An Isolated Incident by Emily Maguire Page B

industry e-news because it made her feel bad to see people she’d been at uni with getting city and national jobs or being nominated for Walkleys. She stopped boring her friends with rants about advocacy journalism and how when she finally had a high-profile position she was going to . . . What was it she’d been going to do? End sexism, racism, homophobia and poverty? Bring about world peace? She couldn’t remember exactly. What she did remember was drinking cask wine on the floor of her share-flat and realising mid-rant that her friends were swapping cringes and side-eying the fuck out of her. She’d gone to the bathroom and in the mirror she saw a puffy, transparent, needy loser. Pathetic to reflect on it, but she’d felt that way ever since. Until Craig . . . No, fuck him. Focus.
    â€˜Seeing her in particular – someone you knew – it must have been really distressing.’
    â€˜I’ll tell you something, Miss Norman –’
    â€˜May.’
    â€˜I’ll tell you, May, there are some things a person is better off not ever knowing and what a body left wrapped in a tarp in the rain for two days smells like is one of them.’
    â€˜So when you got there she was . . .’
    â€˜C’mon now, let’s leave all that. Eat your soup before it gets cold or Aunty Jo’ll be wild.’
    After soup and garlic toast and chicken schnitzel with pasta salad, accompanied by questions about where she lived in the city, whether she’d ever been robbed, what kind of security she had on her place and what car she drove, May managed to slide in another question about Bella Michaels. The food must’ve sharpened him up though, because he said he couldn’t really tell her anything and definitely nothing on the record. She suspected he actually didn’t know much about the investigation anyway, but that was okay. The stuff he shared when she encouraged him to talk more about the town was detailed enough that she at least had a good idea now of who she needed to hunt down.
    He wouldn’t let her pay for the enormous meal, asked her if they could do it again sometime. ‘That’d be lovely,’ she said. ‘But I don’t know how long I’ll be in town. It all depends on –’
    â€˜Us doing our jobs and getting you more stuff to report.’
    â€˜Exactly.’
    â€˜Speaking of, I better get back to the station.’ He lurched forward as if for a kiss. May caught his arm and slid her hand down to force an awkward shake. ‘Ah, righto. Um, see ya.’
    He ambled off towards the street. May found the public toilets and did her best to get rid of the lunch, though it had taken so long to eat that half of it was too far gone to get back now.
    Walking to her car, she switched her phone off silent and saw she had a message. She dialled in, stopped short in the middle of the car park at the sound of his voice.
    â€˜May, it’s me.’
    Fuck. A car beeped politely, she waved and continued walking, the phone pressed hard to her ear.
    â€˜Listen, I’m sorry about that message. I had to, but . . . I need to see you. I know I said . . . Jesus, I miss you. I can’t get away for long, but maybe, I don’t know, we’ll figure something out. Um, don’t call me back, because – well, you know. I’ll, ah, try again when I can.’
    May made it to her car and collapsed into the seat. Her finger hovered over his name. But he said don’t. If she did and his wife was there it would get him into trouble and then he’d be mad at her and then . . . Fuck. She put the phone in her pocket. He’d call back. He would.
    May spent the afternoon with a man who’d lived next to Bella Michaels’ mother until her death. He had some good colour for her, but it was so embedded in endless, interconnected stories about each and every person who’d ever lived in the street and their relatives and their jobs and