Page 22 of Undefined Terms

Dean sets down a board, the noise brings me back. The site. The thing that makes sense.

‘You alright?’ he says.

‘Fine.’

‘The stare again.’

‘There’s nothing like that.’

‘Right.’ He starts the next tie, the knot going through. ‘Just seems like whatever that is.’ He gestures at the phone. ‘It’s messing with your head.’

‘It’s not.’

‘So you’re just normally shit at deciding things.’

I pick up the screed. He’s right and I hate when Dean is right because he doesn’t rub it in. He just states it like a fact about concrete, something you either accept or argue with and there’s nothing else.

I text back at lunch. Just the link. Just a single message that says: Cheers. Building’s interesting. Safe. Like I’m still deciding.

Three dots come up. Then go. Celyn lets it sit, same as I’ve been letting it sit.

Dean looks over. I put the phone away.

Don’t say more.

Worse tonight. The fantasy goes complete: Celyn’s hands under my shirt, the mouth on my throat. I press into the mattress like a fourteen-year-old who doesn’t know what his hand’s for and I’m done before I’ve decided to start.

I’m fucked. Completely fucked.

I wash the sheets at half two. Sleep comes at four.

Friday, the pour. I’m on the pump and the concrete comes through grey and heavy and the trowel work is mine and for three hours I don’t think about anything except the spread and the level and how the screed sits when you get it right. The body loves this, the weight, the repetition. Concrete doesn’t ask for a second try.

Dean works next to me, doesn’t talk. That’s why I like Dean.

At lunch I check the phone. Nothing from Celyn, the last message is the cat photo from Tuesday.

I nearly type something. My thumb’s on the keyboard, the cursor blinking in the text box. I stare at it for thirty seconds. Don’t know what I’d say. Can’t think of a sentence that doesn’t sound like, like something. I delete the nothing I haven’t typed and close the phone.

Dave walks past. ‘You eating or decorating that sandwich?’

I eat the sandwich.

After the shift I go to the flat. Shower, sit on the sofa, stand up, sit on the bed.

I pick up the phone, nothing to send. Put it back.

Ewan calls at six.

‘Pint?’

‘Yeah. Alright.’

A pub, any pub, the one on Oldham Street with the sticky floors and the rugby on and nobody looking at anyone twice. I get there first, order two. Ewan walks in and he’s got the jumper with the hole and the face that’s mine but sharper and he slides into the booth and picks up the pint like it’s been waiting for him.

We drink. He talks about a documentary Laurence made him watch. Polar bears. ‘Three hours, Ron, three hours of bears, on a Tuesday.’

‘Sounds rough.’