The Bit In Between by Claire Varley

morning Alison left a sleeping Oliver and took herself to swim in the pool at the Honiara Hotel. She tried to do laps but was interrupted by a family of loud, sunburnt Australians who were unhappy about everything in general, including but not limited to the weather, the menu and the lack of pool toys. She left when she noticed the youngest one squatting in the shallow end, its face screwed up in concentration as fine bubbles danced in the water around it. When she got home, Oliver was sprawled out in the hammock asleep. A notepad was wedged between his hip and the netting. Alison glanced at it. All it said was: ‘Narrator is a cat?!’ A little further down the word ‘­allegory’ was crossed out several times.
    When she emerged from the shower, Oliver was back at his laptop. She kissed his cheek. ‘How’s it going?’
    Oliver stared at the screen. ‘This is all I’ve got for three hours work.’
    She looked over his shoulder. There were a couple of random lines, a few individual words, and then a longer passage that was preceded by a note reading: ‘Col. Drakeford talks to assistant over tea and scones.’

    â€˜You know, Johnson, independence is like these scones here.’
    â€˜How do you mean, sir?’
    â€˜Well, everyone thinks they have the perfect recipe but rarely does one come across a truly decent version.’
    â€˜Quite right, sir. Quite right.’
    â€˜The secret,’ Colonel Drakeford said conspiratorially, ‘is the jam. You can have any type of scone you want, but the jam’s the thing that brings it all together.’
    Johnson peered at his scone. ‘We’re the jam, aren’t we, sir?’
    â€˜Right you are, old boy. Right you are.’
    Alison was quiet for a moment.
    â€˜It’s a metaphor,’ Oliver prompted. ‘For empire.’
    There was a prolonged hesitation, during which Oliver deleted everything he had written that morning.
    They had lunch together, but then Oliver started looking morose, so Alison grabbed her bag and headed back out the door. She was enjoying this new adventure with Oliver and hanging out with him was fun most of the time – he made her feel special and important, and he laughed at all her jokes. There was something incredible, too, about being beside him as he conjured a whole new work from nothing, but she knew by now when he was about to enter what she called ‘moody bastard writer mode’, and preferred to leave him alone at those times. If she didn’t, he would spend hours complaining that he was a hack and a fluke and should just give up on life altogether because he was terrible at everything. Alison didn’t mind listening to him moan for a while, but the unspoken rules of relationships dictated a level to which one should not see one’s partner descend, and Oliver curled up under the table biting his knuckles was a fairly solid benchmark for this.
    The Honiara air was thick and muggy, desperate to release the rain from its clouds. As she strolled towards town Alison felt sweat patches forming across her lower back and stomach and beneath her armpits. She couldn’t bear another afternoon drenched in her own sweat, so she waved down a taxi and got into the passenger seat. The taxidriver was a worried-looking young man with thin dreadlocks pulled back into a thick bundle at the back of his head.
    Alison smiled at him. ‘Mi laek go lo post offis,’ she said and he nodded, pulling into the traffic. Alison sat beside him, still smiling, trying to look open to conversation. The young man didn’t take his eyes off the road but cleared his throat.
    â€˜You are from where? America?’
    â€˜Australia,’ Alison replied.
    â€˜You are with RAMSI?’
    â€˜Nope. Just . . . volunteering.’ While currently she had no work, she was looking into volunteering options, so it wasn’t really a lie, and it was much easier