nothing I could do to stop myself.
'I'm sorry if I disturbed you,' the visitor said gently. 'I'm lost.'
What kind of a species can travel halfway across the universe and then get lost in Dreighton I found myself wondering silently? I didn't dare say anything even remotely facetious.
'Where are you trying to get to?' I asked instead.
'I'm looking for Lime Street ,' the alien replied politely. 'I'm supposed to be meeting a friend there.'
Again I found myself staring at the creature in front of me. It had obviously seen many more humans than I had aliens and I sensed that I was of little reciprocal interest. Its baby-blue eyes quickly scanned my face and the thin lips of its small, delicate mouth gently curled at the corners again. I'd heard that the aliens had two separate sexes in much the same way we do and I guessed that this one was female. There was something about its movements and mannerisms that was innately feminine.
'You're a long way off,' I said, eventually remembering to reply. 'Lime Street 's on the other side of town.'
'Oh,' she said quietly.
'When I say you're a long way off,' I continued, blabbering like an idiot, 'I'm talking relatively. It's only half a mile away.'
I was talking before thinking. A bad mistake that was making me look like an idiot. What kind of ambassador was I for my species?
'I don't understand,' the alien said. 'I don't know what you mean.'
There I was, talking to a visitor from the other side of the galaxy who had been speaking English for just a few weeks and who was speaking it like an expert. I, on the other hand, had been using the language for more than twenty years and yet I was still having trouble making myself understood.
'What I meant to say,' I explained sheepishly, 'was that the distance to Lime Street is nothing compared to the distance you've travelled to end up here.'
She nodded. No smile this time.
'I see.'
There followed a long, awkward and humourless silence.
'So can you tell me how to get there?' the alien asked hopefully.
'What? Oh, yes,' I stammered, feeling my face redden. 'Sorry, it's just that I wasn't expecting to...'
'To what?'
I didn't know what to say. Instead I began to direct the alien across town.
'Take a right, follow the high street until you reach the junction with the road to Fordham. Turn left and Lime Street is the second road on your right.' 'Thank you,' she said and she turned and began to walk away.
'So how are you finding it here?' I asked, shouting after her. I instinctively wanted her to stay a little longer. I would have been disappointed if my first conversation with an alien had ended as completely unrewarding and embarrassing as it had begun.
She turned back and smiled again.
'When you say here,' she began, 'are you talking about the town or the planet?'
'Either,' I replied. 'Both.'
She sighed and thought for a moment before answering.
'I don't know how to answer honestly without offending you...' she said.
'Just offend me then,' I interrupted.
'Your planet is fine, but it's not what I'm used to. It's not my home, is it?'
Although her use of the word 'fine' annoyed me because it made my planet sound nondescript and barely adequate, I understood what she was trying to say.
'Of course it isn't,' I agreed.
'Don't get me wrong, I like what I've seen here,' she continued, 'but I'd rather be back home.'
'How long will it be before you get back?'
'A year and a half, maybe longer.'
'And how does that make you feel?'
'Desperate,' she replied, before turning and walking away again.
I watched the alien disappear and thought about her constantly until Joe finally emerged from the warehouse.
Chapter 14
By seven o'clock that evening I was restless and bored. The day was in danger of ending as dishearteningly lonely and quietly as it had begun. Everyone seemed to have something to do except me. I was too tired and it was too late to do any more work at Porter Farm, Rob still hadn't come back from wherever it was he'd gone to, Siobhan was visiting her parents and just about everyone else I could think of were at home with their families. Leaving the rat-race behind seemed to have had a strange and unexpected side-effect on my life in that I had become a misfit of sorts. Without the normality of a regular routine to base my life around I was free to stay up late or go to bed