Crimson China by Betsy Tobin Page B

due to the storm, and soon they are both straining to see through the windscreen. Johnny looks increasingly tired, running his hand every minute or so through his short cropped hair, as if struggling to stay awake. Lili too feels exhausted, both from the journey and the emotional energy it has cost her. She dozes offjust past Birmingham, waking with a guilty start when Johnny pulls off the motorway into a rest area. He parks the car in a deserted area and switches off the engine. She turns to him, and a shot of apprehension runs through her: she barely knows this man, nor whether she can trust him. She feels her chest tighten. Johnny rubs his face in his hands.
    “ Ta ma de ,” he swears through his hands. He lowers them and looks at her. “I need to sleep.”
    “Okay,” she says, her voice faltering a little. She is flooded with relief as he climbs into the back seat and stretches out across it, balling his jacket into a cushion. He closes his eyes and gives an enormous sigh, and within moments is asleep.
    Now Lili herself is wide awake, staring out into the deserted car park, watching the rain run in tiny rivulets down the windscreen. The night Wen died the weather was similarly bad, according to the news reports. She wonders whether it was the waves that finally overcame him, or the freezing cold. She feels guilty that she is now warm and dry, as if she should be out there somewhere, battling the elements, just as he was forced to.
    With dismay, she remembers that she had meant to look for cockles on the beach, or at the very least, buy some in a local shop. She has never seen a cockle, much less eaten one. Wen said in his letter it was easy to spot the tell-tale pockmarks in the sand just after the tide had gone out: that when you raked the sand they lay like buried treasure just beneath the surface, their pale white feet pointing downwards. Once he had pocketed a few small ones and later pried them open with a kitchen knife. They had the taste and texture of salty elastic bands, he had written. Perhaps steamed with ginger and spring onion they would be palatable, but the English ate them cold from polystyrene cups with only a small squeeze of lemon, and this he could not fathom.
    A sharp knock on the window startles her, and Lili looks out to see a tall figure looming in the darkness. She glances anxiouslytowards the back seat, but Johnny is still fast asleep. Slowly she lowers the window, and is relieved to see a man in a police uniform. He leans down to speak to her.
    “Everything all right here, miss?”
    “Yes.”
    “You’re not allowed to stop here overnight.”
    “We do not stay the night,” she says nervously. “My friend is tired.”
    The policeman cranes his neck forward to look at Wen in the back seat.
    “I can see that. Is he the one that’s driving?”
    “Yes.”
    “Has he been drinking?”
    “Drinking?” repeats Lili.
    “Yes, miss. Alcohol. Has he had any alcohol tonight?”
    “No. No alcohol. Only water. And Coca-Cola,” she adds, wondering whether it is a crime to drink Coca-Cola while driving.
    The policeman eyes her, weighing up her words.
    “This is a rest area?” she asks.
    “Yes, it’s a rest area. But it’s not for sleeping.”
    “Oh,” she replies. “Of course. I will tell him.”
    “Thank you.”
    She watches as he returns to his car. Johnny is stirring now, awakened by their voices. He sits up and looks at her, bleary-eyed.
    “Who was that?”
    “Police,” she says.
    He looks askance.
    “Why?”
    “He says you’re not allowed to sleep here.”
    Johnny shakes his head, swearing under his breath, and climbs over into the front seat.
    He starts the car and backs out of the parking space.
    “Do you want to stop for coffee?” Lili asks.
    “I’m fine,” he replies, lurching into forward. “I just want to get home.”
    They reach London just after ten o’clock, and she is relieved when he does not offer to take her to her flat, dropping her instead at Hounslow