The night before I travelled home,  Sioux asked me if I’d confirmed the taxi to pick me up and take me to the airport in the morning.

‘No. I’d better check,’ I said.

He watched as I dialled the cab company. The call was very confusing to me. They were too quick to say that it was all booked, so I asked them if they were sure they had the address correct, and they read it back to me, but they got the name of the hotel wrong, and when I pulled the woman up on it, she said it used to be called a different name but the old name was the one in their records, and they all knew which place it was. Don’t worry about it, she said; an address is an address, right? But I was worried – it’s a huge city – and I was left with the impression that the cab might come in the morning, or it might not.

‘You should’ve got the hotel to book it,’ said Sioux.

‘It’s cheaper this way,’ I said.

I didn’t sleep at all that night, while Sioux slumbered deeply and cruelly beside me. Numerous creeping anxieties intruded into my mind. I became concerned that I might never see his naked body again, so I got out of bed, stood over him, and took three photographs. I didn’t want to get back into bed, so I sat in the chair by the window and watched the waitress leaning on the counter in the diner opposite the hotel.

© Barry Lee Thompson and ‘Stories, by Barry Lee Thompson’, 2013.