Ruby brought the sweets on Tuesday. June brought the arguments.
The programme was called Love Against All Reason, which promised more than the cinema could afford to print on its posters. Two old films, one ticket, a short break between them. June had chosen the seats a month ago. They were the best ones for watching Ruby react without having to turn her whole head.
Ruby was already there when June arrived, holding the paper bag open.
“I bought the ones you dislike as well,” she said. “To preserve the experience.”
“Very considerate.”
June took a soft raspberry sweet. Ruby kept the liquorice beside herself, establishing a border.
The first film was about a woman who agreed to pretend to be engaged to a man in order to stop his aunt selling a house. The aunt apparently couldn’t sell a house with a wedding planned in it. Nobody explained why. June wrote a question mark on her programme. Ruby took the pen and added another.
Twenty minutes later the aunt announced she had hired an architect to redesign the house.
Ruby leaned over. “Has she met a solicitor?”
June put a hand over her mouth. “She’s very busy.”
The pretend couple had an argument beside a lake. He accused her of taking the arrangement too seriously. She said she had never cared about anything less in her life, then fell into the water.
Ruby’s shoulders began to shake. June passed her a raspberry sweet, which she accepted without noticing. When the woman emerged completely dry in a different dress, Ruby had to bend forward until she could breathe.
June laughed because Ruby was laughing. She missed the next line. Ruby missed it too, and for once they both let it go.
This was what June hadn’t known how to ask for all week. Something they were both looking at. A laugh that hadn’t begun with one of them asking the other for anything.
At the break, they went out into the little courtyard behind the cinema. The air was damp. Ruby pulled her coat round herself and stood under the narrow shelter by the back door.
“She never went home,” June said.
“She had the lake dress to change into.”
“Where did she get it?”
“Fish.”
June laughed so hard the woman who had followed them out smiled too.
Ruby waited until the woman went back inside. Then she looked up at the dark sky.
“I missed this.”
“We still had the tickets.”
“You could have decided not to come.”
June leaned against the door frame. “I wanted to.”
Ruby turned to her. Her face softened, and June felt the familiar urge to make the whole evening better by saying more. She said only, “The second one looks worse.”
“A man marries his neighbour’s sister by accident,” Ruby said. “I’ve prepared myself.”
“Do you think he has the wrong paperwork?”
“I think he has the wrong neighbour.”
They went back in. Ruby put the sweet bag between them, ending the border.
In the second film a woman went to a wedding in sunglasses and nobody recognized her. The glasses weren’t large. When she took them off, a man gasped as if her head had been missing until then.
June looked at Ruby. Ruby was already looking back.
They both said, silently, No.
Afterwards, they stayed in their seats until most of the little audience had left. June was reluctant to move. Ruby was eating the last sweet with care, making it last too.
“Friday will be better than this,” Ruby said.
“Almost anything would be.”
“I told people at work about it. Two said they’d come.”
“Thank you.”
“One says she likes the ending. So you won’t be alone.”
June smiled. Ruby smoothed out the programme on her knee.
“You should do something about tonight. A little post. You could use me to bring people to yours.”
June looked toward the door. The last customer was waiting for her partner to find his glove.
“I’m not presenting being your friend,” June said.
“Ruby’s friend presents. It’s a way in. Some might stay for the film.”
“And some might ask me about Eli.”
Ruby’s mouth tightened. “Well. Are they wrong to be interested?”
“In my film evening?”
“In why you’re spending time with him.”
“I asked him to help. You saw what we did.”
“I saw you enjoying each other.”
June folded her programme. There wasn’t an answer she wanted to give in the small screen with the cleaner waiting at the door.
“I’ve written the invitation,” she said. “It’s about the film. Please share that if you want to.”
Ruby got up. She carried the empty sweet bag down the row and put it in the bin. June followed more slowly.
At the front doors, Ruby stopped under the awning. They usually walked a long way round after these evenings, past the bakery that left its downstairs lights on. Once they had stood there arguing so long that the baker had come out to ask whether they needed help.
“I think I’ll get the bus,” Ruby said.
June looked at the pavement, already shining with new rain. “It’s only a little wet.”
“I’m tired.”
“All right.”
Ruby lifted a hand rather than stepping forward for a hug. Then she crossed to the stop.
June walked home by the long route. Through the bakery window she could see trays waiting for morning. She didn’t stop.
When she got home, she checked the cinema’s invitation. Ruby had shared it without adding anything about their friendship. June sent her a thank-you.
Ruby answered with a heart. It ought to have been enough to end the night kindly. June put her phone down and kept thinking of the walk they hadn’t taken.