– but even those who don’t stick to the bars that are closer to where they’re staying.
I knew a few places on the edge of town because Lander would take me there. It’s not just that they’re quieter, it’s that they feel more real. The other bars will be showing football, or other sport that I don’t think the locals are too bothered about. There will be pub quizzes, or karaoke… things for tourists.
The bar Paul and I settled into was almost silent. I’ve never understood those places that have loud music all the time. Literally nobody in the history of humanity has said to their friends: ‘Let’s go out and listen to recorded music at a volume so loud, I won’t be able to hear you speak.’
Paul and I found a snug at the back of a bar. There were a handful of tourists there, but no one either of us recognised. Paul ordered a bottle of the local beer and I did the whole ‘Coke, Please,’ ‘Is Pepsi OK?’ ‘Yes’-thing.
Paul: Emma was interested in the documentary we were making, which isn’t much of a surprise. I told her a couple of things but nothing important. She kept asking whether the end was fixed.
Emma: He pretended he didn’t know what I meant, so I had to spell it out. I was asking whether he knew what happened to Alan nine years ago.
Paul: I don’t remember what I said in response to that.
Emma: He said a lot without saying anything. They’d spoken to the person who found Alan’s body, Jin the police chief, Scott and a couple of other locals that he didn’t name. I was fishing for details and wondering if I should tell him about the fake driving licence I’d found with Alan’s name and Dad’s face.
After looking through the contents of the PO box, I finally had an idea why that licence existed… but I wasn’t quite ready to admit it to myself.
Paul: I don’t remember things quite like that. She wanted to talk about the film, so we did, though she knew there was lots that I couldn’t say.
Then I mentioned that I’d heard rumours someone else had fallen off a cliff in recent days – and that’s when she said it was her dad. It was fair to say I was surprised. Speechless, probably.
Emma: I didn’t particularly want those worlds to collide – but Paul knew who I was by that point and he’d have found out about Dad sooner or later. It wasn’t that I’d gone out of my way to avoid telling him, it was that Paul and I had only seen each other once since Dad fell – and that was on the street with Scott and the rest of the crew.
I told him that Dad was awake, though he had fractures in both legs. He needed surgery and that it was likely he’d end up flying home to have it.
Paul: I didn’t want to be the one to say it.
Emma: He didn’t mention the similarity to what had happened with Alan, though he must have been thinking it.
Paul: We moved on to chatting about other things. It was either that, or go our separate ways. She told me a bit more about the shop where she works and I told her how I’d got into film-making. It was one of those talks that lasts for hours and yet, at the end, you can’t remember what you were talking about.
Emma: I didn’t tell him about prison, or the car crash. I thought about it but didn’t want to spoil the moment. I thought there was a chance he’d know, anyway. If you search for me on the internet, it’s impossible to escape stories of my sentencing.
…
I probably should have told him – but…
…
I think I probably liked him.
Paul: We left the bar and walked back through the village. It was late by then and the sun was all the way down. The market stalls had been packed away and the only sound was the vague noise of music coming from the hotel bars. I saw the village in a different way that night. It wasn’t only the front that everyone gets to see, with the all-inclusive buffets and the sun-burned tourists. It felt like a real place, with real people.
We stopped outside my hotel, tucked into the shadows underneath the palm trees where nobody could see us. It was a few degrees cooler. I held her hand.