembering the names of Havannah’s friends and was even worse if the friend happened to be a boy.

“Oh, the gypsy lad?”

A prickle of anger jolted along Havannah’s spine.

“Dad. Don’t…don’t call him that. Come on, think about what we get called,” she lectured, looking from her father’s ebony skin to her own. “Don’t be like them.”

“I didn’t mean anything by it, sweetheart!” Patrick protested, raising his hands in mock surrender. He tried again “Carnival folk? Traveller?”

“It doesn’t matter, dad. None of that matters. He’s in trouble. Kristi…Kristi’s made a false accusation about him attacking her and he needs help. He’s been arrested.”

“Did he do it?”

Havannah shot her dad a look.

“No, he didn’t. They’ve got him on some bullshit charge because he ran.”

“Well, why did he run?”

Havannah didn’t answer. She dropped her head to stare at her feet instead.

“It’s because his…sort…don’t talk to the police, do they? Not if they can help it. So really, it does matter what he is.”

Patrick had been looking down his nose, where his spectacles had slipped to, his eyebrows raised. When Havannah didn’t respond, he was reminded of her childhood and the stubborn little girl who wouldn’t tell him which girls had been picking on her at school; she had tapped her feet together, staring at the floor then too. Patrick took the spectacles off altogether and started afresh.

“What would you have me do?”

Havannah raised her head, hopeful.

“He can’t afford a solicitor.”

“They’ll assign him one.”

“They won’t be any good.”

Patrick exhaled, exasperated. He had been worried the conversation might lead here, and so it was with great care that he chose his next words.

“I can’t afford it. Not right now. My money’s tied up in this investment with Damon.”

“Which you still haven’t told me about,” Havannah interrupted, eyes narrowing. “I’ve felt less like your partner in all this as the summer’s gone on. I don’t know anything happening up here anymore – you used to tell me everything.”

Patrick scoffed harder than he meant to, then cleared his throat in an attempt to recant the impression that he was mocking her. He could see though, written all over her determined face and tied up in the so-called angry knot between her eyebrows, that Havannah had been singing from a different hymn sheet this whole time.

“Havannah…petal, you aren't my business partner. You're my daughter and, I suppose, my employee. That’s all. I’m thankful for everything you’ve done. Really, I am. But you’re nineteen and all of this is far more complicated than you’re ready for.”

Havannah said no more. There was nothing to say, and if she had moved her lips, only a whimper would have escaped, followed by a great deluge that would drown them both in harsh words she didn’t mean but would say just to make her father feel how she did in that moment - small and unimportant.

Instead, Havannah rose and quietly left the room. Patrick let her go.

***

By the time Kristi had realised her house keys were not in her bag – rather, they were on the bar stool in Foxy’s – the taxi had already left Victor’s. It had picked her up from the main road, where she had waited beneath the window of Victor’s flat; now she knew he could spy the street’s goings-on, she wanted to stay out of sight.

The taxi driver was an older man, long past patience for the flightier customers; when Kristi had asked for a detour down to the seafront to collect her keys, he had sighed.

The rest of the short trip unfolded in silence. To avoid any further awkwardness, Kristi relieved the driver of his duty outside of Foxy’s – which only seemed to infuriate him further. She made sure to tell him he could keep the change, thought the crumpled tenner was barely consolation.

The club was still open, serving the odd day drinker huddled in the dark. Kristi made a beeline for the office, already sure that Damon would have found the keys and held onto them. This is why she kept a watchful eye on him; his tactics were too obvious.

The door to Damon’s office swung open without warning. Damon glared at her from behind his desk, phone to his ear while he talked numbers and premiums and pay outs. His spare hand mercilessly squeezed a stress toy.

“I’ll call you back, Alistair. Something’s come up.”

Damon put the phone down and left his desk to wind around Kristi and push the door to.

“What can I help you with?” he asked, folding his arms and leaning back against the desk.

“I left my keys here,” Kristi said, the air having left her sails once Damon had passed her.

He playfully turned his head around, scanning his desk for them.

“Oh, these?” he said, pulling them from his pocket by the novelty keychain of a white cat. He let them dangle there.

“Thanks.”

Kristi went to take them from him, only for Damon to move the keys out of reach. She tried again, but this time he grabbed her wrist as it moved in front of him.

“Did you fuck him?” he snarled, taking Kristi by surprise.

“What?”

“You heard me. Did you fuck him? I do so much for you – I look after you – and you give me fucking nothing.”

“You’re hurting me,” Kristi said, trying to loosen his grip on her arm. “Let me go, Damon.”

“You don’t even fucking look at me. Look at me! Look me in the fucking eye, Kristi!” he spat.

Fear rushed from her face, where she felt the warmth of his furious breath, right down to her feet, weakening every joint as it went. Afraid of what might happen if she disobeyed, Kristi met Damon’s gaze, staring into the dark green that curled around his pupils.

He yanked her around the desk to a drawer, refusing to relinquish her grip as he pulled a file from a drawer beneath his laptop’s perch. It spilled open as it collided with the surface of the desk and Kristi could see architectural plans and numbers – none of it made sense to her.

“This is what I’m building for you – for us.”

“I…I don’t know w-what this is,” Kristi stammered, afraid of his reaction to her ignorance.

“It’s a hotel. Sixty-seven per cent of tourists don’t stay here – they stay out of town. The rest are relegated to grotty bed and breakfasts. This hotel will be a new beginning for the whole town, and for you and me. I can look after you. You’ll never have to work.”

“I-I don’t want that,” Kristi yelled, finally able to break free of his grip while he was distracted by painting the future he had dreamt for them. He looked heartbroken. Kristi massaged the red skin that encircled her wrist and looked at him with pity and confusion.

“I love you, Kristi. I love you. I-I’ve always loved you. You’re different to all those people out there.”

“You’re not.” The words came faster than she could stop them.

Prompted by the anger creeping into Damon’s expression, Kristi began to back away, manoeuvring out of the way just as he lunged for her. She broke into a run across the office, but Damon was faster. He slammed the door shut just as she opened it.

“You didn’t find this hard when it was him,” Damon said, pointing to the bruises. Kristi looked back at him, perplexed.

“What? You know that never happened. I told you,” she said, backing up against the door.

“We can pin a lot on the gypsy.”

Damon closed in on Kristi, and her heart threatened to explode from her chest. Overwhelmed with panic and fuelled by the sudden urge to not simply stay adrift while life happened to her, Kristi jerked her knee. It connected with the softness between Damon’s legs, crumpling him in pain. By the time he could attempt to grab Kristi again, she was already halfway down the stairs, bursting out into the club and onto the street.

“KRISTI!” he yelled from the window, his voice threatening to shatter the glass. “GET BACK HERE!”

Kristi didn’t look behind her as she fled. If she had, she would have seen Damon for what he really was: a powerless man grasping for a woman just out of reach, furious to have found something untameable after all.

***

Despite the clash with her father, Havannah remained dedicated to the pier. She finished the rest of her shift, flitting between food vendors, snatching small smatterings of conversation with Simon – accompanied for the day by one of his uncles, a gruff man in his fifties who simply bowed his cap by way of introduction – and noting the repairs still outstanding.

It was the last item that brought her to the far corner of the pier, back to the bulging wood that marked the spot where she had first met Ronan.

The bright yellow ‘wet floor’ signs she’d erected as a makeshift deterrent had blown over in the wind again. Havannah stood them upright, rearranging them in an almost ritualistic fashion so that they encircled the blessed spot where they had crossed paths. She hadn’t heard anything yet, and although she didn’t expect him to use his one phone call on her, Havannah couldn’t help but wonder who he would’ve called instead. It hadn’t been his brother, Simon had revealed during one of their brief conversations.

“He probably called mum to let her know he’s OK,” Simon theorised, passing a new batch of players more plastic hoops while his uncle hooked a great stuffed tiger and lowered it from the hanging place above their heads.

“I just hope they let him go soon. Surely they can’t charge him with anything? Nothing that’ll stick, anyway.”

When the late afternoon started to roll into early evening, the pier started to empty. Havannah watched as the shutters came down on the food stalls, and Simon packed the game up with his uncle silently assisting.

Havannah returned to the bulging plank. They couldn’t hold Ronan without charge for much longer, and he would be back on the pier tomorrow, standing on this spot with her. She closed her eyes and inhaled the sea air, as if it might clear out all the feelings sticking to her insides, thick and clotting.

She waved Simon and his uncle goodbye – the man once again lowering his cap to signal his departure – and sauntered down to the pier’s gates. She would leave one of the caretakers to lock up once it was late enough. In the meantime, Havannah could enjoy the quiet of pacing the pier with couples and office workers escaping their sweaty commute for some fresh air and a bag of chips by the sea. The collection of people that visited in this pocket of time were different, kin almost. They existed only in the twilight moments between day and night, each of them enjoying being able to hear the waves lapping below, dragging the sand back into the sea, rather than the screams of children and rattling of fairground rides.

Havannah was leaning against the barrier, enjoying the warmth of the sun on her skin, when Victor approached.

“Havannah. Can I talk to you?”

She turned, surprised at the interloper in her private moment. Suddenly, she recalled the sight of Victor and the stranger beneath the pier, the memory shrinking in the face of Ronan's ordeal.

“Is this about the other night?”

Victor motioned for her to follow him. Reluctantly, she did, making sure to maintain a short distance between them as he led her to the pier’s entrance.

“Where are we going?” she tried asking, but Victor didn’t answer. He turned right onto the street and then right again, down the sandstone steps to the beach.

At the foot of the steps, Havannah hesitated. Her trainers wouldn’t offer much protection from the waterlogged sand left behind by the tide, and Victor was walking purposefully beneath the pier. He glanced behind her and jolted his head again in the direction he wanted her to follow.

Gritting her teeth, Havannah delicately jumped to position herself on the dry sand as much as possible, using the wall as a guide to the great iron supports beneath the pier. As she got close, Victor held out a hand. Rather than helping her to balance, however, he pulled her forcefully towards him, discarding her against the wall.

“What the fuck, Victor?” she snapped, the back of her t-shirt wet with seaweed residue; now she stank like the wet ripeness that repelled so many curious beachgoers, who would hurry under the pier with breaths held captive.

“Look,” he demanded, lifting the phone to show Havannah footage she didn’t understand at first. Then, as the shapes and the sound of moans – which echoed around the columns and against the strengthened pier frame – began to make sense, Havannah realised what she was seeing.

“What the fuck is this, Victor? Why are you showing me…porn?” she recoiled in disgust.

Victor grew desperate, thrusting the phone closer to her.

“It’s me. It’s me and Kristi. We’re having sex... I’m not gay,” he exclaimed, voice shaking and face desperate.

“I never said you were,” Havannah shot back, shoving the phone from his hand. “And I also don't care one way or another. Whatever sick insecurity made you fuck your girlfriend’s sister and film it just to show me isn’t my problem, Victor.”

Havannah motioned to leave, but Victor blocked her.

“It is now,” he said, lowering the hand holding the phone, his lips grimacing, eyes narrowing. “If you tell anyone – and I mean anyone – they won’t believe you. They’ll think you made it up just to get back at Kristi.”

“Nobody would believe that,” Havannah spat back.

“They believed Kristi,” Victor said, face inches from hers, desperate to intimidate. He had miscalculated, however.

“What do you mean?" Havannah asked, brow furrowed and eyes searching his face for the crack through which that confession slipped. "Are you saying she made it up?”

Victor backed up in surprise, his cheeks flushing red.

“You fucking know something don’t you?”

“Women like you are dangerous,” came the little voice, still playing from the phone.

Victor went to switch it off, but Havannah grabbed the device from his hands and ran across the sinking sand. The beach tried to swallow her whole, sucking the soles of her feet into the still-wet sand. Her pursuer didn’t fare much better, though his stride was still longer than Havannah’s. Realising this, Havannah stopped and turned where she was, trainers sinking into the beach face, phone held up in the air. She was tired of running. Victor stopped, out of breath and legs splattered in wet sand.

“Havannah, please. Give it back," he asked, an awkward eye roaming up to the street above them, watching for witnesses.

“Why did you say she was a dangerous woman?” Havannah demanded, loud enough so that the pedestrians above them might hear should she need any help – if they decided to come, that is.

“Fuck!” Victor exclaimed, crouching down into a squat, head in his hands. He dragged them across his visage, bringing them to a prayer position at his lips, asking for forgiveness. The water soaked the bottom of his jeans. “She lied. Kristi made it up. Claire told me.”

“Claire knows?” Havannah roared.

“And Damon, I think. He was there when they found out.”

“Does Envy know? In fact, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. You’re all snakes," Havannah spat. "I can’t fucking believe this!”

To passing observers, Havannah was a tyrannical girlfriend bemoaning her boyfriend, offering penance on his knees. She lowered the phone in front of his face. The screen had darkened now, showing only the glaring reflection of the sky.

“Unlock it,” she demanded. “Or I’ll tell everybody you’ve been spending your summer sucking cock beneath the pier.”

“What are you going to do?” he asked, finger hovering over the screen. She could see the fear in his eyes. Perhaps it had been there all along, hiding behind the rage and the snarky comments and the rough treatment.

“I’m going to send this video to Claire, and to Kristi, and to myself so I can show the police Kristi confessing. And then,” Havannah lowered herself to Victor’s level. “Then you’re going to get the fuck out of my town. And if I see you here again, I’ll string you up to the pier myself.”

Victor moved to lash out, but Havannah was one step ahead, thrusting the phone once again into his face.

“Do it. Now.”

A couple paused at street level, watching the sea - and the scene - beyond the sandstone wall. Victor saw them and relented. He obeyed, keying in his passcode and unlocking the screen. He dropped his head in defeat. Havannah selected the video and lined up its recipients.

“You wanted people to believe you weren’t gay. Now they will. And you can live with the consequences.”

The words leaving Havannah’s mouth weren’t hers, she could tell; they were hollow and alien. They didn't belong to her, nor the minor celebrity taking the stage on the night of the fireworks, nor the girl who still took flowers to her mum's grave. There was no satisfaction for her in seeing Victor like this, knees sinking into the sand, tears staining his face as his shoulders jolted in time with his stifled sobbing. In the early days of his relationship with Claire, Havannah had considered Victor to be quiet and stoic. She hadn't known him in the intervening years aside from the odd encounter or some second-hand news, but she hadn't expected him to be here like this in front of her, so easily humbled.

Havannah’s thumb hovered over the ‘send’ button. One quick movement would burn down so much of what troubled her, letting the snakes loose to eat themselves and each other. And yet…she looked down at Victor and pitied him. Whatever he was, he was clearly desperate to conceal it.

A memory flashed into Havannah’s view, the same trembling feeling as her finger hovered over another ‘send’ button, in another life, only that time it had been Kristi’s posts and an act of war she could never rescind. There had been too much bloodshed already. She turned the screen off and handed the phone back to him.

“I’m not doing this again. I don’t need to lower myself. I haven’t sent it,” she said, as Victor scrambled to unlock the phone and check the damage done. Relief flooded him and before he knew what he was doing, he had leapt up and embraced Havannah, apologising and thanking her in choked breaths. Her hands separated them.

“The only person you ever need to convince of anything, Victor, is yourself. Figure your shit out,” she said, turning her back to him and heading up the sandstone steps and onto the seafront, where the curious onlookers dispersed once they knew they’d been noticed gawping at the scene.

Victor stayed rooted to the spot, stuck to the shore, waiting for the tide to return and sweep him away. Havannah was right – more so than she might have even realised. Victor had found himself surrounded by vipers, attempting to play the same complicated games they played with one another. But he couldn’t keep up. An attempt to be smart and calculating had been made, and he had failed; they spoke a different language, one of riddles and subterfuge, and he couldn't make sense of it. So instead of trying, he decided, standing alone on a beach in a town he never wanted to be in, living a lie – for the sake of what, reputation? – to pack a bag and leave.

But not before he’d pressed ‘send’ on the video, salting the earth behind him as he went.

***

From the perimeter of the graveyard, it was possible to see the edge of the world – or so Kristi had always believed. The horizon had marked the limit of her own world for so long, why shouldn’t it be true?

In the distance, the sun burnt the shoreline, loose embers flickering on the crest of the waves dancing below. It was hypnotising to watch.

“I like to come here too,” said Envy as she came to a stop beside the young woman.

Kristi wrapped her open hoodie closer around her body. “Claire mentioned you weren’t at home, so I thought I’d check here. She’s worried about you.”

“I don’t need her to worry about me. I’m fine.”

Envy watched as Kristi wiped her face, soaking the edge of her hoodie’s arms. She sniffed and crossed her arms. There was a tremor in her hands.

“Are you OK?” Envy ventured, instinctively placing a palm on Kristi’s back and proceeding to rub it in a circular motion.

“I’m sick of this fucking town.”

“Maybe you need to get away for a little bit?” Envy offered, though the advice sounded flat and inconceivably small in the face of Kristi’s many woes.

“I can’t afford to go anywhere, Kristi admitted, feeling even more sorry for herself as she said it. "It’s bad enough that you’re leaving – who’ll look after Claire if I left too?”

“Maybe...maybe it’s time to let Claire look after herself for a change,” Envy suggested, returning her hand to her side. Kristi missed the touch.

She turned to look at Envy’s squat face and tanned skin, letting her eyes drink in the sight of how the younger woman looked at her with care and the love of a sister. This might be the last time she could say Envy respected her.

“I fucked up, Envy. I need to change; I know I do.”

“Hey now, what’s brought this on?” Envy asked, mimicking all the adults she’d ever encountered who tried to meet a child’s crying or tantrums with placating words that had no real response.

“I-I lied to the police,” she began, too tired and too sad to form more than dregs of tears that silently leaked across her cheeks.

“Stop," Envy interjected, quickly and firmly. She stepped away. "I don’t want to know.”

Kristi was stunned into silence. It wasn’t the response she had expected.

“Sorry?”

“Just don’t, please. If you tell me something like that, you make me an accomplice. I’m sorry, Kristi.”

A wall had been reached; Kristi could feel it. Before her stood a person who would not allow Kristi’s sadness to encroach upon her life; the rot couldn’t reach Envy, the cracks beneath her feet recoiling from Envy’s stance.

“Let’s just watch the sunset a little longer and not saying anything more about it.”

Kristi was stunned into silence. She tried to stifle her crying, even as the sniffling grew momentarily louder.

“Does Claire know? Whatever it is you’ve told the police. Does Claire know the truth?”

Kristi nodded, “And Damon.”

His name tasted like ash on her tongue, but she let it pass if only to incriminate him in the conspiracy she had spun on a whim, all to hurt Havannah for misdeed Kristi was starting to think she deserved.

“I’d better go.”

The younger woman turned to go, hands resting loosely in the pockets of her own checkered hoodie.

“Envy, please.”

“It’s OK, Kristi. I’ll text you in the morning,” Envy promised, half-heartedly as she turned to leave, never looking Kristi in the face.

In time, Envy would regret that moment, revisiting it on occasion, trying to imagine Kristi’s expression had she acted differently. It would be hopeful at somebody showing her kindness at her lowest ebb, Envy was sure. But she would never know, and it would break her heart.

As Kristi watched her surrogate sister leave, she felt a buzz in her pocket. Her phone lit up in her hand. One new message, it read. She tapped the notification and then the attachment, squinting as the video started, a blur of movement and limbs. The horror crept in slowly, freezing her veins and reaching all the way up to her face, her jaw open and rigid as she watched her and Victor having sex. Using her index finger, Kristi skipped ahead, capturing the final conversation. Held to her ear, the phone gave away her secret to anybody who had sat through the lurid scene.

The world slanted ever so slightly, the horizon seeming to tilt and vanish in the distance. Kristi clung onto a nearby headstone as her legs gave way. She vomited, acidic panic splashing against the worn headstone and onto the grass.

All at once, she felt the crushing overwhelm of disaster smashing her against the rocks. In such a short amount of time, Kristi had lost everything; her relationships had imploded, her career was finished, and her dreams of escape were dead in the water.

Soon, Kristi would be dead too – sooner than expected and crowned by the reflections of flames as the water kept her body afloat beneath a burning pier. And it would be Envy – who had not taken care to remember her face during their last meeting, to memorise the pattern of her skin and the colour of her eyes – who looked upon Kristi’s pale, beautiful face as it was pulled to shore, identifying Kristi by the screams of her name.

None of the bystanders watching would know who she was or recognise the name, her star long since dimmed. Kristi’s life – the brief teenaged fame, the potential of the path she never took, all the impact she had on the world – would burn like the pier, gone in a flash, all used up. Just a memory of a different summer that had to end.