The Bit In Between by Claire Varley Page B

milk, so they’re both regular milk,’ she explained.
    Sera nodded. ‘Hem oraet, no wori.’
    The waitress left and Sera turned to Alison. ‘That’s so random.’
    Alison smiled. ‘Kind of. We’ll keep working on that one.’
    Sera poured a couple of packets of sugar into her coffee. ‘Okay, I have a question. Why do some people pronounce “the” in different ways?’
    Alison contemplated this. She tipped a single packet of sugar into her coffee and then stirred it carefully until she was sure it had dissolved. Then she poured in another packet and stirred it thoroughly. After a while she stopped stirring, took a sip and then looked pensively across the café.
    â€˜You know what? I have absolutely no idea . . .’
    Sera nodded. ‘That’s so random.’
    The English lessons, which had been taking place for a fortnight now, were going well, though Alison was quickly learning that there was a lot about the English language that didn’t really have any explanation other than ‘because’ or ‘I don’t know’. Most of the time they met in one of the handful of cafés in Honiara because it meant coffee and cake. She suspected they were both getting a bit thicker around the middle, but neither of them cared because life is too short to not eat cake.
    There was a sudden crash of plates followed by a high-pitched scream and both Alison and Sera started. The waitress was standing in the middle of a pile of broken plates and food, while a young child sat to one side rubbing his head and howling. An embarrassed young woman rushed over.
    â€˜Timothy!’ she exclaimed as she picked him up. Alison had seen the woman trekking around Honiara with a small army of children. She vaguely remembered meeting her once and was pretty sure her husband worked in one of the High Commissions. The woman looked apologetically at the waitress.
    â€˜I’m so sorry,’ she said.
    The waitress smiled. ‘It’s okay,’ she said, and together they started cleaning up the mess.
    â€˜It’s not okay.’
    Alison looked over her shoulder. An older woman was sitting at the table behind them with an older man. They were both dressed in business suits, which always seemed so out of place in Honiara. The woman shook her head.
    â€˜There are places you bring kids and places you don’t bring kids,’ she said to the man.
    â€˜Like cafés?’ he asked.
    â€˜Like the Solomons,’ the woman replied.
    The man smirked but didn’t say anything. ‘Should we get back to that report, Gwen?’
    Gwen nodded and turned back to the paper in front of her, but not before adding a stern tsk-tsk.

    Gwen had done everything in life that she had planned to do. She’d started with field work in Africa and a master’s degree at a prestigious university, then worked her way up through the levels at a well-respected international NGO. She was now a country director for a major agency, and with the money she earned she had managed to buy a couple of houses back in the States that she rented out, securing her financial future. After she had done all these things, she had met a man who ticked enough of her boxes and who didn’t mind loving across two continents, so they had married and Gwen had crossed off another goal. He had grown-up children of his own, so she went right ahead and crossed motherhood off the list too. She didn’t like children. No, Gwen did not like children. She told herself so every day, just as she told herself how lucky she was to have done nearly everything she had planned to do. Nearly everything. And she didn’t regret anything. That was what she told her reflection in the mirror – I don’t regret a single thing. And most of the time she didn’t.
    Alison stared at Gwen for a moment and then turned back to Sera. Sera made a face.
    â€˜I think she doesn’t have