Exposure by Talitha Stevenson

us?'
    'Oh, fuck you.'
    'Fuck
you.
What makes you think it's OK for you to stand on a table and kick glasses on the floor? When did you get a letter from fucking
God
saying it was OK for you to do that? No one else did. I never got that letter.'
    He sounded Dutch. It was an Americanized Euro voice. His sense of the dramatic had obviously been acquired from action films: it was lead-weighted with portentousness that no real-life circumstances could have fulfilled. His posture was studied, dumbbell refined. But you could have had nothing but respect for the breadth of his shoulders.
    Luke turned abruptly to the friend he was standing with at the bar. 'Is that Andy Jones?' he said.
    The DJ let one tune recede and another take over, and the dancing became faster in the background.
    'Who? Where?'
    'That guy. By the table behind us—with the girl on it. Andy Jones.'
    'Andy Jones...'
    'That
guy. The one on the right, in front of the door. You must be able to see him.'
    'I can
see
him, Luke, I just can't remember who the fuck Andy Jones is. Do I know him? Is he famous?'
    'We were at fucking school with him. Didn't he, like, act or something? Something artistic and vaguely poncy. Was it the choir? You did all that stuff. I
know
you remember Andy Jones.'
    What was Andy Jones doing with that incredible girl? It was against nature somehow. Not that he was with her—just near her, really. She was an independent figure in the scene.
    Arianne would always give him that impression—even much later, when she angled the mirror so they could see themselves making love on the bedroom floor. He watched her watching herself, analysing her own performance. He felt fascinated and lonely. Was Narcissus drawn to his own reflection as much out of fear of others as love of himself?
    In spite of her beauty there was little genuine conceit in Arianne. Her self-obsession was born of alienation, of the early disappointment of realizing her parents had an 'open marriage' and that the word 'love' was liable to interpretation by sophisticated minds. Her consultations of all reflective surfaces were made with the intention of reinforcing self-sufficiency. Arianne feared that she could not surrender herself to dependence on another person, no matter what superficial trappings of it she allowed to exist. In fact, she was increasingly aware that the superficial trappings—financial, practical—were merely conjuror's diversions she had developed over the years. These were ultimately destined to fail in convincing both her and the men she chose.
    'So, I think I'll go over,' Luke said.
    'You think you'll go over. Right. What for, exactly?'
    'To say hi to Andy Jones.'
    'Oh, I
see!
    'So, back in a minute, OK?'
    'Luke?'
    'Yes?'
    'I'll bet you a million quid that big one's her boyfriend.'
    Luke grinned and finished his drink. 'Look, this is Andy Jones we're talking about. I can't miss an opportunity like this.'
    'Yes. What you can't do is chat up girls who are plainly insane and who are obviously
with other men!
    'I know that. I do know that,' he said.
    He put down his glass and turned to move off towards the table, but before he could, something else was said—something quiet between the two men—and the big man knocked Andy Jones off his feet.
    It was a perfectly timed right hook to the jaw; a punch Dan had always affectionately termed his 'classic'. The atmosphere in the bar changed immediately. It liquefied. A wave of bar staff crashed at the edge of the bar and the distinction between dancers and drinkers dissolved as people stopped moving. 'Where? Where?' they said to one another as they strained to see what had happened. They wanted a bit of blood, a bit of human drama to mark out this evening among all the others. The strobe light was more apparent, slower and more sinister without the dancing. For a moment it was like cold, flashing moonlight, bouncing off all the hard surfaces—the glasses and table edges, the geometric aluminium