Not That Kind of Circus

Flash Fiction by Hilary Ayshford

Photo by Mohammad Saifullah on Unsplash

The lights from the advertising screens are dazzling as you emerge from the gloom of the tube station into the cold December afternoon. Blues, greens, reds and golds sparkle in pavement puddles, spreading a jewelled carpet at your feet. He has promised to take you to the circus, but when you ask tentatively what time the show starts, he stares at you blankly, then laughs, although it sounds more like a bark.

He puts an arm round your shoulders and puts his mouth close to your ear. 'It's not that kind of circus,' he says. You want to pull away from his hot breath on your face, the scratch of his stubble on your cheek, the stale smell of his hair, but he holds you close.

He points up at a golden figure poised on tiptoe high above a fountain. ‘This is Piccadilly Circus, and that's Eros, the god of love,’ he says. His rough fingers stroke your neck.

He grabs your hand, pulls you down a narrow alley into a dingy pub where the wooden benches are grimy and your shoes stick to the carpet. The musty, old-man smell is like grandad's house.

He asks what you want to drink and you say just a Coke. You can't let on you're too young to go to pubs because you told him you were eighteen, even though it was your fifteenth birthday just two weeks ago. Your face burns with the memory of the humiliating sleepover, when your best friends started talking about sex and you couldn't join in because you were the only one never to have even kissed a boy.

So when he sent you a message and a pic on Insta, you exaggerated a few things, told him you worked in customer services rather than as a Saturday girl stacking shelves in Tesco, and described the type of men you liked.

He lied too, though. He must be at least thirty, though he told you he's nineteen. It's a good thing he recognised you when you got off the train, because he looks nothing like his photo.

He puts a small glass of Coke down in front of you. It tastes odd, but you're thirsty, so you swallow it down anyway. He has hardly started his pint of lager, but he gets up straight away to buy you another. You drink that too.

The pub is almost empty. An old man in the corner has a beer glass and a whisky tumbler in front of him; he sips from them in turn, delaying the moment when he has to buy another, or leave. At the bar two women, one in a turquoise sequinned top, short black skirt and high heels, the other in a clingy leopard print dress and boots, look over at you, whisper to each other.

Your boyfriend — he's been that in your head for the last week —finishes his drink and gets up. He squeezes your leg, tells you to stay there, he'll be back in a minute, and heads for the gents.

As the door bangs shut behind him, one of the women comes over. Her nail polish is the purple of new bruises, and her eyes are rimmed in black. She grabs your arm and hauls you to your feet. 'You need to go now,' she says. The scarlet slash of her lipstick is like an open wound. 'Now,' she repeats, pushing you roughly out onto the street. 'Go home.'

You are disorientated, your head spinning. At one end of the alley you glimpse the flashing lights of Piccadilly Circus, and stagger towards them, reeling, bouncing off walls, stumbling over piles of unidentifiable rubbish, pausing only to vomit in the gutter, spattering your best shoes. Your footsteps echo off the grimy brick walls of the alley: 'stupid, stupid, stupid!'.

Standing by the fountain, jostled by workers hurrying home, tourists posing for selfies, theatre-goers and early diners, you start to cry. You've never been alone in London before; you've never really been anywhere by yourself. Guilt trickles down your cheeks, shame drips from your chin, humiliation slimes thickly from your nose.

High above, the gilded figure of Anteros, the avenger of unrequited love, stares down as you fumble blindly in your bag for your phone to ring your mum.

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Author: Hilary Ayshford is a former science journalist and editor based in rural Kent in the UK. She writes mainly flash fiction and short stories. She likes her music in a minor key and has a penchant for the darker side of human nature.