Afterwards by Rachel Seiffert Page B

of the summer. Four of them in a taxi, going back to the hotel: civilian vehicle, civilian clothes. Three small boys at the side of the road, couldn’t have been more than six years old: hard little faces, spitting, giving them the finger as they were passing.
    Joseph drove off the estate. Been a while since he’d remembered anything like that too, but it was more the kind of memory he was used to. Stones thrown, people staring, mums shielding their babies from you, like you were infected or dirty. Didn’t matter if you weren’t inuniform, there was no getting away: even on leave, everyone knew who you were, even the kids. Was a time he’d have had to stop the van, hands useless, feet shaking on the pedals. Not today, though. It was just that feeling that stayed with him: years gone by and still no escaping.

 
    Alice called Joseph again at the end of the week. Still just the machine doing the answering, so she hung up. Called her mum a few hours later, not intending to talk about Joseph, but she ended up doing so anyway.
    – It’s too bloody stupid, this. I feel like an idiot. Adolescent. Waiting for some spotty boy to phone me.
    It was a relief to laugh at herself with someone. Her mum said:
    – Maybe he’s in bed. I don’t answer the phone when I’m ill.
    – No, he’s fobbing me off. He doesn’t pick up if he doesn’t want to, I’ve seen him do it. Just lets it ring and gets on with whatever he’s doing.
    – Are you a bit in love with this one, maybe?
    – Not today I’m not.
    – Sounds to me like you are, sweetheart.
    – I think he’s a wanker.
    – Well, in that case, so do I.
    Alice had to laugh again, properly this time, and it helped that Martha agreed with her later too:
    – If he’s being a berk, you just have to ignore him until he stops.
    Alice thought of the days, weeks even, that Keith and Martha could be angry with each other and still stay together, and it was comforting. She took her mother’s advice and went out with Martha, to the pub first and then a late show. They queued too long for coffee and chocolate and sat down a few scenes in. Alice couldn’t get interested in the film and irritated herself again thinking about Joseph instead, how much she’d liked being with him. She wouldn’t be the first to confuse sex with something else, but it still made her flinch: to think that’s what it might amount to, just the familiarity that comes from knowing someone’s body. Should know better than to trust that. Patients would sometimes tell her the most intimate things, all about their childhoods, their divorces and bereavements. Because we touch them, that’s what Clare said: they put themselves in our hands. Alice thought of the past weeks with Joseph and all that she’d told him. Too much, probably. You can go too far with people .
    Alice had told her mum that she was writing to her father, but they’d never really discussed the letters.
    – I’m sorry, Mum.
    – Don’t be, love. None of my business really.
    She was patient like that, her mother: Alice thought maybe it had been enough for her to know they’d made contact, and that the letters were ongoing. Martha got to recognise the envelopes after a while, and she used to slip them under Alice’s door instead of leaving them on the kitchen table if she picked up the post downstairs. Alice had thought she would talk about it with all of them later: her mum and Gran, Martha and Clare too, once there was something to talk about properly.But then it was all over, when it had just got going, and telling anyone had seemed too difficult. Joseph had sat quietly for the most part and let her get on with it, but he’d wanted to hear, and there was no pretending with him either: you can’t blame him for turning his back? He was right: it had been daft to make out she wasn’t hurt by her father’s absence, or that she understood it. In theory, yes, but Joseph could see that’s all it was. He had been teasing her, but he’d