Wild by Naomi Clark

was sat in a window booth in The King’s Head waiting for her bacon double cheeseburger. She tapped her nails on a bottle of beer, not sure whether she really wanted to drink it or not. It smelt sour, kind of like Harris.
    Across the bar, under the wide screen TV playing the football scores on mute, lads cheered or jeered, depending on their allegiances. Across from Lizzie’s table, a pool game was in full swing, a pink-haired girl crowing with delight as she pocketed the final yellow ball on the table. Her male companions groaned and mocked her with good humour.
    Her burger came, thick and juicy and swimming with grease. Her stomach growling, she stripped off the gherkins and cheese before shovelling the meat down. When the burger was gone, she went to the bar to order another, and almost walked into Nick Doyle as he emerged from the men’s room.
    “Lizzie! Fuck, how are you?” He caught her by the shoulders, looking her over with a too-sharp gaze. “Are you okay?”
    Caught off guard by his sudden appearance, she pulled free of his grip, nerves jangling for reasons she couldn’t name. Well, all right, maybe she could. Looking at Nick, she saw Hannah convulsing in the Krazy House toilets, saw a big black wolf emerging from the shadows. She couldn’t help herself; he was just tangled up with the two most horrible things that ever happened to her.
    “Lizzie?” Nick nudged her. “Are you okay?”
    She gave herself a mental shake. He’d also helped her, she reminded herself, taking her to hospital before she could bleed to death in the street. “Yeah, sorry. Yeah, I’m good. How are you?”
    He nodded. “Great. Just here with some mates.” He indicated the pool table, where the pink-haired girl had apparently won. “Can I get you a drink? How are you feeling? I’m holding – do you need anything?”
    She accepted another beer, two pills – well, it would be rude to say no - and ordered herself another burger. They went and sat back down at her table, Lizzie downing the capsules with one swig of her new pint. Nick raised his eyebrow at her first empty plate. “Hungry?”
    “I haven’t been eating lately.” She shrugged and swigged her beer, feeling awkward and uneasy but the MDMA would take care of that soon enough. Nick was watching her too closely, as if examining her for something. Oh. Was he waiting for a thank you? “Thanks for the other night,” she said, staring at the stains on the table top. “I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t shown up.”
    He shrugged, flicking his black hair from his eyes. “It was the least I could do, after … everything. Your friend, I mean.”
    She felt a prick of grief and forced herself to shake it off. “It was an accident.”
    “Yeah, but it was my fault.” His expression turned earnest and he reached across the table, grabbing her hands. “I wanted to do something … I don’t know, atone for it.”
    Lizzie pulled away, shaking her head. You can’t, she wanted to say, but forced herself to rephrase it. “You don’t have to. It’s –”
    She cut herself off when her second burger arrived, and a pang of hunger hit her hard. Forgetting Nick for a second, she tucked in, relishing the peppery taste of the burger and the salty tang of the bacon. Perfect.
    Nick watched her eat, she realised with a flush of embarrassment. Watching as she wolfed down the burger, relish staining her chin. She swallowed a mouthful of cheese and set the burger down to wipe her chin. “Shouldn’t you get back to your mates?” she asked. She felt better now. The burger was just what she needed.
    He shook his head. “They won’t miss me. Are you okay, Lizzie? You been okay since that night? Not felt sick, or anything?”
    Why did he keep asking that? She was out here, wasn’t she? Fully functional and walking around. Irritation spiked through her. Yeah, she was grateful to him, but she didn’t need a fucking babysitter. “What do you want, Nick?”
    “I