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SHORT STORIES
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SHORT STORIES
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UNMASKED
The heads had changed places. He was sure of it.
Someone must have swapped them around.
It was no big deal, but they had definitely been rearranged.
Rick had sat at the same table the night before, and his gaze then had wandered through
the window of the bar and to the display of the small fancy dress shop directly opposite. And
there to the halloween masks and novelty accessories decorating the window. A narrow side
alleyway was all that separated the two buildings and so the display of masks, costumes and
similar halloween novelties were no more than fifteen feet away from his position at the table
right by the window.
Rick didn't know what it was about the masks but they did look unnerving.
He dragged his gaze away and looked down at his pint and glared at it accusingly,
wondering if it had been spiked with something more than he'd payed for - something to
heighten his paranoia. Something to make him more irrational.
But, of course, it was more than likely his current frame of mind that was the cause of his
sensitivity.
Oh, what the hell?...
Shaking his head, feeling just a touch embarrassed by his wandering imagination, he
reached for his pint and lifted the glass to his lips. He took a couple of large mouthfuls and
swallowed them down. The cold and bitterness felt good.
He lowered the glass and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, brushing away the
froth moustache that he could feel there.
There... now pull yourself together...
This was the third night in a row that he'd been sitting in the same pub. And at the same
time. Alone. Basically because he couldn't face going home - couldn't face the prospect of
walking into an empty house. Better to come in here and stall for a few hours - put off the
inevitable; down a few pints and let the time pass by until the alcohol had anaesthetised his
senses enough so that the prospect of walking through the front door into his empty dwelling
was a slightly less depressing prospect.
It had been like this since Linda had walked out on him four days ago.
She wasn't happy, so she'd suddenly revealed - hadn't been for a while. She needed some
time and space alone and away from him to get her head sorted out - blah, blah, blah - the
usual cliches. To say that the whole thing had been a bombshell would have been the
understatement of the year. Though now, when he looked back at it, all the signs were there;
he'd just chosen to ignore them; had told himself that it didn't really matter that the passion
had died long ago and that sex had been non-existent for months, indeed that any sort of
intimacy between the two of them had been virtually zero for ages. But they had been
together for close to four years, and he had been sure that he had loved her. Was sure that he
still loved her. And he was equally certain that she had loved him. But then things were never
quite that simple were they? He was certain that he loved her, but was he in love with her?
Had it not become more like the lust-free 'brotherly/sisterly' type of love that so many people
surrendered to in the fading stages of a relationship? Some were philosophical about it, put up
with it and put it down to reality - that was how things became when two people became
over familiar with one another; others decided that it wasn't good enough and sought lust and
excitement elsewhere. It seemed that he and Linda had fallen into the latter category. Well...
Linda had, by the looks of things.
Whatever; there was no getting away from the fact that it had, quite simply, become a
passionless, routine, unexciting, taken for granted relationship...
In an attempt to distract himself from his sombre thoughts, Rick blew out a long, weary
sigh, looked up from the frothy head of his pint and turned to his right - looking into the pub
rather than outside...
And noticed a girl that hadn't been there before....
She was sitting just a few tables away.
He wondered why he hadn't noticed her arrive. But then he remembered the fancy dress
shop outside and the stupid masks that had drawn his attention, and then his mind wandering
to the depressing thoughts of Linda's walkout.
She must have arrived when I was gawping at the stupid masks. Or whilst
contemplating life alone and dumped. She must have arrived and slipped into her seat
unnoticed.
Unnoticed and alone.
Like himself.
Alone... or at least she seemed to be at this stage.
Wishful thinking. More than likely, her boyfriend or hubby was at the bar, waiting to be
served; or relieving his bladder in the gents, and would join her any second now.
So just cool it! Now's not the time to be jumping from the frying pan and into the fire
anyway. Give the fairer sex a wide berth, at least for a while.
'Can't live with 'em; can't live without 'em...'
Rick couldn't help but smile. The first time in four days, but it actually didn't feel too bad.
But she was very pretty. Extremely pretty. Verging on beautiful in fact; and the longer he
looked, the more he decided that she was beautiful.
Rebound! Avoid like the plague! Don't go there. Leave it! Appreciate by all means (just
try not to stare) but nothing more...
She lifted her bag onto the table and, tip of her tongue peeping out of one corner of her
mouth, started to rummage inside. Rick continued to watch, semi-transfixed, as she took out
a pack of cigarettes with slender fingers. Her long nails were painted a shade of red, the name
of which he didn't even want to guess at (and didn't much care); they looked good, that was
all that mattered. Her eye colour, from this distance and in this lighting, he couldn't be sure of
either, but he guessed somewhere in the blue/green ball-park. Again, whatever their hue -
they looked nice!......
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