Page 63 of Undefined Terms

She sees me, waves, comes over.

‘Ronan! Hi.’

Then she clocks Celyn, the stubble, the blouse, the glasses, and something stutters in her face.

Half a second.

The smile holds.

The eyes don’t know where to land, so they land back on me like that’s easier. Like I’m the part of the table she understands.

‘This is Celyn,’ I say.

I put the name down on the table. On purpose, the way you set a level on a surface and wait for it to read true.

Steph’s eyes go to Celyn. Half a second, the same half second as before. Then back to me. She doesn’t take the name. Sets it aside like a word in a language she’s decided not to learn.

‘Didn’t know you came here.’

‘Most nights.’

She pulls a chair from the next table without asking and sits angled at me, shoulder turned away from the laptop. Not rude exactly, worse than rude. Like Celyn’s just someone working nearby and she’s making sure the conversation knows it.

‘Quiz fell through,’ she says, before I’ve asked. ‘Thought I’d have one anyway. Saw your head through the window.’

Saw your head through the window. So not the door’s fault she’s here. Hers.

She laughs and fixes a strand of hair that didn’t need fixing.

Celyn’s hands still on the keyboard. Not typing now.

Steph talks about the site, the steel, the pour. Fast at first, then slower when I answer, because she’s got me answering. Her knee goes under the table. Not accidental. Close enough that I have to move mine or not move mine and both options are a thing. Gaz’s girlfriend’s knee. Gaz not in the room.

I move mine. Away. Look at Celyn while I do it, the glasses, the jaw, the stubble shadow. Can’t say it. Not to Steph, not out loud, not yet. But the leg’s already decided. The leg knew before I did.

She’s Gaz’s girlfriend. That’s the first wall, and the one I can put a hand on: you don’t, not to one of the lads. Simple.

The other wall I don’t say out loud. A year ago I’d have taken Steph, if she were free, because she’d have asked nothing of me. And the knee does nothing. A woman’s knee on mine and it’s furniture. Three feet off there’s a pencil between someone’s teeth and a pair of glasses, and that’s where all the air in the room went. No pull. Not a flicker. Eyes for the one not even looking my way.

She doesn’t say hello to Celyn.

Not because she hasn’t noticed. Because she has.

‘You on your own?’ she asks.

I look at her.

The question sits there, stupid and bold, with Celyn’s mug beside mine and Celyn’s laptop open between us.

‘No.’

‘Oh.’ Another laugh. Smaller. ‘Sorry, I meant—’ She doesn’t finish it. The eyes flick to Celyn and away again, quick as a dropped tool. ‘There’s a table free by the window. Bit more room?’

There it is.

Not us needing room.

Her wanting me in a place where Celyn isn’t.