Those first few days, when Book Boy sat in the bar, were the first of many. He never drank anything, but he devoured the complimentary sweets like they were going to disappear at any moment.
He was the kind of customer places like this usually detested. He sprawled across the table for hours on end but never spent a penny. If it weren't for the steady stream of girls he attracted, I imagined Kelly would have kicked him out days ago.
As it was, he'd become like a piece of the furniture, silent but unignorable. We'd taken to calling him Book Boy since he hadn't offered his name and none of us were brave enough to ask him it. It wasn't just that he was attractive, it was the way he held himself. His eyes focussed on the book in front of him so intently, that it felt like a violation to interrupt him.
After two weeks of ogling, Callum's interest had waned to the point that he had started to pay attention to the other customers again. A fact many would wish wasn't the case, if they knew the things he said about them.
"Can you believe what that girl's wearing? She looks like she's been dragged out some 50s abstinence advert," Callum said with disdain as a girl walked in and made her way towards a small huddle by the window. They'd positioned themselves so they had the perfect view of Book Boy, but the perfect hiding place to spy from. I'd seen them move several times before they'd settled on that perfect spot.
Emma tried to hide her smile at Callum's comment. It wasn't in her nature to be so harsh, but Callum had a way of drawing it out of her.
"I like her hairband," Emma added, as if trying to find something to compliment her on. Even if she couldn't hear it.
"What do you think, Anna?" Callum piped up.
I looked at the girl I was supposed to be slating. She was just another girl, but there were definitely parts of her that screamed Mary-Sue. That shiny brown bob, the cute Mary-Janes, the butter-wouldn't-melt face and Alice in Wonderland hairband. I felt a flare of anger and sneered at the utter sweetness she encapsulated. Sickly sweet.
The itch within reared its ugly head.
"I bet she's so innocent she sleeps with her legs crossed, just in case," I said as a bitter taste settled on my tongue. I could feel it seeping up my throat and on it I tasted the truth.
I wasn't angry at this girl. I didn't know her. Yet, just looking at her, I couldn't help the jealousy, hurt and shame that rose to the surface. She was everything I would never be. She was the type of girl who looked down on me the most when my secrets came out. I wanted her innocence and the respect it would command later in her life. I'd lost mine and with it went the respect of my friends and family, even myself.
I stared down at my black coffee as Callum and Emma laughed at my comment. All I could see was my own reflection on the dark surface. I wondered, if I tied my dark hair back in a hair band, could I rewind the clock, or at least pretend my past had never happened? If I wiped the mascara and eyeliner away, would I look like the wide-eyed girl I used to be?
Could I fake it?
I took another glance at the reflection on the coffee's surface and knew that, even if I was the greatest actress on earth, I could never be like that girl. I could never fake it enough to fool those around me. That thought hurt more than I realised it would, so I stayed silent for the rest of the day.
My mood wasn't any lighter as I walked through the supermarket after my shift. I idly filled my basket with an array of ready meals and dried packet mixes. In a world of endless dietary factions, I had chosen to belong to whichever was cheap, quick and easy. I added a handful of fruit and vegetables to ward off vitamin deficiency.
I smirked as I saw a couple rifling through the bags of peppers, trying to find the perfect combination of colours. I never did that. I rarely bothered looking at what I was picking up. I didn't enjoy food as much as I used to. It was just sustenance, and I saw little point in spending precious time and money on it.
One item I did splurge on was the new bag of dry cat food I picked up for Nightmare. She'd been visiting more often recently, so I wanted to have something decent for her to eat.
As I waited to pay at the checkout, I picked up a trashy magazine. Reading about someone else's poor fashion choice or hapless love life was bound to lift my mood.
"You work at that bar, don't you?" a disembodied male voice sounded over my shoulder, and for a moment I assumed they were talking to someone else. The busy cashier gave me a pointed look, indicating I was the person who was meant to reply.
I turned slightly, trying to look past my hair. The mass of brown waves blocking my eyeline. I twisted and my view was met by a chest, a black t-shirt hidden under a check shirt.
I looked up to find Book Boy staring down at me. His dazzling face was friendly and open, a half smile playing on his lips as he waited for my reply.
"Yes," I blurted, stunned to actually hear him speak, before turning back towards the cashier and placing my items on the conveyor belt.
"I thought I recognised you, so I thought I'd say hi. I'm Atticus," he continued. I don't know what I'd expected him to sound like, but this wasn't it. His voice was deep and rough, as I'd imagined, but almost musical too. No 'ums' or 'ahs' punctuating the flow of words.
I rolled his name around in my mind.
Atticus.
It felt wrong to say a name like that in a place like this. I lived in a world of Toms, Bens, and Dannys. Never an Atticus. As if he needed anything else that set him apart from the rest of us mere mortals.
He paused again, and I saw the cashier smirk slightly at my ineptitude.
"Anna," I said, my voice sharp and curt. It sounded positively bland in comparison.
He laughed softly, a sort of deprecating sound that didn't seem to fit with his confident stance.
"Not much of a conversationalist, are you?"
I bristled slightly. Perhaps from nerves, or perhaps because I was out of my comfort zone. At the bar I could laugh and chat and be the persona I'd built there. Here, in the middle of some discount supermarket, I wasn't sure how to act.
"That depends on the topic," I retorted. "I spend 40 plus hours a week at the bar, so talking about it on the few hours I get away from it, isn't particularly high on my to do list."
I moved along the queue as I talked. Book Boy followed fluidly behind, placing two sharing bags of Skittles and a large bottle of Coke behind my items. I briefly wondered if he ever ate anything else or just existed on sugar and E numbers.
"£34.43," the cashier said as she started to fill the bags for me. She clearly thought I had more important things to do.
"So, what kind of topic would warrant a conversation?" Book Boy pressed. Even though I refused to look, I could almost feel him leaning over me as I thumbed through the money I'd had stuffed in my pocket. His rich spicy aroma drifted around me. He smelt like cinnamon and sweet leather.
"If you don't know that then you probably shouldn't be having the conversation in the first place," I countered as I handed over two £20 notes.
He chuckled. I listened for the hard edge of frustration or politeness, but there was none.
The cashier rose her eyebrows as she handed me back my change. Her eyes refused to look at me, as if one glance would turn her to stone. I wondered if that was the girl I was outside the bar. Some scary difficult person, hard and unyielding without the softening influence of Emma, Cal and Kelly.
"Thanks," I mumbled, as I threw the change into the animal charity bucket and picked up my things.
I didn't look behind me as I left the store. I didn't socialise with people outside the bar, unless I counted Gina, which I didn't. I wasn't about to break that rule now.
My leather boots created a heavy thud as I walked home. A metronome beat while the two heavy bags crinkled at my sides with every step. I'd just rounded the corner off the main road, when I heard a second set of steps following closely behind.
They were heavier than my own and further apart.
I picked up my pace. The sun had set a couple of hours ago and the dim yellow light of the streetlamps always made me feel uneasy. This part of town was rough during the day, but at night it was worse.
The footsteps were closer now. I dared to glance behind me. The darkened figure was stalking up my street, swift steps chasing me down with ease. One hand was stuffed in their pocket while the other wielded something long and thick.
I saw my door just a few houses away and fumbled to bunch my keys in my palm, one protruding from between my fingers. I knew it probably wouldn't be much use if I ever got attacked, but I felt better having it there anyway.
My breathing hitched as I turned into the small front yard attached to the house. I expected whoever was following me to just keep walking, as if there was an invisible forcefield extending from the front wall, but they didn't. Instead they followed.
"Can I help you?" I snapped as I spun to face them. I'd tried flight, so it seemed fight was the only other option.
"What exactly do I need help with?" Book Boy asked playfully as he pulled down his hood and stepped into the yellow glow of the streetlight.
I looked down at the bottle of Coke in his hand and felt myself blush. My embarrassment didn't last long before it was replaced with suspicion. Just because he wasn't a truncheon wielding psychopath, didn't make following me home any less weird.
"Are you stalking me now? Because first you spend all day at the bar. Next, you're at the supermarket. And now, you're following me home," I interrogated, my eyes tightening as he seemed to suppress a smirk.
"Very suspicious, aren't you?" It didn't sound like a question.
"You haven't exactly said no."
"I haven't said yes either," he quipped quickly. He pulled out a set of keys. "I live in 11B."
I looked at the door beside mine. It was for the flat above.
"Oh," I felt myself gape for a moment or two.
"See you tomorrow, Anna," he said as he slid his key into the aged brass lock.
"Why?"
"I'm your stalker, aren't I?" he grinned, as he pushed the door open with ease and disappeared behind it.
I heaved my own door open, throwing my weight against it. As I wrestled with my bags and the heavy door, I wondered how he had made it look so easy. I caught the door with my foot, in an attempt to stop if slamming behind me, but the sheer weight of it made a loud echoey thud resound through the flat.
I thought of the how silent Book Boy and his girl had been since moving in, and the inherent noise these houses produced without any human intervention, and I decided there and then that there was definitely something odd about the beautiful boy with the book.
Atticus.
Following our conversation, the weekend passed by quietly. Figuratively and literally. Book Boy was as silent as ever in the flat above me, and that fact was just as unnerving as it was before. He must have been six foot two, maybe three, how could a guy that size walk around without making a sound? And where was the music, the TV, the aggravated shouting at the computer screen or the console? What twenty-something guy spent his weekend in silence? And the girl, where was she? Where was the endless drone of a hairdryer, or rhythmic resonance of heels on wood?
These niggling questions were what had led me out to the yard, loitering until Gina came out for her hourly cigarette.
"No work today?" She jumped straight into conversation and for once I was relieved.
"No, back in tomorrow."
"Pity, bonny lass like yourself working all hours. You should be out enjoying yourself." She paused briefly as she took a drag, speaking through the exhale. "What do you think of the new neighbours then?"
"Quiet."
"Are they? Can't say I've noticed." She took another puff. "Then again my hearing's not what it used to be."
"Maybe it's just me," I murmured as I fiddled with my fingernails. Picking at the chipped dark nail polish. "You said there's two of them?"
"Yes. There's that tall dark-haired lad and a blonde lass. Very pretty but she looks a bit stuck up if you ask me."
Another drag.
"Do you know what they do?" I queried because I knew she'd know. She knew everything about this street.
Book boy, Atticus, had been in the bar every day since they moved in so either he could work anywhere, or he didn't work. The latter was more likely in this part of town, but his clothes and demeanour suggested otherwise.
"I don't know, actually. The dark-haired boy's gone most days, but I think I've only ever seen the girl a handful of times."
I glanced at the dark window of the flat above as I leant against the far wall. It must have been the kitchen because there was a door beside it that opened onto the small balcony that sat on top of my bathroom. I couldn't see into the flat. There was just the reflection of the grey sky and the houses opposite, but as I looked, I felt a shiver run down my spine. Like I was being watched.
I jumped as I heard the metallic ping of Gina stubbing out her cigarette butt on the metal edge of her balcony. I tore my eyes from the window and watched her toss the butt into an overflowing plant pot she had stashed beside her chair. It soon tumbled down the pile and into next door's yard.
"T'rah for now, pet," she called as she went back inside. "Don't be feeding that cat. You'll get fleas," she shouted over her shoulder.
"Yes, Gina." I smiled slightly as I heard her shuffle away, closing her door behind her. As she did Nightmare dropped over the wall and circled my feet. Almost like she had waited for Gina to leave before coming into the yard. I ran my hands over her small frame. I could feel the angular edges of bones through her skin. I made a mental note to put more food down for her in future.
I stood outside for a few moments more as Nightmare purred at my feet. I don't know what I expected to happen. Maybe Book Boy or the girl would come outside, we'd talk, and I'd realise I was just being paranoid. Or maybe I'd hear talking or the sound of cooking, and I'd know the lack of noise was just the result of excellent soundproofing and modern engineering.
Either way, I got neither. Not a peep nor a clatter. Just silence.
I walked back into the flat with Nightmare tootling in front. I slammed the kitchen door behind me a little louder than necessary, as if demonstrating the noise people were supposed to make. I half hoped to hear something in reply, but there was nothing. Just the same unearthly silence.