Now Showing by Ron Elliott Page A

said...’
    â€˜Not nice guys.’
    She nodded, got it. She looked around the room. Someone laughed, but most had gone back to talking. She was embarrassed and blinking and blushing and she made me smile.
    â€˜I’ll get your blouse,’ I said and went out into the kitchen. When I got back my coat was folded on the table and she was walking out the front door. I went after her.
    Someone yelled, ‘Let her go, man. Too high maintenance.’
    A girl yelled, ‘I won’t yell at you after.’
    Outside I yelled, ‘Hey. Your blouse.’
    She turned. She was still embarrassed. She looked at her blouse in my hand and said, ‘It’s clean.’
    â€˜I washed it.’
    â€˜You washed it?’
    â€˜It was pretty pongy.’
    â€˜You washed my blouse?’
    She looked up at me and smiled. It was delicate and hopeful and maybe a little scared, like I’d saved her puppy from drowning and given it the kiss of life.
    â€˜In the sink,’ I said. ‘I mean I didn’t soak it in lavender and dry it on the French Riviera and iron it atop the Himalayas or anything.’
    She laughed. The lines went away from around her eyes.
    â€˜Zac, if you don’t leave your love-life at home and get in here and start serving the customers, I will fire your arse!’ yelled Mike from the front door.
    She stopped smiling.
    â€˜He won’t fire me.’
    â€˜Anyway, sorry about the tirade.’ Still not smiling.
    â€˜Wanna go see a movie?’
    â€˜I have to study.’
    â€˜They play old movies during the day at the Cygnet for half price.’
    She looked at me, wondering how I knew she liked old movies, but then got distrustful again.
    I gave my smile. I raised my eyebrows. I turned the smile up a bit.
    â€˜No. I don’t want to be part of all your love-life, thank you.’
    And she turned and walked away.
    I like looking over at her at a party to find her looking back. I like hearing about her day. I like her jokes. The way she takes the piss out of me. I liked the way she made love. It had a concentrated intensity that became abandoned, like we were in a storm and she was the only one who could get us through, like she was the boat and the ocean both. Then we’d drown.

    ***
    I lay on my back in the dirt and felt a chill. The sun was going down. The sky was turning orange and red, and the earth under that, from red to black, filling in with shades of grey. The deserted buildings were darkening too, into black lurking shapes.
    It took me months of asking Robin to films before she said yes. Doctor Zhivago finally did it. I do not know why she suddenly said yes. I do not understand how Robin’s brain works. And that, I suppose, is why it is over. I’m not up to it.
    A fire was going at the house where Robin had gone. I went to the boot again before I went over to where she was sitting. She’d made a circle of rocks and stacked bits of wood. She was a good camper. Not always happy, but a first-rate woodsman.
    I had the rifle in one hand and something hidden behind my back. She had changed into her jeans. When she looked up she said, ‘What did you get?’
    I brought out the can of soup I’d packed. ‘Nothing out there. Just cans and bottles. And they all escaped.’
    I put down the rifle and stood holding the can of soup.
    â€˜Can opener?’ she said.
    I went to the wall of the house where she’d built the fire and found a nail sticking out of a window frame. I tried to hit the nail at the right angle to puncture the can, but it only dented. When I stopped banging I heard Robin say, ‘I’m sorry.’
    I didn’t say anything.
    Robin said, ‘I...’ and then after a while she said, ‘Sorry.’
    â€˜Sorry about what? What are you sorry about?’
    â€˜For being mean. For being – a mess. For all the...’ She sighed and looked off into the dark. Then she said, ‘I used to live