Where There's Smoke

Kate gagged at the smell of cooked meat as they passed the hot dog and burger stalls. She held her breath until they had left them behind, and glanced at Alex. His eyes were unfocused. He walked loosely, as though he were concussed.

“Are you all right?” Kate had to repeat the question before he responded. For a moment he looked at her without recognition, then he nodded.

“Yes, sorry, I...” His voice tailed off.

“Do you want to go for a drink?” Kate asked. They had reached the park exit. In the light from the street lamps she could see how pale his face was.

“No... no, I think I... I’d just like to go home.”

Kate flagged down a taxi. They rode in silence. Alex seemed to have withdrawn into himself. He sat in a corner of the cab, staring out of the window. Lights from the street played over his face like a slow-motion strobe.

“Why would someone do that?” Kate said, unable to keep quiet any longer.

Alex shook his head.

Kate saw the figure leap into the flames, the fire collapse again. She gave an involuntary flinch. “Even if he wanted to kill himself, why pick such a — a horrible way?”

She found that her teeth were chattering a little as she spoke, although it wasn’t cold in the cab. Alex continued to stare out of the window.

“Perhaps it didn’t seem horrible to him.”

His face was in shadow. Kate couldn’t see his expression.

She knew she was beginning to sound ghoulish, but couldn’t stop herself. “But why do it like that? In front of all those people?”

She felt rather than saw Alex stir. “It was a way of getting attention. Showing everyone he was there. Perhaps he wanted to hit out at them. Or at someone in particular. Like saying, ‘Look what I’m doing, this is your fault. You made me do this’.” He was silent for a moment. “Or perhaps he wanted to punish himself.”

Kate tried to shut out the memory of the steward’s face, paralysed with horror and disbelief as he was forced to watch. She knew that no matter how bad her nightmares might be, his would be worse.

“It seems... I don’t know. Selfish, somehow.”

“Selfish?” Alex had turned to look at her.

“Doing something like that in front of so many complete strangers. Not caring what it would do to them afterwards.”

“Would they have cared about him if he hadn’t done it?”

“No, probably not, but—”

“So why should he care about them?”

The bitterness in his tone was like a rebuke. She didn’t answer.

Alex sighed. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right.”

“No, I...” He gestured, helplessly. “It just got to me a bit, that’s all.”

Kate was already regretting what she’d said. Alex rarely talked about his work, but she felt clumsy and insensitive for not anticipating how this might have affected him. Tentatively, she asked, “Have you known someone like that?”

“Once,” he said, looking back out of the window.

Lucy and Jack asked Kate over for Christmas Day, as they usually did. “Ask Alex, too,” Lucy added. “Unless you’ve both got other plans?”

Kate tried not to sound too evasive. “I haven’t. I’m not sure what Alex is doing, though.”

“Is he thinking about going to his parents’?”

“He might be, I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? Haven’t you asked him?”

“Uh... No, not yet.”

“Not yet? Don’t you think you’re leaving it a bit late?”

Kate wouldn’t meet Lucy’s eye. “I just haven’t got round to it. Anyway, I expect he’s already got his own plans.”

“And I expect he’s thinking exactly the same about you. God, you’re as bad as each other!” Lucy went to the phone, looking exasperated. “All right, what’s his number? If you’re not going to ask him, I will!”

“Don’t you dare!”

Lucy smiled, the receiver held ready.

Kate threw up her hands. “All right, all right! I’ll ask him.”

“Now?” Lucy offered her the phone.

“Tomorrow,” Kate said, firmly.

She told herself it was ridiculous to feel nervous, but that didn’t make her feel any less so as she waited to broach the subject the next night. The theatre bar they were in was festooned with gaudy green and red baubles and tinsel. Christmas was inescapable, no matter how much you tried.

“Are you going to Cornwall for Christmas?” Kate asked finally, giving up any attempt at subtlety.

“Cornwall?”

“To your parents.”

“Oh! Oh... yes, probably, I expect.” He gave an unenthusiastic smile. “Have to carve the turkey and listen to the Queen’s speech, and everything.” He paused. “What about you?”

Kate tried to sound unconcerned. “Lucy and Jack have invited me over. They wondered if you wanted to go as well, if you hadn’t already got something lined up. But I said you probably would have.”

“For Christmas Day?” He sounded surprised.

“Yes, but it’s all right. We thought you’d be spending it with your family.”

The chime sounded for the start of the next act. Kate finished her drink. “We’d better go back in,” she said, and blamed the flatness she felt on the poorness of the play.

It was two days later when Alex phoned. “Looks like I’ve been ditched at Christmas,” he told her. “My mother rang last night and asked if I minded if they went away instead. A last-minute offer from friends in Spain.”