Crosstalk — Heavyweight Crewneck

The table has split into three conversations and you are following the wrong one for where you are sitting. This means laughing at a sentence nobody near you has heard, then being asked what is funny by someone halfway through a story about their boiler.

Across from you, a friend is explaining a haircut. Beside you, somebody has reached the part of a recipe where quantities become a matter of personal feeling. Further down, two people are discovering that they know the same dreadful flat. You once went to a party there. The haircut also occurred there, it turns out. The recipe is unrelated, although the person telling it is willing to travel.

You like a room that has acquired this much life. You like the butter ground with the blue and coral crossing it, a broad crewneck above something plain, enough color to join the table before you have found a chair. Your friend noticed it at the door. You intended to ask where they found their trousers, but somebody mentioned the flat and now everyone has an important addition.

For a few seconds, all three conversations meet at a single name. An extraordinary person, apparently. You remember a perfectly pleasant evening with them and decide to wait before contributing. The person beside you asks whether you have been listening. Yes, you say. To rather a lot. They offer you the dish they have been talking about. You take some and finally learn what it is.

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