Bay of Fires by Poppy Gee

hand. It was fresh from the Esky and cold water trickled down his arm.
    “Is that right?” She didn’t seem to care if anyone heard her.
    “They’re mad; there is a group of them going round telling everyone not to swim in the lagoon. They think it’s too close to Roger Coker’s house, and it’s hidden from the road, so therefore they deduce that’s a possible murder site.”
    Hall laughed, although he could see she was partly serious. “Are you okay?”
    “Fine. Why?”
    “Some people get posttraumatic stress disorder after seeing what you saw.”
    “I’m not as fragile as I look.” She tilted her head back and finished the last of her beer. “Help yourself when you want another.”
    They watched the park empty. The dog fight had ruined the mood. Simone Shelley smiled at Hall as she walked past him, looking for her son. Sam was with some of the older kids milling around the swings. Sam stood out, his blond good looks and substantial physique setting him apart. He was better dressed, too; his khaki shorts and T-shirt looked newer and more expensive than what the other kids wore.
    “I’m staying for a bit,” Sam told his mother. “I’ll be up in an hour.”
    Hall didn’t hear what she said, but Sam reluctantly followed her out of the park. Everyone was scared to be alone tonight. Standing with Sarah in the long twilight’s soothing dimness, Hall did not want to return to his empty room. As though she could read his thoughts, she suggested they take a nightcap down to the water’s edge.
    “And then I’ll walk you home,” she said. “It’s not safe to walk on your own in these parts. Too dangerous.”
    “Very kind of you.”
    She grinned, revealing a dimple in her cheek. His confidence had diminished since he turned forty. These days it took a dozen games of pool, sixty bucks’ worth of bourbon and Coke, and the Batman Faulkner Inn’s jukebox had to be playing the right kind of song for him to muster the courage to leave with a girl. He always went to their place, and he never brought them home. Somehow, as pointless as it was to think this, it felt a betrayal of Laura to bring another woman into what had been their bed.
    Right now Hall was far too sober to consider having sex with anyone. He liked the straight-talking country girl sitting next to him, and common sense told him to say good night. Cut his losses before he made a fool of himself.
    It was her smile that made him stay. Her smile was easy, glad, as though she had nothing more pressing on her mind than enjoying a cold beer on a warm evening.
      
    It was hard to tell how late it was. The sky above the ocean was brighter than in the city. There was a chance it was almost midnight; the sun did not set until nine o’clock and it wasn’t dark until an hour after that. The grass, rocks, and sea had melded into one. Hall looked over the ocean, drinking Sarah’s beer as he listened to the waves rolling. He couldn’t tell if Sarah was drunk; her speech was clear and she was steering the conversation. Earlier she had told him that men found her intimidating. Now she was saying she would make a good mistress.
    Hall said some silly things too which he knew, in a vague drunken way, he would regret in the morning. He told her an old story about the time he and Laura were locked inside the public toilet block in the city park. The toilets were notorious for attracting unsavory characters, and Hall had stood outside the cubicle door while Laura was in there. The caretaker, not realizing they were inside, locked the padlock. It was a winter evening, and they were stuck there for three hours, rattling the gate and calling out, until someone came past to help them. Hall had been so young then, barely thirty years old.
    It was a funny story and Sarah laughed. But what was he thinking? Everyone knew you didn’t talk about your ex-girlfriend when you were chatting up a woman.
    Sarah stood up. “Do you want to see the fishing shack where the girl who