The Ascendant

Chapter Thirty-Seven

‘What do you fancy eating?’

‘I don’t know, anything really.’ I hadn’t given food any consideration but Dawn had become very keen on the idea.

‘Oh, I don’t know what I want. We had pizza last night, and I don’t really fancy anything bland, I’ve got to have something with plenty of flavour. How about some thick vegetable sludge?’

‘I hope you’re not taking the piss out of my soup. I’m still recovering from the stress of that meal.’

‘Oh no, I wouldn’t dream of it dear,’ she said in mock indignation. ‘Or maybe we could have lasagne?’

‘Yeah, one of those nice ones with some dodgy looking spikes coming out of it should do the trick.’

‘Oh, just the thought of it. You are not the only one who is still recovering from that meal Ben.’

‘Yeah, yeah, all right,’ I said. ‘What do you fancy then?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe we should grab something from one of the noodle stalls in Stables market. Fancy that?’

‘Yeah, sounds great.’ It was becoming an increasingly confusing day. Dawn had seemed so far out of my league when I first met her. Well spoken. successful, confident, beautiful, elegant, trim, sassy: she was everything that all of my ex-girlfriends were not. As a new lad in town I was just grateful for her company and had no plans for any relationship with her; it simply hadn’t seemed on the cards. I squeezed her hand and walked along with her, and she responded with an affectionate, companionable smile. Christ, she looked stoned. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.

We turned into Stables market and Dawn navigated the way towards the eating area. The choice of outlets and cuisine was vast, with virtually every Asian country represented, plus a few more traditional favourites for less adventurous tastes.

Dawn chose a bowl of Vietnamese Quang while I went for the Thai equivalent. We sat and ate for the next ten minutes, Dawn becoming monosyllabic as she devoured her meal with alarming haste.

‘Sorry about that,’ she said as he wiped her mouth, the tin container having been completely emptied.

‘That’s all right,’ I said, putting my meal to one side. ‘I wasn’t all that hungry to be honest. How’s the head?’, I asked.

‘Clearing. Think the food is helping too. I’m not sure what came over me there.’

‘An acute case of the munchies, if I’m not mistaken. I still haven’t really got the hang of the correct dosages with that skunk you know.’

‘No,’ said Dawn. ‘Still, it did the job. Mmm, I think I feel better now.’

We decided to stay seated on the benches, watching the world and its weirdos go by. After discussing some of the more elaborately attired locals I told Dawn about Iain’s hot date, though I didn’t go into the grubby details which he had been good enough to share with me.

‘Sounds intriguing,’ said Dawn. ‘I never did tell you about the reason for his unusual behavioural patterns did I?

‘You mentioned it in the pub that Friday night.’

‘I touched upon it yeah. Has no-one else mentioned anything?’

‘Not a word. Certainly not Iain.’

‘Well, as I said in the pub there’s nothing sinister about it. Iain is a really nice guy  – I’ve known him for about five years now and I’ve never had any problems with him whatsoever, but you’ve got to understand his moods to know how to deal with him.’