Tonight, there will be no.

Walking up the staircase of the now converted Victorian home, he noticed something. Stalling at the top, he scaled in on a familiar face. He took another glance, and yes, it was her. Carol had been a friend at varsity. They had been in the same circle. At the time she had had a boyfriend. A useless specimen of a man who treated her less than well. Looking back he remembered her as the lap dog. Agreeable and dismissive, she almost enjoyed the sideways jibes and overt flirting that was dished out daily. But now, standing alone with a beer in hand wearing a tightly fitted leather jacket and ass-hugging jeans, she was confident. Confidence that was bordering on arrogance. He liked.

Over at the bar he ordered a beer – the same as hers. Casually he made his way over to where she was standing. She had her back to him. For a moment he stared at the slick brown hair that had been neatly plied back into a pony. He remembered that hair, and it hadn’t changed. A tap on the shoulder was all it took. She turned around. He held his breath. And in that instant something changed. The moment her face became visible, he changed. From pasty to red and she noticed. Silence.

Verbally he stumbled. She said something. He didn’t hear. After what seemed like five minutes of silence, he made a second attempt.

“Hi, it’s Jack!”, he blurted.

Her face didn’t give any indication of whether or not she remembered him. Inside he curled.

“Hi Jack”, she said, with a tone that echoed her nonchalant stance.

Silence. The dimly lit bar didn’t show it, but his face was now an even deeper shade of red. Almost purple. He curled again, still vacantly aware of the silence that lay between them.

“From varsity, I was mates with Mike”.

“Jack!” she shouted.

The people beside flinched. He winced. Did she really remember him? He wasn’t sure.

A further five minutes in and it was obvious that she knew who he was. She talked and he stared. Flicking between her lips and her eyes, he noticed something. A thinly etched horizontal scar just below her left eye. It crinkled when she smiled. He wondered if it had been there before. Maybe now, on the precipice of something more, he had become hyper-aware.  In mid-sentence he smiled. For no apparent reason she smiled back. The scar crinkled. He shivered. To him it was more than just a smile. Not only did it sparkle, tickling his heart with effervescence, but in it he saw something more. A future. And in that moment he made a promise. Tonight, there would be no fucking.