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Soil. Mud. Trowel. Don’t break the history.
Alex had only been about fifty per cent attentive to the introductory talk, but he reckoned he’d internalised the main points. He wasn’t here for the archaeology anyway. He was here for something else entirely. He was sick of watching Helen mope. If she wasn’t going to do anything about her feelings, it was time for a friend to step in and give things a little nudge. Emily was here, standing at the back of the little tent they’d set up to keep in the important people dry. She was wearing pink wellingtons. Alex should hate that. It was such a twee little affectation. ‘Look at me,’ it seemed to say. ‘I’m just a helpless ickle girl.’
And she wasn’t a little girl. Helen had told him that there was four years between them, which meant Emily was only two years younger than him. A spoilt-rotten, pink-wellingtoned Barbie doll. A spoilt-rotten, pink-wellingtoned presidential candidate Barbie doll, he corrected himself. With a boyfriend, he added. There was something there though, something stronger and more vital then you’d expect at first glance. He remembered her leaning against his car, struggling to find her breath. He wasn’t sure what happened. It wasn’t just car sickness, whatever Helen thought, but whatever it was Emily had handled it. He’d watched her pulling herself back together. She might be a Barbie doll, but she was doll with an iron core.
Alex put down his trowel and caught the trench supervisor’s eye, gesturing in a vague way that he hoped suggested the intent to go to the toilet or for a cigarette or some other equally innocuous reason for leaving his post. Emily was on her own now. He walked towards her. Ten steps away, nine steps away – she was watching him as he closed the gap between them – eight steps away, seven steps away – she looked over her shoulder, scanning her eyes across the dig site – six steps away, five steps away, four steps away – he could almost reach out to touch her now – three steps away, two steps away, one step. He brushed his arm against her and caught her fingers amongst his own, and carried on walking. For a second he felt her arm pulling on his, before the tension dropped and she followed his lead.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I don’t know.’
They walked to the corner of the site along the length of a fence with a gate at one end. It was chained shut.
‘Come on.’ Alex dropped her hand, climbed the gate, and jumped to the ground on the other side.
‘Where are you going?’
‘I don’t know.’ He stopped and turned back to face her. One of them was on the wrong side of the gate. His head and his body were giving him different messages about which of them that was. ‘I can’t stop thinking about you. You’re always on my mind. I can’t help myself.’
He stopped, trying to think of some better words. All of the things he’d said were true but they weren’t why he was here. He reminded himself that he was only doing this for Helen. Helen loved Professor Collins. Alex was simply helping clear her path. He liked that idea; it would be the first time in his life that he’d used his powers for the greater good. He needed to say the right thing. Anything that wasn’t a cliché or a song lyric would suffice. ‘I really really want to shag you,’ he said.