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eccentric front room. She had a loyal clientele and simultaneously managed to make anyone else feel welcome, from their first visit. She still looked up when the door opened, smiled warmly as she chatted, and her enthusiasm for the business still outshone the trials of running it. As long as customers respected her pub, who they were, how they behaved and what they looked like was irrelevant.
    But, of course, once in a while there had to be an exception.
    Justine was sitting just outside the door that led from the bar to the stockroom. She’d been halfway through a pre-lunch break, and was using the free time to phone through to her bank. She’d been on hold now for ten minutes, and apparently her call was still ‘important’. She was also ‘next in line’ but she hung up when she saw the woman arrive.
    Justine didn’t hurry to serve her but busied herself with sorting the condiment sets while the young woman picked up a menu,holding it artificially high in front of her face and looking like someone trying too hard to appear to be actually reading it.
    Justine produced one of her best glowing smiles. ‘Coffee or tea today?’ she asked.
    ‘Coffee, please.’
    ‘Mug, isn’t it?’
    ‘Yes, thanks.’ The woman’s voice sounded dull and no hint of recognition showed in those hollow eyes. After paying, she sat down by the window, just cupping her mug of coffee as though warming her hands, not drinking it.
    Justine continued to rearrange the condiments sets, hoping this made her look as if she was preparing for the lunchtime rush, but really watching and pondering on the lone woman. When she’d first started coming to the café, Justine had silently bet herself ten quid that she could make her smile. Now she couldn’t even remember exactly when that was, but it had to be at least two years ago – maybe three.
    Justine had since nicknamed her Greta, and the customer seldom missed a day, hardly ate and rarely spoke. But her routine was always the same. She would come in at a quarter to twelve, buy a drink – usually coffee – and sometimes a baguette, and then sit by the window.
    And, in all that time, Justine had never seen her smile.
    Justine positioned herself so that she could see Greta’s reflection in the mirror behind the optics. Today, she decided, she looked particularly uptight.
    The first time, she’d been the same, and had chosen to sit at the window table in the corner. She’d waited specially for it to be vacated, even though other tables were free and then, after just a few minutes, another couple had attempted to occupy two of its three empty seats.
    ‘Are these taken?’
    Looking them straight in the eyes, she’d replied stonily, ‘I want to be alone.’
    That’s when Justine nicknamed her Greta – after Greta Garbo.
    Justine finally turned and snatched a direct glimpse at her. Perhaps she’s ill? she wondered.
    Greta raised the mug as if to sip coffee but lowered it again immediately then turned to operate the jukebox mounted on the pillar behind her.
    Justine answered her own question as Greta’s current favourite track began to play. Nope, same old same old.
    Every day Greta selected a record, sometimes playing it several times, but each day she’d choose the same one. Same one every day for weeks, until a different one caught her fancy. This was week three of her current choice.
    It had been a long time since any patron had stirred Justine’s curiosity the way Greta did. She would focus her attention on the new customers arriving, but continued to wonder who Greta really was and what had gone so very wrong in her life.
     
    Greta watched the Station Road/Hills Road junction and let the warmth of the coffee and the mellow rhythm and blues soothe her. She didn’t want to throw up again.
    She ran her hand along the rounded edge of the dark wood table. Relax. You can cope. Keep calm. Keep calm. She’d been feeling better recently. Thinking about that girl’s face must have