2020, Freya McNeill

Present

2020

by Freya McNeill if she saw our shared memories in Méliès’s

I sat in the darkness. The arch’s stone was cool against my back, reaching through my thin baggy shirt. Shivering, I adjusted my binder and closed my eyes, fantasising about the warm hoodies stacked away in my cupboard. Someone walked past me and then stopped, I curled my hand around my beer bottle like the last soldier holding onto his battalion banner.

“You look like a tramp,” a voice said, scoff ing. I reluctantly opened my eyes then her rolled off my tongue like it did a year

blinked, adjusting my blurred vision to a girl who had long black braids with purple tips - it took me a moment to recognise her.

“I think that’s doing tramps a disservice, some - ” I held up a warning finger to her, sleeves and nearly downed it in one.

feeling that familiar sensation in my throat before letting out a massive burp. Pausing for a few seconds, I reached for the glass bottle again welcoming the cold liquid to slip down my throat.

“Disgusting.” I shrugged and rubbed my hands together.

“Well you’re the one who dated me,” I pulled

“Shall we keep that past tense?” She adjusted her medical mask to re-cover her nose. “I promise, I’m not going to infect you,” I laughed, putting an honorary hand over my face. She rolled her eyes but I could have sworn that she smiled underneath it. I remembered her sparkling eyes when we danced under this spot, my hands on her waist as I tried to lead her but kept treading on her toes. I always was the perfect gentleman. “Trust me?” She looked at me as distorted crackly film.

“Vivanne, we’re not in England, get over here milady,” I said in my terrible English accent, a name that only her mother called ago. She laughed, shaking her head.

“You’ve got me in your spiffing logic guv’nor,” she responded, up for the game, “two metres.” Viv gave me a pointed look but stepped forward all the same. I slid over a beer, she picked it up with her hoodie myself up, pouting with chapped lips.

“Woah, easy there tiger.” I said, “Last time I gave you a beer you took one dainty sip and spat it out.” She shrugged, finishing it off.

“Alex you know me, the epitome of grace.” She winked, looking down at her scuffed boots. We sat there in silence with the

evening chill starting to creep in, we looked at anything that wasn’t each other. The place was deserted, the usual late night antics with teens and lovers were gone leaving nurses hurrying home after a long shift.

“How come you’re here anyway?”

“I want to get away from it all.” Viv said, “You used to take me here and I would wait until my dad had the night shift at the hospital. Nights here to forget everything. I’d take a small bottle of wine under a jacket” I grinned, even rebel Viv wouldn’t stop being classy. “You’d bring some cheap weird liquor and a packet of -”

“Cigarettes.” A smile tugged at her lips, she sat cross legged rapping her hand on the bottle.

“Yeah cause you seem to like poisoning your lungs and I would always -”

“Respectfully decline,” I laughed and shook my head opening another beer, my tongue skimming the bottle rim. “Well I listened to you V, look no - ” I turned my pockets inside out.

“Cigarettes,” she said softly, “I haven’t heard you call me that since…”

“I know.” Our faces lit up in the flickering blue light as the police car zoomed past, sirens blaring cut through the stillness of the night. I gave a nervous laugh putting a hand on my pounding heart. We instinctively shuffled closer. “How’s your dad finding all this?”

“He’s scared, of being there, of maybe endangering us.” Viv sniffed, “And...then he got a temperature, went into hospital and then we got a call today that... he wasn’t coming home.” I ran a hand through my short hair. I drew closer, my hand reaching for her shoulder. “Two metres.”

“Right,” I shook my head, awkwardly retreating my hands, fiddling with the seam of my checkered shirt “Two metres.” I sat on them.

“I wanted to get away from it all, Papa with his fake smile at home sobbing in the bathroom when he’d thought I’d gone to sleep.”

“You see the success stories on the news, he’ll be fine” Could I promise that? I wanted to reach out to her. To hug her. Anything. But all I could do was sit trying to not make my teeth chatter.

“I know,” she whispered, putting her head in her hands, “I know.” There was two metres to separate us but there was more than that, she had dyed her hair, I got an ear pierced - the nights that we shared under this arch I now spend alone. I could have left her there under the arch but tonight she needed me to stay - to wind-back-the-clock.

“You know why I took you here?” V looked up at me, searching for some kind of meaning inside my blue eyes with their copper rim. I didn’t know if I could give it to her, some meaning beyond the genetics lottery or the luck of us checking out the same library book. “The night I came out, it was chaos, I mean catholic family and their perfect ‘daughter’ - how did I think it was going to go? I’d cut my hair and my sister took me here. I mean she drives us to school past it everyday but it was the first time I really saw it you know? She told me

about our great grandfather that when his Dad got killed in the war he wrote the family name…” Feeling around the left corner, my hand brushed against the small defiant carving spelling out ‘FAVRE’. “here.” Viv turned her phone torch on peering at the carving still etched in the stone. “My sister asked if I had picked out a new name yet. I hadn’t, not until that moment. Alexandre after him.” Viv smiled at me and she looked at her phone, the white bright light illuminating the spot. 2:04.

“I have to get back before my Papa notices I’m gone,” she got up and gave me one last look, I smiled at her capturing the moment as a mental polaroid picture. “Alex...call me?”

“Sure.” I watched her leave, zipping her jacket and disappearing from view.

But I don’t think I will.