By Andrew J Parfitt

A portly gentleman sat at his usual morning table in his usual cafe in the 17th. He admired the miniature coffee whirlwind and enjoyed the luxurious feel of his cashmere scarf against his neck. The air was thick with early morning cigarette smoke but this never bothered him and he snapped open his daily paper. He liked to start the day like this and used to say that a man feels invincible with a copy of Le Monde in his hands. It was here that he felt cocooned from the world, immersed in all there was to know. Devouring the various passages, he felt his nostrils twitch uncontrollably. He smelt the creature before he heard it. He heard the beast before saw it.

Raising his head slowly over his paper he witnessed the foulest of sights: a pathetic wretch in high heels, three day stubble and a torturous pleading smile. The sounds were abstract to his dumb-struck mind and provided a white noise soundtrack to his ordeal. He hurriedly shoved the change lying on the table in the beggar’s direction and attempted to resume his reading. He could hear the sound of his own heart beating as he pretended to read, praying it was gone. Then, two yellowed hands appeared from the other side of the black and white barrier he had erected. He dared to look up and stared straight into those two horrible, crazed eyes. Paralysed from the waist up, his legs squirmed beneath the table and he hoped his frozen grimace was not too obvious. ”What could she want from me”, he thought, ”I’ve given it money for God’s sake!” He watched the alien stroking its dried and matted hair. The hair was long but the scalp was balding. He already felt sick but it turned to panic as the strokes turned in to pointing. She was pointing at him.

Relief momentarily flooded his body as the mess was cleared away by the ever efficient bar man wielding a broom. In peace at last he managed a smile of gratitude. He discarded his paper feeling that it was now tainted or infected. Staring at his coffee he could still see that crooked smile. This feeling stayed with him until he was enveloped by a sudden and dark sensation. “Oh God, she was not quite a stranger.”