Art Pact 22


We moved into the corridor. Further away, safer, although I wanted to rush back to the kitchen door, throw the bolt. I glanced into the living room, then up the stair. Clear. Should we go up, or was there a risk we'd get trapped up there? It's only the first floor. I told myself, you'd be able to jump.

"So anyway," Marsha continued, "I've been going to this club for - I don't know, six or seven months? I suppose they know me there, or well most people do, all the other regulars. You know, it's strange, because you never get introduced to anyone, but you sort of overhear names at a tangent, odd isn't it? So if no-one else knows the name of someone you never hear it either, and when you've met someone three or four times and had conversations with them suddenly it becomes very awkward to admit that, 'hello, yes, we know each other but I was just wondering what exactly is your name?'"

I decided on the living room - more connectivity, there was the other door that led into the conservatory, better than the bottleneck of the staircase. Marsha followed me, and nodded hello to the other couple that were hiding in there - John and Kate, who were sitting on the far end of the sofa and perching on the sofa arm respectively. I wondered if any of the things on the mantelpiece were heavy enough to defend ourselves with, but I knew that most of my trophies were hollow plastic painted gold - not a lot of mass there, even if I had the guts to stand up and fight back. I felt in the pit of my stomach that that wasn't the case. If we saw them, we would have to run. Run madly, without any thought but escape. I halted just shy of the other door, considering my options. Marsha, seeing that I had paused, went on with her story.

"So there I was, dancing with this fellow who I knew, but I didn't know his name. So Salsa is quite a - well I suppose it doesn't have to be intimate, but it can be, and sometimes it depends a bit on whether or not you resist someone's lead. I don't mean resist like refuse to dance the steps they're leading, but you can set up a kind of"--she scooped up my free hand in hers and stepped back, creating an outward tension between us--"wow your hands are really clammy. Sorry, that was rude of me." She looked towards the mantelpiece, hoping to distract me from the surreptitious way she dragged her hand along the hem of her jacket to dry it off. "Uh, so yeah, I-uh where was I? Oh, that's right. This guy whose name I didn't know."

A sharp rapping from the front door. My blood clogged in my veins. Panic. I leant slowly to the left, poked my head around the door to the conservatory. It was open. A knot began to rise in my belly, a strangling fat feverish knot.

"This guy was one of those tight hold guys, I suppose because we'd danced a few times before and we'd had some friendly conversation that he thought we were - you know, I guess more friendly than we really were."

The rapping again. I was stuck, frozen in place by two equally horrible alternatives. Did I rush through to the conservatory, to the open door, hoping to slam it before they got in that way? Or was that jumping into their arms? Perhaps they were all around us, the scratching at the front a ploy to drive me out into their waiting - what? Arms? Maws?

"So we're in a very close position to start with, and he takes me into a cuddle hold - which, well, the name sort of explains it, right? Where you're in front of the guy and - sorry, are you going to get that?" She pointed towards the front door. I stared at her blankly. "Or do you want me to? It's okay, really. It's just, it's probably Dan and Alice back from the off-license. Or Dan, anyway. I suppose he must have taken Alice, I haven't seen her around for a while."

I stared at the conservatory. The garden outside it was pitch black, but I was sure that something was moving out there.

"It's okay, I'll get it," Marsha said, putting her glass of red on middle shelf of the bookcase. She turned back to the front door. I tried to say something, but the lump in my throat stifled my words, and the only way I could speak was to push out and out until out popped a single scream:

"NO!"

Marsha turned and stared at me, shocked. John and Kate too.

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