CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER XIX

“Theo put you in a taxi, knowing how you feel about them, and left you,” Amara muttered to herself, aggressively scrubbing the stainless-steel pot in her hands before before placing it in the industrial dishwasher. Whatever was burnt onto the bottom of it had refused to succumb to her fury. Of all the duties she had at the café, this was the one she liked least but it did make for excellent anger management therapy.

Amara hadn’t seen Theo in three months.

She had spent that time throwing herself into her work just to keep busy. Her boss, Alice, was a broad, tall woman whose voice could boom across the café from the kitchen out back. But she was jovial and friendly and made Amara feel safe and protected under her wing. She also kept her busy. And while it had taken them a few weeks to find their rhythm together, Amara now knew, with military precision, how Alice liked to run her café. They worked in perfect unison, keeping the customers happy and coming back for more, day in, day out. It kept Amara’s mind and body occupied from everything atleast.

Until she was alone with the dishes. Then she was alone with her thoughts. What had happened when she’d arrived in Edinburgh. How Theo had looked at her that night she’d finally felt like herself again − as if she was a broken bird to be fixed. The fact that he had forgotten her fear of taxis and then left her. The fact that he’d promised to take her to that tartan shop and in the meantime she had gotten nowhere with it. It all played in the background of her mind in a perpetual loop. The fact that he hadn’t come back at all cracked her heart open further and she let out a small sob.

“Are you muttering to yourself again?” Kiaria, one of the other waitresses, laughed as she came and dumped a load of dishes in the back.

Wicked smart and with a tongue to match, Amara wouldn’t have expected Kiaria to be a waitress, much less Alice’s niece. Where Alice was broad and fair in her late forties, Kiaria was a five-foot, petite Asian woman in her twenties.

“Adopted into the family,” she’d told Amara the first time they’d met, at Amara’s look of confusion she’d poorlyhidden.

Kiaria’s black hair was chopped in a stylish jagged fringe and finished neatly at her chin, which matched the cut of her cheekbones and jawline and made her seem incredibly no-nonsense. Like she’d cut straight to the point, and that was exactly what she did. Her eyes, laughing at Amara, were a deep, dark brown, so close to black that Amara couldn’t actually tell where her irises began. But rather than giving off a cold, shark-like feel, the wide grin that accompanied Kiaria’s heart-shaped face held a glint that was both personable and cheeky.

Amara smiled at Kiaria shyly, covering her sob as a sneeze. Then John, another waiter, who was a tall, lanky Northerner with sleazy charm coming out of his pores, entered. He snuck up on Kiaria and squeezed her stomach, making her squeal, and Amara turned back to the dishes.

She couldn’t help the resentment that stirred in her gut. She felt cheap and dirty as she listened in to the lovers’ whispered conversation. Lustful.

Then the guilt, for burning with such seething jealousy, would hit. They reminded her of Theo. Of what she was missing out on. Envy.

There was always the option, of course, to go out and choose a bedmate of her own. She’d had offers, which she’d almost agreed to a few times. But every time she got the courage to dress up to go out with the rest of the staff crew, she would take a hard look at herself in the mirror and remember that first night in Edinburgh, when she had been confident and secure in herself. Look where that got you, her mind would whisper. A shudder would roll through her body. She’d sigh, defeated, text Kiaria that she wasn’t coming, get undressed, and reach for the bottle of wine that had now taken up a permanent residence on her bedside table in the shared house she was renting. Idle.

She was half convinced Kiaria had given up on getting her out of her mopey state. After her third offer was declined, Kiaria had simply resorted to raising an eyebrow at Amara the next day after she’d made a half-arsed excuse the night before. Usually the excuse was work. Days at the café started early, so it was valid and Amara certainly picked up the most shifts. She worked hard. She earned good money, she told herself. Everything was fine.

Yet when she would finish for the night, there was a collection of bottles her money was spent on, of all varieties, waiting for her at home. Wine, gin, whisky ... the collection continued to grow. Greedily.

At first, Amara had made the excuse that she was using them for something. A pretty blue and orange detailed gin bottle doubled as a vase, yet held a single red rose. Another had been used to store pennies. A third she was going to use for a sand bottle. She just hadn’t gotten around to ityet.

If she was being honest with herself, she hadn’t gotten around to much these days. Apart from work, she came home to eat, binge watch a series on the TV, drink, and go to bed. Upon waking up with a raging headache, she would punish herself by cleaning the dishes she had left from the night before, gagging at the smell of burnt meat. She vehemently chastised herself every time for forgetting to soak the dishes. Furious.

“Earth to Amara???” John interrupted.

“Sorry,” Amara said, shaking her head and turning back to the pair of lovebirds, smiling sheepishly. “What did yousay?”

“I asked if you wanted to come out with us again ... you still haven’t been on a night out in Edinburgh youknow.”

Yes, Amara thought. She had.

“Ah no thanks, maybe anothertime.”

John shrugged, clearly nonplussed, kissed Kiaria on the cheek and went back out front before Alice noticed and reprimanded him.

“What if we just had drinks, me and you?” Kiaria asked.

Amara paused her furious scrubbing.

“Just me andyou?”

“Yeah.”

Amara thought about it for a moment.

“Ok,” she said, finding herself slowly nodding along. She could do that. After all, she felt safe in Kiaria’s company. The fellow waitress preferred to do most of the talking, and while Amara could talk with the best of them, she much preferred to listen. Kiaria made her feel safe by taking theattention.

“Great! Do you want to do tomorrownight?”

“Sounds good tome.”

The following night, Kiaria proved true to her word and managed to keep Amara occupied with copious amounts of wine and tales of her dating woes. Halfway through the conversation, she refilled their glasses with the remains of the second bottle despite Amara’s protests. There was, at least, half a bottle in each glass.

Not long afterwards, John walked in and sidled up to their table. He was hard to miss. Aside from his height, his flaming red hair that crunched close to his skull and pale skin speckled with freckles, like Amara’s own, illuminated him like a beacon. And given his height, his waist hit the tabletop as he snaked an arm around Kiaria.

“Fancy seeing you ladieshere.”

Immediately, regret seeped into Amara’s bones. She should have known Kiaria wouldn’t leave it. Some friend. In desperation to calm her nerves, Amara grabbed at her recently refilled glass and began to gulp greedily.

Given John’s size, he was a man who simply took up room by breathing. Amara could feel his presence permeate her skin without him even touching her. It made goosebumps break out over her flesh. He sat, his legs brushing hers under the table and she immediately recoiled. Kiaria, in comparison, wrapped her limbs around him, entangling herself, like a fly willingly drawn into a spider’s web. That spider was smiling coyly at Amara as she watched.

At some point, when the third bottle of wine was opened and sat on the table between them, Kiaria went up to go to the toilet. Silence hung heavy in the air and Amara took another swig from her wineglass.

“I get the impression you don’t like me,” John said, the smirk on his face saying more than his words.

Amara placed the wine glass back on the coaster, choosing her words carefully.

“It’s not that I don’t like you,” shestarted.

“What is itthen?”

“It’s just that I don’t like being around you and Kiaria much. You remind me of me and … it doesn’t matter.”

“So I remind you of your ex, do I?” John grinned as one long arm extended under the table towards Amara’s leg, as if to clutch at her and lure her into him. She could practically see him preening.

“Kiaria will be backsoon.”

John shuffled his seat forward slightly and Amara felt their kneesbump.

“You’re just as beautiful as her, you know,” he said, as his hand began to stroke herleg.

Amara froze. The last time a man had touched her without her permission had been before Theo. This was another stranger. No, it was John, she reminded herself. She knew John. Except she didn’t really. Just like she hadn’t known Ralph. Not really.

Her mind raced, desperately trying to convince her body that this was different, but it was no use. The fear coursing through her veins was like lactic acid, her limbs like lead. She couldn’t move. She didn’t dare breathe. It was like she was watching herself as John’s hand inched up even closer. This wasn’t what she wanted. She knew this wasn’t what she wanted. Why couldn’t she speak? Move? Anything?!

“What the HELL do you think you’re doing?!”

John’s hands recoiled like a snake so fast it was a wonder he didn’t getwhiplash.

Kiaria stood at the table, arms folded across her chest and a deep scowl painted across her face that turned the corners of her mouth down into a disdainful sneer.

“It’s not what it lookslike.”

“I will deal with you later,” Kiaria told him sharply before pointing towards the door. Hanging his head in demure agreement, John heeded instructions and excused himself. Kiaria stalked forward a step.

“And what the hell were you playing at?” she hissed.

Amara sat there, blinking, trying to get her brain to catch up with her body. She was so incredibly relieved and grateful that Kiaria had returned when she did, but her voice still wasn’t working.

“You know, I could put up with the whole forlorn, woe-is-me, my-boyfriend-left-me act. But this? Going behind my back to try and make yourself feel better about the fact that he left you? It’s pathetic. You’repathetic.”

Finally Amara’s brain began to function again, neurons snapping awake like fireworks crackling in her head. She went to open her mouth to explain, but Kiaria cut her off with a slicing hand action through the air.

“I don’t want to hear it.”

And with that, she stalked off.

Blood began to pool back into Amara’s icy fingertips and toes, pins and needles flooding her extremities, the sensation akin to being on fire. She stood, shakily, and managed to walk to the local bus stop. Thankfully it wasn’t too late and, thanks to the summer evening, it was still light outside.

The minute she was home she went to pour herself another drink and hesitated. Eventually, she thought better of it. Instead, she made short work of last night’s dishes in burning hot water that scalded her skin pink. She scrubbed and scrubbed but the dishes still appeared dirty and she could not seem to get her hands clean, despite her efforts. Aggressively drying off her hands on a tea towel that rubbed her skin raw, Amara decided to hell with it. She poured herself a double helping of brandy, grabbed the blanket off her bed and decided to light a fire to enjoy the rest of the summer evening that was beginning to cool quite rapidly.

Inside, the anger was beginning to build. How dare Kiaria put all the blame on her?! Where was John’s responsibility? Where was his admonishing? He was the one who had made the move and now Amara would pay the price at work. She wasn’t safe here. She wasn’t safe anywhere. She didn’t even feel safe in her own skin. Amara still didn’t quite understand what had happened, why she’d been unable to move, but that guilt just poured gasoline on top of a fire that had enough kindling already.

And this time, Theo wasn’t here to save her.

Moving into the back garden of the house she had moved into in the three months since his disappearance, Amara set coals in the garden firepit with black iron tongs that creaked with age. She placed kindling strips and bunched up pieces of newspaper around them, as if arranging flowers in a crown. Finally, she topped the stack with the brick of a QuickFire starter and struck the match.

She got the odd sense that she had done this before. The ritual felt old, heavy in her bones, and the firepit reminded her of an altar. Her limbs moved slowly as if reacquainting themselves with old muscle memory, but the last time she had lit a fire had been in the chapel with Father Michel and it had been with a quick, mechanical thing with a long lighter that flicked with a switch. This felt different, ancient somehow.

The altar looked different too. For some reason, in her mind, she was picturing a water altar. One with a bath that was filled with spring waters and petals as the full moon passed over it, essential oils added with incantations as nymphs came to pay their respects. The fire couldn’t have been any more different. And yet, somehow, the two rituals were linked. Amara just couldn’t place her finger on why, and like those feelings of home that hounded her, those thoughts that teased and tormented her, the answer whispered just out of reach.

She stared desperately into the fire to get the answer to come back, but to no avail. It must be the alcohol, she told herself as she took another large swig of brandy. She enjoyed it burning down the back of her throat, penance for her inability to get the answers she so desperately kept seeking. Each question in her mind a cut on her skin.

As Amara sat there, listening to the fire crackle and watching the flames dance, the coals glow, and the embers spit, she became entranced. Pulling the tartan scarf, the one that she’d been wrapped in as a baby, over her lap, she began to hum. She didn’t recognise the tune. Her throat opened and phonetic vowels fell out with a melody of a soft lullaby. The song pitched and fell effortlessly from her lips, like the coming and going of the tide, and the flames flickered in unison. She could feel the humming vibrating through her bones, the melody cutting through her lungs, the rhythm tugging at her womb, as if her body thrummed with humanity.

The water in her mind, the fire in front of her, the earth beneath her sit bones, the air in her lungs ... it all added up to humanity. That was the answer, she whispered to herself as her eyes drooped, her head slumped and she fell asleep in front of the roaring fire.

Amara tossed and turned. The dream she was having morphed, and her eyes flickered beneath her eyelids. In the dream, she imagined someone was watching over her, a man with delicate features. Blonde hair that flopped over his forehead in a boyish manner. The eyes that were staring at her were a deep blue, and he had a sad smile on his face as if watching her sleep was bittersweet.

But then the man morphed into Theo and he climbed into bed with her. She could feel his arms wrap around her and she snuggled deeper into the curve of his legs. She could feel the coarse hairs of his legs cause delicious friction against her smooth ones and his hot breath tickle the back of her neck. Smiling, she angled her head deeper into the pillow to allow him better access and felt a rough kiss scraped with stubble against her cheek as his calloused hands began to move across her skin.

Amara awoke with astart.

There was no Theo in bed with her. She didn’t even remember putting out the fire or getting into bed. Instead, the cotton white sheets were tangled around her limbs like vines. The window, which she usually made sure was shut before her head hit the pillow, was ajar and a cool night breeze blew out across the room, raising goosebumps all over her skin. Rising, wearing just a navy blue camisole and a pair of grey cotton briefs, she crossed the room and shut the door, shivering as she did so. She dived back under the covers and wrapped herself in the duvet like a cocoon. Burying herself deeper into the bed, she tried desperately to fall back into that dream with Theo, but it was no use. The fresh air had slapped her wide awake.

She looked at her alarm clock − 4 a.m. The sky outside her small window, opposite the bed, was a dusty pink that promised summer thunderstorms. Amara huddled under the covers for as long as possible. It would only be an hour until she had to get up for work anyway. That thought, and the fact she had to see Kiaria today, made the contents of her stomach curdle. She raced to the bathroom before depositing what remained of the alcohol in her stomach into the toilet bowl. She spent the next hour shaking and retching on the bathroom tiles before showering and trying to make herself halfwaypresentable.

By 5.30, she was out the door, walking down stone pavements lit by the early morning sunshine, a rare occurrence in Edinburgh she had learnt. Yet even with a thin red coat and the sunshine on her skin, she felt a biting cold that sent her numb inside. The only thing that would help was if she made herself a pot of hot black coffee to warm her up as soon as she entered the café. Then she could begin prepping for theday.

“Morning Amara, coffee?” Alice called out as she heard the bell above the door tinkle. She had caught on quickly to Amara’s little routines. It turned out she found them quite charming. Though the coffee she offered was often as strong aswhisky.

“Morning, love.” Graham, Alice’s husband, sent Amara a short little wave from the kitchen doorway out back. He was responsible for preparing the baked goods for the day and was carrying a load of croissants, fresh bread that Amara would now butter in preparation for the hot sandwiches at lunch, doughnuts, and an array of muffins. He set them on the steel kitchen table out the back.

Graham was a couple of inches taller than Alice, his hair and beard speckled in salt-and-pepper shades. He didn’t ever say much more than a greeting. But when he smiled as he waved hello, his eyes crinkled at the corners. He had kind eyes. Between the two of them Amara felt safe, even as the thought of confronting Kiaria today ripped her anxiety wound open anew.

“It’ll be a busy day,” Alice told her.

“Oh?”

“Yeah ... Kiaria’s just called in sick and I have no one else who can cover. I hope you sleptwell.”

Amara forced a bright smile, her anxiety fluttering to a stop. “Ofcourse!”

She got to work immediately slicing and buttering the loaves of bread.

Once the immediate food was prepared for the day, Amara set up the coffee machine, checked the tables, and then began on the back-of-house tasks, like sifting kilograms of flour into old, large paint containers for Graham’s baking tomorrow and other assorted jobs. The tasks, for the most part, kept her busy enough that she didn’t have time to pause and think.

But every so often, her mind would wander back to the dream this morning, which released a cascade of unanswered questions. Where had Theo gone? Why hadn’t he said goodbye? What was wrong with her that everyone hurt her? Abandoned her? Left her? Blamed her? Would Kiaria seek retribution? What had John said? Would she lose her job over this?

Then the bell chimed as the first customer entered and the morning rush began. Amara’s mind remained occupied for the rest of the day, dealing with customers, orders, and coffees. After the early morning commuters in their suits, surgically attached to their phones demanding “the strongest coffee you have” left, the mums with their prams arrived.

“Busy day, Amara?” one mum asked, as she pushed a pram at the counter and balanced a screaming two-year-old on yoga pants that did their best to hide the bulges. The child’s screams continued to pierce Amara’s eardrums until the dull ache at the back of her head turned into a full-blown headache. She tried not towince.

“You know what it’s like here!” Amara laughed it off, scribbling down the woman’s order and handing her a table number. Seeing that a table had left, Amara went to clear it down, wipe, and reset. It held new occupants not even a minute after she was done.

After the morning rush, those local to the area would often stop by for lunch, though there were usually a few new faces every time given the reputation the café was building. But the afternoons were Amara’s favourite, for that was when the old Scottish women would come to see her.

“Tell us, Amara, have you eaten today? Look at you ... you’re skin and bone,” the taller and stricter of the two − Rhonda − scolded in lieu of a greeting. She took off her coat and draped it over the table in the window that the two ladies always took, despite the fact the sun was shining outside said window.

The table easily had the best seats in the house. Two faded red armchairs looked out onto the street. It was perfect for people watching, and the alcove provided by the window kept it far enough away from the other tables that you could have a good gossip as you did so.

“Leave her be. Can’t you see the girl is busy?” Bessie, Amara’s favourite, swiped at her friend as she settled into her chair. Her little dog, Bertie, a black-haired Scottish terrier, was the spitting image of his owner. Amara bent down to give Bessie a kiss on either cheek and then bent further still to give Bertie a rub on his tummy.

“I like your skirt today, Bessie. Where did you get that tartan from?” Amara asked, eyeing up the pattern that looked so similar to the one that had been haunting Amara all herlife.

“Oh this old thing? I’ve had this for years! Why? Would you like me to make you one? I can, youknow!”

“Oh no. It’s just that I have a scarf just like it,” Amara said, gently touching Bessie’s arm. “I was actually looking for a tartan shop that could explain the lineage of it to me. But I haven’t been able to find a store that sells the particular pattern I have.”

“Oh well why don’t you bring it to us next time we’re in and we can see if we know it. We’ve been here long enough − we’re practically historians!” Bessie joked.

Amara stared at her, wide eyed and hopeful once again. “I have it out back. I’ll go and grab it after I place your order. The usual for youthree?”

“Please. Then, after we’ve determined where your tartan is from, you can tell us why we still haven’t seen anyone come and snap you up from this place. It’s been months!” Rhonda said.

Rhonda was a firm believer, as she had told Amara many times before, that while there were times a woman should work in her life, it was to be a ‘shelf-life experience’. And Amara was fast approaching the end of that shelf.

“You don’t have to marry them for love, dear. Take it from me, marry for money the first time. Marry for love the second. It makes it all much easier. You can’t keep working here forever. You’ll get calloused hands. Women should be cherished not calloused in their lifetime.”

Rhonda’s own hands were adorned with two sets of diamond engagement rings on her divorced finger and one remaining set on her ring finger, though she was now widowed. Her late husband had been the only one she’d truly loved, she’d happily told Amara who took the advice with good humour and went about setting their teas and sweet treats and a bowl of water for Bertie. When she returned to the table with her scarf, Bessie and Rhonda eyed the pattern.

“Hmm, no I don’t think I’ve seen this pattern before.” Bessie said. “Haveyou?”

“No,” Rhonda replied. “Where did you say you got it from

again, dear?”

“I was wrapped in it as a baby,” Amara said, a lump in her throat and hope beginning to free fall in her stomach.

“Hmm, we’ll have to ask the others in our Bible study group. Here, you hold onto it for now, love.” Bessie patted her arm.

At Amara’s crestfallen look, the kind old woman spoke again.

“We are worried about you, dear. You do seem to always behere.”

“Well, so are you.” Amara jested kindly, trying to brush off the disappointment that had crashed into her.

“Yes, but we’ve lived our lives. What life is this for a young woman? We didn’t burn our bras in the seventies, you know, for you to continue living a life of service to others,” Bessie admonished gently.

“I’m happy here,” Amara reassured her. And despite the turmoil and drama, it was true. Amara was happy there. Sure, answers still whispered out of reach and she missed Theo so badly it hurt, but she was otherwise content. Wasn’t that good enough?

At the end of the long day, as Alice was out the back, loading the carrier trays into Graham’s car for the fresh-baked goods and Amara was mopping the floor behind the counter, the door chimed open.

“Sorry we’re—”

Amara’s tongue went numb as she looked up. Her heart thudded wildly, threatening to take her to the floor with it. She held onto the mop like her life depended on it right then, her grip on the wooden handle tightening until the veins on the back of her hands popped, like dark blue rivers about to burst through the dams of her knuckles. Leaning on the mop was the only thing that grounded her, that stopped her from collapsing in relief or running to him in gratitude. No, that she would not do.

Because there, in the doorway, stood Theo, with knowledge behind his eyes that said he knew he’d hurt her.