AN EMPTY BOTTLE and Other Tales

AN EMPTY BOTTLE When the south-westerly blows, the sea is stirred with excitement and the white tops wear their caps rakishly. On the beach, people relax instinctively after a week of summer heat. Autumn is welcome. We’ve been coming here, Janice and I, for the past three years, since that amazing day when she walked into my life. Almost exactly three years, as it happens, since Dave said, ‘James, I don’t believe you’ve met Janice’. She walked into my life—and now she has walked out of it. We come to this little restaurant with its panoramic view of the Indian Ocean—I suppose I should say we used to come, because Janice was, in her usual direct way, quite calmly determined. ‘Yes, I know, James—it’s been good. But good things come to an end, don’t they?’ I think I said, ‘why?’ If it’s good, why stop? I’d expected permanency. I hadn’t imagined that I was a temporary filling for a gap in her life. She didn’t answer my question—my stupefied question. Honestly, I hadn’t expected this. Between us, the table held the debris of our meal—plates, wineglasses, cutlery, an empty wine bottle. A waiter appeared as I was struggling for something to say that wouldn’t lower me in my own estimation. I would have liked to roar my pain. But I don’t think Janice does pain. The table debris disappeared, balanced precariously, leaving only the wine bottle. Stupidly, because I didn’t know what to say at a time like this, I nodded towards it. ‘Would you like another?’ She was getting ready to go, and shook her head. ‘Better if I just leave.’ She regarded me thoughtfully for a moment. ‘Look after yourself, James. You’re quite a special person, you know.’ ‘But not quite special enough.’ Briefly she shook her head and was gone. She was gone, and I hadn’t even stretched out a hand to stop her. I saw her through the window, getting into her car, reversing out, turning and leaving. No one could tell, I was thinking, that anything, anything had just taken place, here in this little restaurant that we had both enjoyed. I wondered what I could have done to prevent it. Was it my fault? Am I so boring? She had never given me any idea that she found me so. I didn’t think we were incompatible, but how can you tell? Even with someone you thought you were really close to, understood thoroughly, loved to distraction—how can you tell what the other is thinking?