Cross Country Murder Song by Philip Wilding

running a finger through the sweat gathering in the small of his back. She looked across at him and knew it was his way of warning her off, letting her know that this was something that would not last, that he would go back to her sister, just not then (though he was gone within the hour and always would be), but inevitably, ultimately. That’s where his life was. He said that so much that it became like a mantra to both of them as if once he left home and came to her that it was in some kind of hinterland, that their actions weren’t concrete in this world, that their fucking was without consequence. That there need not be an outcome to this, it was set in time, like a bug caught in amber.
    She thought about this as she looked at her bandaged hand. Her thumbs were uneven – or had been – with a bulb of flesh making an imperfect line on her left hand. She’d all but forgotten about it until Kory touched her for the first time (discreetly and at a safe distance from the house) and she’d felt him flinch when his hand had bumped against it. He’d disguised his reaction quickly and smiled as he kept looking from the house to her and told her how he felt about her, how he’d always felt. She wasn’t stupid enough to believe him, but she wanted to believe something. Her sister came out of the house and he placed his hand back in his lap and smiled at her again and then he stood up to embrace his approaching wife.
    Their affair started soon afterwards. Christmas had passed, but winter still lingered long into the New Year. The snow was still on the ground when she first made love to him; she did wonder later whether it was making love for him too or just fucking. Even later still she’d feel silly and girlish for even allowing herself to ever think that; he was fucking her against the wall of a generic motel room in a building that looked like it had fallen out of the sky and landed near the highway, and in his memory he always would be.
    Cosy, she thought to herself as she tried not to think about the orange bedspread or the lifeless-looking carpets as she first entered the room. Dull light played through the window as he produced a bottle of whisky from his bag and went down the corridor to find some ice. She’d enjoyed it and him, though, despite herself. The sex was good and playful, sometimes rough. She found herself smiling as she sat across him and was happy to feel his weight pushing against her as he covered her body with his. She’d had a mole removed from near her mouth next. It was strange to look at herself in the mirror and not see her hand move to it any more, to caress it lightly and wonder what she would look like without it. Now she knew; there was less of her, there was nothing to see, no punctuation to her face any more, she thought, and then wondered what had made her think that.
    You look different, her sister said to her, and for a moment she panicked and thought that guilt and satisfaction really could be seen set across someone’s face. Your mole, her sister said, and she looked at her again more directly as if trying to balance the two halves of her face: before and after. I liked your mole, her sister said again. Why did you get rid of it? She didn’t know, she said, then she said, a mole can indicate cancer, you know. Her sister, a hint of hysteria creeping into her voice leant forward and said in a stage whisper, Your doctor thought you had cancer? She shook her head. No, she said, the doctor never thought that.
    They were sitting on high stools at a corner of a bar that neither of them had been to before. There was a silence between them; her sister waved her glass at the barman, ordering another round.
    Better to be safe than sorry, right? she said, but her sister just stared at her, at the tiny mark, at the thin line where her mole used to be.
    He was pushing his thumb gently into her mouth when he noticed that the mole had disappeared. He