A Thin Line

Pierce watched the shards of colour knife over the surface of the table as he sullenly pushed and prodded his glass through puddles of spilt beer. The brilliant prismatic hues at odds with the cracked varnish and beer-stained wood. Light and dark. Two sides of a coin. A chance meeting. Fate. Bollocks.

“Hi, Pierce, thought I’d find you here. What you smiling about?”

Pierce looked up at the woman pulling a chair from his table and making herself comfortable as she hit him full in the face with ‘that’ look.

“Hi Connie, take a seat why don’t you,' he said. “You haven’t changed a bit.”

“Hey, I’ve missed you too, sweetheart.”

“You want a drink?”

“Sure, Pierce – why not?”

“Beer?”

“Jesus, no. A glass of wine, I think.”

Pierce shrugged and brought the drinks over, placing them between the puddles on the table.
 Connie didn't look up, busy opening a box of matches for the cigarette dangling from her lips, its filter stained by red lipstick. Details. 

“You never called me, Pierce.”

Pierce re-focused. He never could work out how she managed to talk with a fag in her mouth.

“Was I supposed to?”

Connie shrugged as a match burst into flame. Pierce sat down and watched the familiar ballet begin. The cigarette flare, a quick shake of the wrist, match killed and disposed of, eyes unfocused on the ceiling, smoke drawn deep. Greta Garbo re-born. It was her escape from reality. He wondered what his escape might be.

“Hey Pierce, you weren’t under no orders, but I would’ve appreciated it,” she said, blowing smoke into his face.

“Hell, I was going to, would’ve,” Pierce coughed. “Jesus, why the hell don't you stop smoking, fer Christ's sake?”

Connie ignored him, waiting for his answer. Knowing she wouldn't be denied, he waved a defeated hand towards the darkness outside and towards the bridge spanning the Thames, “I would have. After tonight.”

Connie sighed. “Listen, you dick. You’ve been inside for four years and the first thing you do is come back here.”

“Yeah, had to.”

Connie stared at him without sympathy. Pierce turned away and gritted his teeth. Condensation pooled into rivulets on the cracked windowpane and flowed down, perhaps weeping for the crime of allowing light to spill out into the darkness. In mocking memory of a young face smiling up at him, innocently taking his hand. She'd been just thirteen. He looked up and out through the dirt stained glass of a window. He noted his reflection. A man past his prime, three days worth of stubble, shoulders slumped. Defeated.

How she had trusted him. That trust was undeserved, wiped out in the shadows beneath that bridge. Her carefree young life a reflection in the mad eyes of her rapist, bathed in the light from this crummy café.

“Pierce!”

Connie’s voice snapped him back into reality.

“You have to break this obsession, Pierce.”

“I don’t think I can.”

“Stop this. Right now. You do anything again and they’ll throw away the key.”

“I can’t help myself, Connie. You know that. I have to look for them. I know who they are, I can recognise them.”

Pierce was desperate for some understanding, but her expression was hard. At least she hadn’t walked out on him. Yet.

Connie was special. One of the girls who earned their living from under this very bridge. Not many things shocked Connie. Once, she had even tried to entice him. Considering him a potential punter as he wandered the area where she worked. Then she had ignored him. But gradually she discovered what drove him. Then began to help him. Gradually they became friends. Then lovers.

Pierce buried his face in his hands as images again flared into his mind. A terrified girl pleading as brutal hands beat her into submission. Connie drew his hands away from his face.

“Come home with me. Leave this place. Let me help you.”

Pierce snorted. “They tried to help in stir, but what can they do? What do they really know? Fucking nothing.”

“You did what you did, Pierce. I know that. We all do what we have to.”

Pierce slumped back in his chair and stared out towards the bridge and nodded.
 A heavy silence built between them. He wondered if Connie would wait, or lose patience and walk away. He wouldn’t blame her. Part of him even wanted her to walk. Slender fingers entwined with his and Pierce looked up.

“What’s going on beneath that bridge right now, Connie?”

“You can’t stop it happening again, Pierce. You can’t be everywhere.”

“She was so young, Connie. Nobody deserves that. She trusted me. Where was I when he took her? Why wasn’t I there to stop it happening?”

“But you caught the bastard, Pierce. Those months you spent watching for him eventually paid off. Yes, they sent you down, but it was all they could do in the circumstances. Do it again, and you’ll go down for life. Come home with me. The world can do with one less vigilante on the streets tonight.”

Pierce downed his beer, placing the glass in the middle of the largest beer puddle. He nodded imperceptibly. They left the café, the darkness and the bridge behind them. For now at least. But he knew he would be back. Another bastard was out there, hunting for thrills. There always was. With Connie and her girls' help, he might make a difference.