Best British Short Stories 2020 by Nicholas Royle (best novels to read for students txt) 📕

how to synchronise her arms and legs. She could still only move one set of limbs at a time. My self-parenting guide had taught me that handling such moments wrongly could be permanently damaging, that my words could one day pound in her head like blood. You have to practise a lot to do a solo, I said. People have expectations, not just me but all the people who will watch you. I know, she said, as if that was unimportant. We could dance together after class. Just you and me, I said.

She peered down at her new-looking trainers. The soles lit up and were inappropriate for dancing. I can do it myself, she said. But you can help if you want. Will your dad come to the finale? I asked, after a few seconds, as if it was an afterthought. She nodded. We could work on a dance that will impress him, I said. She looked up sharply. I don’t want to impress him, she said, I just don’t want to be in the back row.

Have you been with an older man before me? John asked a few days later. I said yes. He looked disappointed. I picked up the oil bottle from the side of the bed and put it into the cupboard, which was mostly empty, apart from a few toys I had bought in anticipation of tonight. He lay on the bedsheets, his head behind his hands, his body stiff, like he was imitating someone relaxing. This house is so unlived in, he said. What’s your house like? He didn’t answer. Will you put pictures up if you stay? he asked. He kept looking around at the bare walls. No, I don’t think so, I said. I hadn’t noticed before that they had nothing on them. I lay down next to him and put my head on his chest. Staring up at the ceiling, I noticed for the first time that someone had traced a smiley face with the gloss paint. Terrible things happened to you once, he said. Before we met, he added. I didn’t know how he knew, but it made me think that we could connect. When people shared their most awful and life-changing experiences, they were more likely to fall in love. It wasn’t just a coincidence Barbara found me when she did, I said.

I thought about it every day but when I told it, gaps inserted themselves. The order became confused. I left home and moved to a bedsit in London where I spent every night circling job adverts in Loot. I stopped dancing because classes were too expensive. Something had to change but I didn’t know who could change it, I told John. And then a business card came through the letterbox. It was from a real psychic called Nebula. I called and made an appointment. I went to Nebula’s place in Camden. She stood in the hallway, vest top sliding down her shoulders, cargo pants falling off her skinny hips. She led me through beaded curtains that kept on swinging and knocking against each other as we walked down another corridor. There were laminated pictures of ethereal, pastel women on the walls. She took me into a small, dark room with a white plastic table and two chairs, which looked like garden furniture.

Nebula sat me down, drew my arms into the centre. She closed her eyes, squeezed my fingers. We held hands until the table started shaking and she began digging her nails into my skin. The whites of her eyes became so big it was like they’d been boiled. You’re cursed, she said. I need £50 to lift the curse. That was the exact amount that I had saved from my dole for next month’s rent. I don’t have £50, I said. She sighed, got up and switched the light on. Started opening one cupboard after the other, leaving them ajar. We were in a kitchen but there was no food anywhere or anything that might be useful: no plates, no cups, just a polystyrene container with dried noodles hanging from its lip. When she turned to me, she had an armful of green candles. She bundled them towards me: Take these, burn as many as you can, she said.

I went back to my bedsit with the candles in a carrier bag. I drank three cups of lumpy instant coffee and lit each candle, watching until they burnt to nubs. I fell asleep before the last one. The next morning Barbara called me on my phone and said that she had a job for me. I had applied for so many that I didn’t know who she was or what she was talking about, but I said I’d take it.

I didn’t tell John about the fire. When I stopped talking, he was sitting upright, staring at the door. It was past midnight. You should speak to someone, he said. About what? I asked. The curse, he said. By someone, he meant a professional. Not him. After a few minutes, he got up and started looking for his trousers. I need eight hours of sleep every night, he said. I always need eight hours, whatever happens. He laid out his trousers on the bed before going to the bathroom, clutching his white pants in his fist. His peeing was loud, as if he were pouring water out of a bucket into the toilet. It went on for ages. He came back into the room and sat down next to me. His underwear sagged below his rounded stomach. I wanted to reach out and stroke the soft hairs tufting in the dough. There’s no such thing as a psychic, he said. Just charlatans. I know, I replied. I wondered what it would be like to be Cherri, and whether he patted her head in the same way.

John stopped pretending to be a stranger. He said that he wanted to see me in person only, me as me. In the meantime,