Page 52 of Undefined Terms

The room holds. Thirty-odd people holding their breath at the same time. One woman in the front row has her hand over her mouth. The bloke next to me, the one with the scarf and the canvas bag, hasn’t blinked.

My skin’s gone cold. The small hairs on my arms up. Celyn wrote that about fear. And the room knows it and my arms know it.

Celyn pauses. Looks up from the page. Doesn’t look at anyone in particular, or looks at everyone, and the eyes land somewhere near the back row and stay for half a second and the grey-green goes bright. This is mine.

Then back to the page. Elin opens the fridge. It’s a new fridge. She doesn’t remember buying a fridge. Inside, every shelf is full, and the labels are in her own handwriting, dated weeks she hasn’t lived yet.

The audience laughs, nervous.

I don’t laugh. The cold on my arms is still there. Like someone opened a door in the room that wasn’t.

Celyn reads for ten more minutes. The corridor scene. Elin walks down the hallway and it’s longer than yesterday, or shorter, or the same length but the door at the end keeps changing colour. Green yesterday. Blue today. The paint is wet. The paint is always wet, and when she touches it her fingers come away red, and warm, and it isn’t paint.

The voice drops for the last paragraph, every word placed like bricks in a course.

The room applauds. I clap.

People everywhere. The room breaks into clusters: plastic cups, voices, the noise of people who want the person at the centre.

Celyn’s at the centre. The tutor, grey hair, navy blazer, the pontificating type, has one hand on Celyn’s elbow. Possessive, territorial, the teacher who takes credit. He’s talking and Celyn’s nodding. The half-smile, professional, not the one I know. The closed version.

I stand against the back wall. The plastic cup, the shite wine, my boots on the carpet.

I watch the tutor’s hand on Celyn’s elbow. Don’t like it, don’t know why. It’s an elbow, it’s a hand, it’s nothing. But the fingers are there and they’re staying there and Celyn’s not moving them.

A woman, short, dark hair, loud, breaks through the cluster and throws her arms around Celyn. Celyn laughs. A real one, the full-body kind, the one from the pillow two days ago. The tutor’s hand drops.

‘Rhi,’ Celyn says.

‘That was fucking terrifying and I loved it and I’m sleeping with the lights on tonight and you owe me therapy.’ All in one breath. Welsh. Same accent as Celyn, thicker.

Rhiannon. Celyn’s mentioned the name, from the course, the workshops, the midnight texts about word counts and deadlines. She says my second act sags, does my second act sag? The best friend.

Rhiannon pulls back, looks at Celyn properly. ‘The eyeliner is insane, where?’

‘Boots. Like, a quid.’

‘Get me one.’

‘Already did. It’s in your bag.’

Rhiannon makes a sound that could shatter the plastic cups. Hugs Celyn again.

I watch, the cup, the back wall, my boots. The room is Celyn’s world and I’m stood in it like I’m stood on a site that’s not mine. I can see the structure, I can read the weight, but I don’t have the drawings.

A bloke. Tall, sandy hair, one of those faces that knows it’s a good face. He’s talking to Celyn now, leaning in. Celyn laughs the polite one, the one I can tell from the real ones.

The thing in my stomach. Not jealous, not quite. This is a room full of people who know the words for what Celyn does and I don’t, and the sandy-haired bloke has them and I’ve got nice, my arms went cold.

I grip the cup, the plastic cracks. The wine slops over my knuckle. I don’t wipe it.

It’s not that I think Celyn’s interested. It’s that the bloke can stand next to Celyn and talk about the writing and the craft and the second act and whatever else and I can stand next to Celyn and say. What. Nice. That was nice, my arms went cold. Proper literary analysis there, Ron. Well done.

Celyn’s head turns, scans the room, finds me at the back wall. Walks over, the heels on the carpet, doesn’t excuse the exit, just walks. Sandy-hair’s still mid-sentence when Celyn leaves.

Takes my wrist, the wrist. The fingers wrap around it, the ring, and the grip. This one.

Turns to Rhiannon. ‘Rhi, this is Ronan.’