The Christmas Bookshop(56)

‘You’d think,’ she said, without even realising what she was saying, ‘people couldn’t possibly be unhappy somewhere so beautiful.’

Oke gave her a look.

‘I thought you were unhappy,’ he said.

‘I never said that,’ said Carmen.

Oke stopped and looked puzzled.

‘No,’ he said. ‘I apologise. You did not say it.’

‘But you thought I was?’

He held up the half-price voucher and pretended to study it.

‘No.’

‘You don’t have anyone else to share that with?’ said Carmen, wondering.

He blinked.

‘Yes. But most of them are busy.’

His accent was so faint, just a slight ‘th’ sound on the ‘s’ of busy. She liked it.

‘I was busy.’

‘That’s true.’

She glanced at him.

‘Do you always literally have to tell the truth? Always?’

‘It’s just a habit,’ said Oke, looking a bit awkward.

‘Should I ask you how many people you asked before … ?’

‘So – fortunately it is just here and there’s no queue, look!’

‘Hence the voucher,’ said Carmen.

Why, she found herself thinking, did she always have to settle for the last-minute invitations? Why couldn’t anyone ask her out on a proper date, give her time to get dressed up, get excited about things? Why wasn’t she anyone’s first choice? She thought of Idra, choosing ski clothes, and tried not to look petulant.

‘Don’t be sad!’ said Oke as they entered. ‘Look. They have those flashing lights that you like.’

She stuck her tongue out at him, and decided to at least try and enjoy herself.

The Camera Obscura was in a beautiful, ancient narrow building at the top of the Lawnmarket, right next to the castle’s huge courtyard. You entered through a narrow door and filed up narrow ancient steps, diving in and out of different rooms.

Despite herself, it was fun. The sideshow exhibits were funny: forced perspective rooms that made them look big or tiny; a rather pretty light tunnel; a hall of mirrors.

This was just … going to see some lights. In her lunch hour.

She laughed in the mirror maze, where lights shimmered and changed and it was impossible to tell how big it was: an infinity of mirrors, perhaps, in the ancient house, reflecting back and back. Once they got separated you could see glimpses of the other person, but not precisely tell where they were.

The last people in front of them had carried on up the steps, and there was nobody behind them – it was very quiet – and suddenly Carmen realised in the dark sputtering maze she didn’t know where Oke was at all. She pressed herself against the side of a mirror. When she let out an involuntary giggle, it echoed throughout the space eerily. She glanced around, her heart beating faster. She could just see a flicker of his old coat, reflected over and over, but she couldn’t see where he was.

‘Where are you?’ she said, her voice bouncing off a thousand panes of glass.

‘You will have to find me … me … me.’

She spun around, sure that he was right there behind her, but there was nothing, just a flicker of a coat against the mirror, replicated into infinity in two glasses facing one another.

She stepped to the side, concentrating very hard on listening over the sounds of her breathing and her rapid heart. There was something just on the left … She leaped there and gasped as she saw a satsuma bouncing off a side mirror and onto the floor.

‘You … (you you you) Did you just throw a satsuma at me (me me)?’

‘It distracted you,’ said the voice, and she stole past the satsuma and towards anything, any tiny spot of light darting here and there, but he was absolutely nowhere to be found as she ran around columns of mirrors, the lights changing colour, disorientating her as she came face to face with herself and an empty nothingness again and again and again, and she nearly collided with the walls as she went faster and faster, running out of breath. It wasn’t possible.

‘You’ve left the room!’ she called out eventually. All she heard in response was a chuckle that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. Increasingly desperate, she spun around; where was he? And again, nothing. Crossly she hit at the wall, and made a clanging noise, then leaned against it, quite out of breath and a little spooked.

Suddenly she felt two hands across her eyes and spun around, till she was in his arms. The room went oddly still, and she was conscious of his tall presence above her, how close she was to another man for the second time in a very short space of time, who, it felt to her in that moment, was taking her for granted.

She jumped back in shock.

‘What are you doing?’ she said.

His face was absolutely stricken and he jerked his hands upright.

‘I am so sorry! I am so, so sorry! I shouldn’t have touched you! I’m so sorry!’

He looked scalded. Carmen’s anger faded almost immediately. It wasn’t his fault, was it, that she was feeling cross and undervalued and jealous?

‘You just gave me a fright, that’s all,’ she said.

‘You should have kicked me!’ said Oke. ‘I am so, so sorry.’

‘Okay, stop apologising.’