Aethernet Magazine by Tony Ballantyne

Author:Tony Ballantyne [Ballantyne, Tony]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2013-03-29T07:46:02+00:00

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The Smallest of Things by Ian Whates

The Smallest of Things

by Ian Whates

It all started with a text. Nothing dramatic, just a simple message that popped up on my screen: Help. need 2 c u urgent. The number was tagged as Claire's.

I'm the world's worst texter, but succeeded in sending a simple where when in response.

Gino's 6 this eve came the reply, far more swiftly than I'd managed to fumble.

I had plans for that evening, but nothing that couldn't be changed. Ok, I sent back.

For a moment I simply stared at the screen, wondering what could possibly be so urgent; it wasn't like Claire to press the panic button. I hadn't seen her in months, not since she took up with Bartosz, her new boyfriend. Don't get me wrong, I had nothing against Bartosz, I simply didn't know him. To me he was just a tall, broody, eastern European mystery - Polish, to be precise. Claire hadn't been around much since the two of them got together - too wrapped up in her new beau and what was clearly developing between them. Even her group, The Quiet Catastrophe, found itself relegated to the limbo of hiatus, and that's quite something. I'd never known Claire to put any man ahead of her music before.

My initial reaction on receiving the text was to suppose that their relationship must have floundered, but I instantly dismissed the idea. Claire has plenty of girl friends with sympathetic ears and shoulders broad enough to cry on if needed; far more likely she would turn to one of them. Besides, she wouldn't trouble me with anything personal like that, not while calling it 'urgent' at any rate. No, there had to be something more going on.

After all, Claire knows what I do for a living.

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