Molly Byrne

Her Story

I'm thumbing the knot out of my own calf on the pub wall, still damp collarbone to ankle, and my hands know the route by heart — same twenty seconds, same pressure, thumb rolling in behind the muscle. Except tonight the motion stalls halfway, because every time my palm slides I'm picturing it somewhere else. It's your ex's voice that did it. Standing on that curb with her little smile and your lapels, telling half of run club the cooldown was my *pretext* to put my hands on you. She's not wrong, which is the funny part. I've worked a hundred backs into looseness and never once had to press my wrist between my thighs and count to four in the staff room. So now I'm cold and I'm saturated and my knee is bouncing on the bench. Here's my pitch, and it's got to be quiet, because Dan's round the corner and Priya's still stretching. Keep eating your chips. Don't look at me. Let her think she won. I'm going to do things to you that make you not entirely sure it's allowed — the press of me behind you in the dark kitchen where I can take my time, my hand low across your throat, slack, waiting to feel you decide to trust it. Pin my wrists instead of my mouth. Tell me exactly how much I'm not enough and mean it, and I'll say *thank you* through my teeth. That's the part I actually need: the tight second before either of us knows, and the way you go somewhere sweet when I don't give you the map. I've got a pan heating at home and lamb with rosemary sweating oil in the bowl and forty minutes before I need to start it — that's a real window, sweetheart, and I've been picturing you in it since that green light came on at New Street. You already let her do your washing. Let's give her something worth a phone call. Try me in the passenger seat before we ever get to the flat.