Sebastian Roe sold fish at the old town market. He sold only the finest fish so that nobody could say he neglected his trade. His octopus for example always had the longest tentacles and, if anyone asked, he told them his octopus had ten legs instead of eight. 'Do try my decapus' he told passers-by to his stall. In addition, his rainbow trout caught light not only from the visible spectrum but ultra-violet light and x-rays too. 'Perfect next time you have a party,' he told people. 'Just like an airport security scanner, you can scan them before they enter.'
Sebastian Roe wasn't married. Sometimes he bunched the fish on his stall close together so that customers had to point to show him which one they wanted. He'd reach out and clasp their fingers in his palm when this happened. He'd smile thinly, revealing a top row of teeth that resembled small pebbles. They seemed to dangle from snips of string attached to his gums. 'Is this what you're looking for, my dear?' he'd say, guiding the poor person's fingers toward the stinking fish. They'd nod, and tear their fingers away before reaching into their purse.
Sebastian Roe's customers were mostly bored women wearing too many jewels. They came back.
Opposite Sebastian at the old town market was the geologist Rebecca Pryce. She spent her days examining the flaws in her semi-precious rocks through a jeweller's magnifying glass. She kept her head bowed because whenever she looked up she caught Sebastian leering at her.
Rebecca though was a warm person. Visitors to her stall always had to cough to catch her attention, and she always let out a high pitched 'Oop!' before looking up to see who it was. Then she took great pains to make sure customers got what they wanted. She'd insist that customers peer into her magnifying glass to see what they getting, and planted the semi-precious jewels in their palms. People didn't often buy from Rebecca, but she had lots of visitors.
Both Rebecca and Sebastian were alone. They inhabited islands between which the daily visitors were sail boats. Rebecca bade these visitors welcome, before sending them on their way with a trinket and never giving them a second thought. She kept to the flaws in her stones. Sebastian meanwhile would have stuffed the visitors to his stall together into a fish tank. He'd have given them a decapus tentacle a day to eat and told them it was the very best.
Sometimes Sebastian ignored Rebecca's closed body language and tried to have a chat with her.
'That's a pretty one,' he'd say, nodding to the jewel Rebecca was holding and revealing his pebble teeth. 'I'll give you fifteen pounds for it.' His smile resembled a grimace most of the time.
Rebacca would look up without putting down her jeweller's magnifying glass. With one eye closed she'd spend two or three seconds peering at Sebastian. Sebastian was losing his hair and combed what remained over from left to right, so that he resembled an egg at a social function.
'Really?' she'd reply.
'Yeee-eess?' Sebastian would croak. But then he couldn't think of anything else to say and leered.
This of course caused Rebecca to bolt her head back down towards her stall, and Sebastian would look at her for another moment. She had thick red hair tied straight back into a pony tail. The pony tail was drooped over her right shoulder and over the green duffel coat she wore.
Sebastian would clear his throat and turn his attention to whoever was passing his stall. 'Fresh!' he'd bellow like a fog horn, and the passer-by would almost drop her purse from shock.
'Fresh!'
From across the way Rebecca would bunch her shoulders and peer more intently into the stone.
These exchanges of course didn't happen all that often. Sebastian came away from them feeling like someone had let loose on his internal organs with a hand-held blender. It took weeks to shake off the sensation and pluck up the courage to try again. Then he repeated himself.
Even worse: every afternoon Sebastian had to watch Rebecca pile her semi-precious stones into her mud-covered Land Rover and leave. During this process he felt like his spine was being extracted with tweezers. By the time the last jewel was packed and the boot closed he was ready to collapse - more invertebrate than the octopus he peddled. He'd sink into his chair.
Truly though Sebastian felt this way about everyone that passed his stall, to some extent. People seemed like warm centres of energy, and the closer they were the better he felt. He thought sometimes this might be because he lived alone, and handled cold fish on a daily basis. He might feel warmer if he sold roast chicken at his stall or something. But this rang false. He knew what he wanted to do was scramble over the fish and dive into the rows of people.
Instead he told fibs about ten-tectacled squid, and made a decent living leering at bored women.
–
One day in July Rebecca woke up before sun rise. The night had been balmy and so she'd dispensed with her duvet and worn only pyjamas. She had pyjamas with a multi-coloured jewel motif. They even had plastic beads that sparkled, as though someone had crossed a rainbow with a perfect night sky. Rebecca twinkled whenever she tossed and turned in her sleep.
She'd awoken early because yesterday someone had arrived at her stall and claimed he wanted to buy her entire stock of jewels. Rebecca hadn't even seen him there, and he just announced his intention without saying hello or anything. Rebecca's magnifying glass had fallen from between her fingers. She'd peered up and the customer before her had superb teeth.
'Oop!' she hiccuped, and goggled at the gentleman who smiled at her. He looked like Prince Harry. 'Are you serious?' she cried a moment later, having sufficiently recovered herself to speak.
