more than a metre apart since infancy; she rather thought not. And yet, they always shouted to each other as though they were miles away.
Until they set eyes on Ruth. They were silent enough then. For a moment.
“Well, well!” Cameron grinned. His smile was too wide for his narrow face, so he looked like a cartoon character, mouth pasted over hollow cheeks. He sauntered over to Ruth and Hannah’s table, flattening his palm against the varnished wood. He leaned over Ruth and said, “Look what we have here.”
“Gentlemen,” Hannah murmured. “My sister and I are waiting for the cheque.”
“Gentlemen,” Will mocked, making his voice high and tight. He came to stand beside Cameron, folding his arms and thrusting his hips forward. “Hello, Hannah. How’s your stick?”
Hannah released the sort of exhausted sigh she typically reserved for misbehaving toddlers and did not answer.
Ruth stared dully at a crumb on her plate and tried to unlock her latent mutant powers. She knew she had some. They should come out under moments of extreme stress. Surely, if she could teleport or, say, tear a man’s head from his body, that ability would make itself known now?
“You know,” Will continued, smirking over at Hannah. “Your stick.”
“Yes,” Hannah drawled. “The stick up my arse. Don’t worry, Will; I understand the joke.”
The two men guffawed together, as if they hadn’t told that ‘joke’ a thousand times over the last ten years at least.
Then Cameron turned his attention back to Ruth. His eyes roamed the front of her oversized hoodie until they settled on the place where he judged her breasts to be. Leering at a body he couldn’t see, Cameron said softly, “When you gonna give me a ride, babe?”
Ruth looked up at him, her face blank, her eyes dead. “You know the rules. I only fuck guys with money.”
Under the table, Hannah kicked her in the shin. Ruth ignored it.
Cameron straightened, his too-wide smile impossibly wider. “I’ve got money,” he said, making sure his voice carried.
“So have I,” Will said, more quietly. Because he was married.
Neither of them saw the manager coming over to their table, but they jumped slightly as the big man cleared his throat.
Walt Greengage put his big hands on his skinny hips and gave all four of them—Ruth, Hannah, Cameron, Will—a hard look. Then he said, “You ladies paid your bill?”
Ruth sighed. She reached into the deep pocket of her tracksuit bottoms and found a couple of twenty-pound notes. The bill was £23.65. She threw both notes onto the table and stood, unable to even look at Hannah. “We’re going.”
She and Ruth left the café in silence and stalked through the town centre in the same state. Only when they were far, far from Greengage did Hannah speak.
“Why do you let them do that?”
Ruth turned to face her sister. They were standing in the shadow of the town’s yarn shop, on a side street that not many frequented. Hannah would choose this for a confrontation, if she was too angry to wait for a completely private space.
“Are you blaming me for that?” Ruth asked.
Hannah’s dark eyes flashed. Her sensible shoes tapped against the gravel street, heel to toe, one after another. This meant that Hannah was furious and holding it back.
“You know I’m not blaming you,” Hannah said tightly. “But I do wish you would stand up for yourself instead of… instead of goading them!”
Ruth shrugged. “Why?”
“Self-respect, that’s why!”
“I respect myself just fine.” Ruth started walking again, slower than before, since standing still was difficult when her mind was busy. It felt like clinging to a hot air balloon’s tether, trying to hold it down with nothing but her bodyweight. It was far more sensible to let the balloon fly.
Hannah followed, her heels clicking sharply against the pavement. “You think I don’t know that you’re punishing yourself?”
Guilt plunged into Ruth’s chest, a sharp, barbed arrow. “Someone has to.”
“Someone has. So you can stop.”
“I don’t want to worry you, Han. That’s not what I want.”
“I almost wish I hadn’t noticed,” Hannah said, her voice suddenly soft. “I almost wish I’d stayed distant.”
That was what they called it. Distant. Words like depressed were for girls with English mothers.
“Don’t say that.” Ruth realised that she was rubbing her own hands—wringing them, people said—and made herself stop, even though the action was calming. “I don’t understand why we can’t just leave,” she burst out.
“Because this is our town,” Hannah snapped back. “Your town. Just as much as it is theirs. It’s our home, and we’re