Man-eater

He sighed and squeezed my hand back, then released it as he stood. He stalked to the counter, and returned with the bottle of bourbon and another tumbler.

He poured a measure out for both of us.

I picked mine up in a shaking hand. "Here's to dumb decisions," I managed around the lump in my throat.

"Mm," he said softly. "Here's to resilience and getting back up."

The second glass of bourbon was better than the first, but only just. My lip stung like hell, and one of my teeth felt slightly loose in my jaw.

I wiped my eyes again.

"Where were you going?" I asked him.

"Hmm?"

"Your backpack. You were wearing a pack when you came down the stairs."

"Oh. Right. My head was full of noise so I was going to see how far I could get by dawn. Being outside at night... quietens things."

"Oh. Do you... do that a lot?"

"Some days," he said softly. "Particularly around this time of the year. I was supposed to leave earlier but I was faffing and farting around. I'm glad I dawdled; I hate the idea that you would have had to be alone after..."

He winced, then raised his tumbler and took a long, slow sip of of liquor.

"Thank you, Liam. Thank you for being here for me."

He looked up at me, and for a moment I was transfixed by those blue, blue eyes.

"I hate that I had to be, but I'm glad that I was. Ella... are you going to be okay?"

"I'll live. I'll learn. I'll be more careful next time, though I don't think there's going to be a next time any time soon."

"Alright," he said.

We sat in calm silence for a breath or two. Then I sighed.

"You should go," I told him. "You should go walk and do what you wanted to do with your evening. I'll be okay, Liam. I will, I promise."

"I'll give you my number in case you need it," he said. "It will take me a while to get back but I will come if you call. You have my word on that."

"Thank you," I whispered, touched by his kindness. I dug my phone out of my pocket, let him enter his number into it and gave him a quick missed call so he'd have mine as well.

"In case you get stuck somewhere and need a friendly voice," I explained, strangely shy.

And he smiled, eyes crinkling up like they had on that first day.

"I'll walk you back up to your door," he said.

And when he'd waved goodbye and I'd shut my door on the night, I leaned back against the surface, shivering.

Then I sniffed a final time and went to wash the disaster of an evening off and out of me.

Three days later, I wrapped up a bottle of expensive bourbon and put it in front of his door.

I didn't leave a card. But then, I didn't need to.

.:.

My outsides healed. The bruises faded.

But the internal wounds were slower to mend.

And now something had changed in me - I felt like I'd woken up; I felt more alert, more on-edge than I could remember being in a long, long time.

I'd wake at night, hearing a noise or seeing a shadow, and that would be it for an hour or two - I'd be wired on adrenaline, heart thudding fast and hard until I'd finally be able to calm my panic and fall back into exhausted sleep.

I felt battered and off-centre. And for the first time in over two years my hyperactive libido was gone - snuffed out like a candle. I'd seemingly cured myself - not that I would ever, ever recommend such a cure to anyone, I bitterly thought to myself.

As my body healed I slowly eased back into my runs. But now I'd catch myself watching other runners and planning my escape rather than their seduction.

And I bought a hockey stick and stood it in the corner of my room closest to my bed. Not that I had any illusions about my ability to fight someone off, or even the need for the weapon in our quiet part of the world.

But it helped to know it was there, nonetheless.

The year drew on towards winter. Liam and I would pass one another like ships in the night; each time our courses crossed he'd smile at me, and I'd always find myself reaching out to catch his hand in passing - a silent thank you to him for his unexpected kindness. But nothing more than that. I didn't visit his flat again, and he didn't come knocking at my door - though I often wished he would.

(And my phone stayed silent; he didn't ever message me and I was far too self-conscious around him to be the first to do so)

Then, one early November morning, I was running past the botanical gardens in the faint winter mist when I realised that the male figure ahead of me that I'd been worrying over was actually Liam; trudging towards me. His jacket hung open open and his boots and lower legs were caked in mud.

He looked spent.

But his expression brightened immediately as he recognised me, and I couldn't resist the sudden urge to talk to someone - to anyone.

To him.

So I slowed and stopped and waited for him, puffing slightly and hugging myself in the chill.

"Morning, Ella," he called as he closed.

"Hey stranger," I responded, a fey levity taking control of me.

He flushed bright pink as I skipped playfully up to him and stood up on my toes to place a gentle kiss on his stubbly cheek.

"Sorry," I said, as I ruefully realised I'd overstepped. "I'm... just happy to see you. It's really nice to see you again. Really nice," I added, babbling a bit.

"Likewise," he stammered, still a bit wide-eyed.

"So by the mud I guess you went out walking again?"

"Yes. But I had some transport issues and it all turned into a bit of a farce... so I'm aborting and heading home."

"Oh. What happened?"

"A mate was supposed to be waiting for me at a waypoint; we were going to drive out into the West country and walk the moors and talk about... friends. But I guess he went down to the pub last night and hit the jet fuel and forgot, or didn't forget but just didn't want to talk to me."

"Oh."

"It happens. My mates aren't reliable people. We've got too many... shadows. Too many unhealed wounds."

His face darkened again, and he glanced away and cleared his throat.

"Sorry," he said softly. "You learn to deal with the disappointment after a while, but it still hurts."

He looked smaller, strangely diminished, and I felt I had to reach out... somehow.

"Have you eaten?"

"Not recently."

"Um... could I cook you breakfast?"

He blinked, and straightened.

"You're offering to cook me breakfast?" he said, as if he couldn't believe it.

"Er... yes?"

"Where have you been my whole life?" he muttered.

I grinned up at him; I could feel myself flushing but for once I didn't mind.

"Don't be too happy. I'm not sure what I have but hopefully I can scavenge up something. You won't starve but you might wish you had. Come on."

"Aren't you going to finish your run?"

"No. I'll go again this evening. You're more important to me than that."

"Thanks, Ella," he said, softly, after a heartbeat or two's pause.

"No, Liam," I answered. "Don't be daft. This is a small, tiny part of the vast thank you I owe you."

And I walked back to our building by his side.

He didn't say much, but then I didn't have much to say either, and something about his silent presence was deeply comforting.

He quickly stopped by his flat to change; I carried on up to mine and put my kettle on to boil. He was about two minutes behind me, and I ushered him in and settled him to a stool.

He fitted so very, very well there.

I contemplated that thought for a moment, then turned to continue rummaging in my freezer.

"So... I have eggs and some baked beans but no bacon. There are mushrooms. Oh, jackpot! Here are some pork bangers that still look alright."

"I put on a stone just listening to that," he protested from his perch at my kitchen counter. "You'll spoil me."

I turned to face him. "This just in - you deserve spoiling. Plus you were... what, walking all night? Right?"

He rubbed his chin and grimaced. "Well... some of it was walking. The rest of it I was running."

"Running? With those boots on your feet and that pack on your back? Are you mad, Liam?"

He grinned. "About ninety percent crackers, give or take. But tabbing's an old habit and it dies hard."

"Tabbing?" I echoed him, puzzled.

"Moving fast across country towards an objective."

I stared at him, then shook my head. "Men," I said.

He laughed and shifted on his stool as he looked around my flat.

"I like your space," he said. "It's bright. I love the colours. And I like those woodland photos you have up. And that one of the horses."

"Oh, that? Yeah. Those are the Dartmoor ponies."

"Oh, those thieving little buggers, is it? I should have guessed. Photogenic little shits. Who's this?"

I turned, saw the small framed photo of Anne that I still kept near my kettle.

"Oh," I said softly. "That's... well, that's Anne."

"Your... sister?"

I took a breath to recover from the abscess he'd so innocently lanced.

"She... would have been. She's... my ex-fiancé's sibling and was close as a twin to me. It's..."

And I sighed.

"Complicated," he finished for me, sympathetically.

"No. Sadly it's actually simple when I look back at it. Rory rated putting his cock into someone else as more important in life than his long list of promises to me. Anne was... part of the wreckage."

Liam winced. "I'm sorry."

"So was I," I said softly. "But... life, right?"

"Yes. Do you still speak to her?"

"Not often. It's... difficult."

"Sometimes it's necessary to have difficult conversations."

I stared down at my hands. It took a surprising amount of effort to unclench them.

"I don't know if I'm strong enough," I said, at last. "Losing her hurt too much. And... anyway, she's happy, and that's what matters to me. That she's okay."

I turned on the hob and put a pan down on it. The butter began to bubble and hiss; I cracked the eggs and dropped them onto the hot steel surface.

"Can I ask you something?" I said. "Please don't feel under any obligation to answer, though."

"Go ahead."

"Who is that man in the photo on your wall?"

"That was Rob - the only person who ever acted like a father to me. He died about three years ago, now."

"Oh," I said softly. "I... I didn't mean to open wounds."

"It's okay. I like to talk about him and keep his memory alive. He was my sergeant and a once-in-a-lifetime friend."

"Your... sergeant?"

"I was in the Army. You're probably a bit too young to know much about Afghanistan," he said, grinning cheekily up at me.

"I'm twenty five. Not that young any more. I know... some of it. But not much."

"You're not that old either," he said.

"Meh. I've been around the block. So... um... what did you do in the army?"

"I was what was the brass called a Combat Medical Technician."

"It sounds... important."

"In some ways, I suppose."

"So what is that then?"

"Easiest way to describe it is that I was a sort of front-line first-aider who kept the boys and girls alive until we could get them out."

"So... you were sort of like a paramedic? Like in the Ambulances?"

"Something like that. It's a good enough description. Not as well-trained according to any actual paramedic you'd ask but... I was good enough to be able to help out. Sometimes, anyway," he added, softly.

"And now? Are you with the NHS?"

"No," he said, after a pause. "I saw more than enough in Helmand to not want to see any more. I started my own business when I got out of the forces - now I clean windows. It's calm, it's outside, I can listen to my music and watch the birds, and best of all nobody's shouting at or shooting at me. I like it. It's... better for me."

"You... you don't strike me... well... I wouldn't have pegged you as a soldier. Not that I'd know, I suppose."

"We were all types."

I stared down at the bubbling butter, my mind slowly connecting the dots.

"So when you were talking about your friends and your shadows..."

"Yes," he said quietly, after a horrible, heavy silence.

"Oh," I whispered, heart suddenly aching.

I turned away from the stove and went to him and leaned forward; he twitched and took a strangled breath as I wrapped my arms around him and pulled myself against him as tightly as our position allowed me to.

"I'm so sorry," I whispered.

He made a strange soft little noise as he tentatively wrapped his own arms around me and tucked his face into my shoulder.

I felt him relax.

Just a little.

I squeezed my eyes tightly closed, focussed what tenderness I still had within me on him and him alone.

"Ella?" he mumbled, after a while.

"Mm?"

"Not that I'm complaining about the hug... because it's really, really nice... but you're burning our eggs."

"Oh. Oh shit!"

He laughed at me as I squawked and flapped at the pan, and the awkwardness dissipated like bubbles on the wind.

.:.

Slowly we became what a younger, more innocent me would have classed as good mates. We started walking together, and running together - he became a reliable partner who'd shadow me, dropping sarcastic and hilarious jargon-filled commentary on the dress, haircut, physical abnormalities etcetera of every bird, squirrel, rabbit, fox, dog, child, man or woman we encountered on our crack-of-dawn escapades.

Some of the things he'd say broke me to the point where I'd laugh until I retched; he'd stand, watching me with those heavenly blue eyes and grinning wickedly.

We started scheduling movie nights, and sundowners, and a monthly fry-up breakfast he referred to as his hibernation meal, because he always had to sleep it off afterwards.

And gradually he started to tell me bits and pieces of his life - about his early years and the three different foster families who'd viewed him solely as a source of benefit income, of his subsequent teenage delinquency and, when all avenues to any sort of future seemed closed, the chance encounter with an Army medic at a community reach-out for troubled teens that had changed his life's trajectory forever.

And he began to tell me about Afghanistan.

About how his service there had changed him again.

How he'd seen friends go out on patrol, and how he'd sometimes had to go out to bring them back - sometimes still breathing, all to often... not.

I could now sometimes almost see the ranks of the dead that he carried with him.

I'd sit beside him, legs tucked up against me, scared to breathe too loudly in case I brought him out of whatever shadow world he was traversing.

He'd speak about things he'd clearly never talked to anyone else about.

Frequently he'd have to stop, and get up, and pace.

But he'd slowly calm, and slowly keep on talking about them.

About the worst of them.

Like the the nineteen year old boy from Aberdeen who'd bled out in his arms, sobbing softly for his mum as the last of his strength ebbed away.

Or the baby-faced twenty-two year aid worker from Stoke-on-Trent who'd lost her arm and leg and eyes to a mine.

Or the three year old Afghani girl...

And I'd sit, and try my very best not to make a sound no matter how much it hurt, and sometimes all I could do was take his hand and just hold it for him, wishing I could do the same for his far-too-gentle heart.

And then, softly and obliquely, I began to tell him things about me.

Things like the darkest bits about the abuse at the hands of my father.

Or the non-stop physical bullying and body-shaming at school.

About my two suicide attempts.

And, at last, about my relationship with Rory and how I'd only discovered his cheating ways when I'd tested positive for several (thankfully curable) things and had gone through his message history on his phone while he was sleeping off a boys' night out.

( Liam had clenched his hands to fists at that; he had strong opinions about loyalty and promises)

We became one-another's crutch of sorts.

I began to depend on the knowledge that he was never, ever too tired to listen.

And slowly he began to realise that the same went for me.

My favourite thing became the Friday evenings where we'd alternate cooking and cleaning duty and then dust off an old action movie.

He'd drink bourbon, I'd drink wine, and we'd share a pile of blankets and we'd bicker and snipe good naturedly at one another as he pointed out the tactical errors in everything the protagonist did.

But then one morning he called me to cancel on me.

Because he had a date.

I spent a miserable, restless night trying very hard not to visualise him and a succession of implausibly gorgeous women. I tried to not imagine his hard, muscular body braced between their spread-eagled thighs. I desperately didn't want to think about the kisses he'd give them, the way he'd touch their bodies, the way I'd imagine he'd toy with them until they'd forgotten everything but their name...

I was completely unsuccessful.

I felt hurt. And betrayed. And abandoned. And indescribably stupid for feeling like I had the right to be any of the above.

He was a gorgeous man who I just happened to be lucky enough to have as a friend.

He had wants and needs beyond those which he wanted from me.

Obviously he was looking for... companionship beyond mine.

I sat cross-legged on my yoga mat, staring hard at my telly as it reached hour number three of an eleven-hour-long recording of the Aurora Borealis over the Swedish forests, hearing but not listening to the monotonous, repetitive synth music which backed it.

My heart was a witch's cocktail of roiling darkness.

How dare I try to claim him?

I had no right to be jealous.

Jealous of what?

Of what I'd viewed as my private time?

I didn't own him.

He was his own gorgeous, beautiful creature.

I gasped an agonized breath and fought for something positive to hold on to.

I tried to hope that he was having a good time; that he'd picked a woman who'd be as gentle with his feelings as he deserved.

I hoped he hadn't run into someone like... like me.

And as the reality of that thought worked its jagged way inward I wrapped my arms around myself and began to rock back and forward, gasping dry little sobbing breaths of despair at what I was.

I had no right to expect anything.

I'd had my chance and lost it.

It made no difference that it hadn't been my fault; not really.

It didn't matter if I was a product of my childhood or not.

Everything I'd done since had simply reinforced the fact that I wasn't long-term material.

Anonymous sex in toilets was what I deserved.

Faceless, impersonal rutting was what my future held until I was too grey and worn out to interest anyone.

There was no Liam waiting for me.

The screen blurred.

I breathed, and breathed, and breathed.

It was one in the morning.

He was probably in bed with a sated and drained woman curled up basking against him.

I hoped he was happy.

I sniffed, clambered to my feet, went and dug my half-empty bottle of low-grade cooking port out of my cupboard and began to drink it with the kind of slow, meticulous intent that can only be birthed by abject misery and a corresponding need for anaesthesia, however brief.

And, at last, I staggered to my couch and fell, half on, half off...

A latter-day Bridget Jones with no Mark Darcy to save me.

.:.

There was a knock at my door. I snorted, groaned. The flat seemed lighter.

I squinted blearily at the part-drawn blinds.

The sun was up.

Hadn't it just been night?

Another, firmer knock rattled the lock.

I groaned again, levered myself to my feet, and stumbled my way over.

"Who is it?" I mumbled.

"It's me. Liam."

"Oh."

I tugged my errant sleepwear straight, combed my hair back a bit with my fingers, and rubbed my eyes to try to wake myself up.

I fumbled at the door and pulled it partly open. Then I spat part of my fringe out of my mouth and squinted blearily up at him.

He looked tired.

Clearly he'd had fun.

I would not let that fact hurt me.