Flagging
The tables are sticky, the alcohol is flowing, the sun is pulsing. In this moment, June feels suspended in the summer. There is life, and then there is this. Jean shorts and a short-sleeved shirt. Her nose is filled with the half sweet, half sour scent of suncream mixing with cigarette smoke. The pub garden is loud and filled with happy people with their arms and legs out.
Sitting across from her, Ettie’s talking with her hands and her eyes, all of these gestures. June wants desperately: to kiss her, to not fear kissing her. June does nothing, watches Ettie instead and itches at her own inaction. Thinks about kissing her and how she ought to kiss her. Thinks about that lesbian couple who were attacked on a bus a few years back. She can see the blood in the heat of her closed eyelids when she blinks. Thinks about Ettie turning away when June leans in. It’s too hot- June’s already made sweaty by the muggy air- the sweat from her anxiety drips down her spine and blends in with her damp clothes.
Ettie’s got a routine down: sip of beer, talk talk talk, toke of cigarette, inhale, talk through the exhale, ash it out, repeat. There’s no pause in that for June to kiss her, anyway.
June is at the pub and feels like half a person. She’ll have what you’re having. She’ll agree with what you’re saying. The weather was grim today. God, yeah, absolutely. The music inside is loud- she has tinnitus, she can’t hear a word you’re saying. Nodding along like a bobble head, her teeth clattering with the force of her smile. Totally, completely agree, you’re so right. Movements sharp like she’s trying to jolt something, anything, any kind of substance back into herself. She’ll set the glass down hard on the table after every sip just to remind herself she’s capable of noise. She calls herself an active listener, but it’s really just an excuse to say naught and get tipsy in the corner. And sure, maybe three pints in, you might get a word out of her, but before that, it’s all empty air. She’s too busy checking how much you’ve drunk, and sinking her beer down to the same line in the glass that yours is currently at. Has her eyeliner bled down her cheeks? There are a group of men looking at her across the pub- turn away- back to humming and smiling and desperately trying to think of something to say. God, her skin is crawling- she scratches at a nonexistent itch on her wrist, all casual like. Her turn to get the next pint? Perfect. She can go and stand at the bar, stand awkwardly behind loud laughing people in suits until it’s her turn to call her order across the bartop, stand awkwardly as the Guinness sits and settles, dither over whether she should give a 50p tip, or whether that’s just insulting. Leave a tip anyway. Nab the glasses, shuffle slowly back to the table, spill the head of one down her hand, debate licking it up. No, don’t do that. Set them down, breathe. Take another sip. Wipe the foam on her upper lip away with the back of her hand.