China Girl

"It said 'Anti-murder juice' on the chalkboard," I say lightly as I place the cardboard carrier on the seat between us. "Although you probably wanted to kill me back there." I nod another apology at the dark stain on his shirt.

"Well, it was pretty hot stuff, and I can't deny it hurt a bit, but I think I'll live." He laughs. He sounds relaxed, confident. Ever the gracious gentleman.

I steal a look at the man beside me. Time has been kind to Peter. Two and a half decades have done nothing to detract from his breathtaking good looks. The teenage heart-throb has become the kind of man who's listed among the "Top 10 Sexiest Something or Other" in magazines.

But life was always good to Peter.

"I can't believe it's really you," I say, aware that I'm staring, that I sound like an idiot, like a gushing fan.

He turns those grey eyes towards me and a wave of heat engulfs my chest.

"Well, I would have known you anywhere. You haven't changed a bit." He winks. Smiles.

I duck my head and fumble with sugar packets. My heart is hammering so loud I'm sure he can hear it. He's lying, of course. The last 25 years have left behind nothing of the sweet and rather stupid 17-year-old I used to be, apart from my long black hair. And even that is streaked with grey. I think it's safe to say my own mother wouldn't recognize me now.

"Shit, I put sugar in your coffee. I forgot to ask if you still take it."

"Haha, I'm supposed to use sweetener these days." He pats his stomach, which shows no sign of middle-age spread. "But a little sugar probably won't kill me."

He takes his cup and stirs it with a little wooden stick. I stir my coffee, too. 

"To lucky accidents," he says, turning towards me. We clink paper cups, softly so we don't spill.

I watch as he drinks. A couple of deep, greedy gulps. Then he puts down the empty cup, stretches his arms over the back of the bench, and sighs. His left hand is almost touching my shoulder, a glint of gold in the sunlight.

I look out over the sea as I sip my coffee, slowly. 

"It's been so long," I say at last. "There's so much I wanted to say to you, Peter."

He doesn't answer. So I carry on.

"You left so suddenly, I never got the chance. And you never answered your phone or returned my calls. At first I thought it was because I saw the two of you – you know, that night. That you were afraid I'd go psycho on you or something. But later my mother told me that she called your mother about five minutes after she found out. I suppose she told you to stay the hell away from me. And I suppose you didn't mind so much. I mean, after all, I was just another high-school dropout, and you were a Rhodes Scholar, drinking Champagne on the banks of the Thames. Easier that way, obviously.

But it was so hard, Peter. You can't have forgotten how religious my mother was. And, also, she blamed what happened on the fact that I didn't have a dad around growing up. So she absolutely refused to let me keep it. And what was I supposed to do? I had no money. Nowhere to go. Nothing. But when they took her away, even though they did it straight away, I felt something crack inside me, here, in my chest. And the pain came in through the crack.

I've tried everything, absolutely everything, to push the pain back out again. I guess you could say it's been my one real ambition in life. At first alcohol was my best friend, but then it was mainly drugs. More expensive, but so much more effective. For a while, anyway. My friends used to call me The Queen of Codeine. But I've moved on. I'm way past that.

And then I found you again, Peter. To be honest, it would have been hard to miss you. You're really famous these days. I've seen the pictures of you and her in the tabloids, and of the two of them too, and your skiing holidays and your yacht, and your beach house, and all of it. 

So, it wasn't an accident today at all, really. I was waiting for you. I've been planning this for weeks. I thought maybe, if it seemed like a coincidence, if it was a surprise, you'd let me talk to you. Let me have just a few minutes with you."

The waves sigh onto the rocks below us. I steal another look at him. His head is tipped back and his eyes are unfocused, gazing off at the distant horizon as if lost in thought. I imagine what we must look like to strangers passing by: Two figures on a lonely bench, silhouetted against shimmering silver ripples.

We sit there in silence a while longer. Neither of us moves. Bit by bit, like the tide ebbing out, the pain starts to leave me. For the first time I can remember, I feel like I can breathe again. 

I stack the two cups together and carefully pick up the paper packets and stirrer sticks. I carry them a long way before I find a bin to throw them into.

******

Story ends.

I’m afraid I can’t seem to add another 109 words. I believe in brevity - even when I’m being paid by the word. I don’t oretend to be Hemingway, but I do often repeat Strunk’s immortal words: ‘A sentence contains no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences. So it does seem rather odd to me that you would set a lower limit on the word count required for your short story competition . To disqualify a story for omitting unnecessary words seems a little arbitrary and even counterproductive, assuming you are in favor of promoting quality of writing.

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cheers