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Brent Cross

Someone standing under a flyover near Brent Cross.

Picture by Kevan: Under a Flyover

They start outside, leaning against their separate walls—waiting for Amos, as usual. It’s cold, and Charlotte’s fingers are red round the knuckles as she watches her screen; waits; reloads; reloads again.

This time it works. “Welcome to the game,” the page tells her. “Rendezvous for instructions in Burger King. Play will begin in six minutes.”

She puts the phone away and hesitates for a moment, choosing a direction, going over maps and landmarks in her head. Six minutes. And Burger King is on the far side. She’ll make it, but it’s going to be close, and if the pedestrian lights are against her she’s bound to be the last. Maybe she should take it slow and save her energy: but she pushes off from the wall and runs left.

Across the road (the lights are with her), along another underpass; up a series of gentle slopes made for supermarket trolleys, grabbing hold of the hand rail to swing around 180-degree turns. The curve of a bridge. She slows as she crests the peak, and then speeds up on the downward slope, a clear run ahead of her toward the white square of the shopping centre. Burger King. Four minutes left.

The walls of Brent Cross get grubbier as she gets closer, and the automatic doors are slow. She turns sideways to make it through before they’ve finished opening, then decelerates on the tiles inside: it’s crowded, and you can’t run here, not so fast anyway. Shopping bags and toddlers jut out onto the left-hand side of the escalators. But it’s going okay.

Two minutes fifteen seconds.

She arrives with forty-five seconds to spare, taps the screen to declare arrival, takes a quick picture for verification later. Plenty of time to receive her instructions and get out, as long as she wasn’t last. Not it, she says in her head, dibs not it, while she waits for the page to load:

Charley Cartwright is no good,
Chop her up for firewood.
When she’s dead, stamp on her head,
Then we’ll have some currant bread.
Charley Cartwright lick and spit,
Turn around and you’re not it.

Not it. But she’s only got twenty-five seconds before the game begins, so she pivots and heads out, not sure exactly where to go but it needs to be quick. The Body Shop, maybe, to pick up a one-off lookahead bonus.

Rain thuds against the glass roof of the shopping centre. It’s speeding up, and she feels her heart as it does the same, even now, even after ten years.

(Spring, 1999, after school on a Tuesday afternoon: they wait too long for perpetually-late Amos, and miss a bus. Still, it’s a nice day, and the park’s only a couple of minutes walk away, so they head over to kill half an hour while they wait. Bags in a pile. Coats off. They run around. Paul sits down again after a few minutes and declares himself the winner; ten minutes later, they’ve got a ruleset.

It’s not a very good ruleset, at first, predicated as it is on the need to leave one player with the bags at all times; but they tweak things, and add some new win conditions, and play again and again, and by the end of summer they have a game. Charlotte also has her second, fourth, ninth, seventeenth and twenty-third through fifty-fifth kisses, and several unremovable grass stains, but that, she’s pretty sure, is beside the point.

They suspend the game halfway through autumn; there’s a variant they can play on the top floor of the bus, but it gets them kicked off three times in a week and they decide to give it a miss. Winter happens, cold and long. Tobin almost, but doesn’t quite, leave the school. Hannah and Theodore almost, but don’t quite, break up. Eventually the sun comes back.

They play through the next summer, and the next, but then there are jobs and universities and it all gets harder. For a while, they manage a few games a year, but before long Tobin’s in Leeds, Amos is south London, Charlotte is north, Hannah and Theodore are over near Bristol and Paul is overstaying his visas in an increasingly unlikely series of small and politically powerless nations. Which is okay, and it’s not like they don’t all have other friends—except it’s not really okay, because summer isn’t fun if you aren’t running around, and running isn’t fun if you aren’t being chased.

Which is where the death of independent shops on the British high street and the increasing homogenisation of world culture start to come in handy, of course, along with Amos’s stumblingly-acquired computer science degree. If all shopping centres and high streets are the same, then what’s to stop half a dozen superficially distinct locations from providing a distributed home for a single game?)

Forty-seven minutes in, and she’s picked up five of the landmarks. If she can survive to the sixty minute mark, that’s it, she wins; but it’s been a long time since she saw a friendly face. She sits on a bench, leaning forward to catch her breath.

The phone rings.

Theodore. Forty-eight minutes—chances are he’s been converted, and even if he hasn’t there’s no safety in numbers any more. She should let it ring. “Yeah?” she says, answering, standing up and starting to walk.

“You’re the only one left,” he says.

She swerves out of the path of the shoppers, towards the wall, and slows down. She can see herself reflected in the window, messily, her face mixed with blocks of colour from the display behind. “And you’re telling me? That’s bad tactics, Theo, so you know what? I think you’re lying.”

“And I think you,” he says, “are hiding somewhere and waiting for the clock to run out. I’m guessing Borders again, but we’ll find out for sure pretty soon.”

The only way he can call her is if he’s standing in one of the phone shops. Trying to keep her busy, she supposes, while the others sweep through and flush her out. If he’s telling the truth, and they’re all after her, this is going to be tricky.

“So were you the first chaser,” she asks, stepping onto an escalator, “or were you just really bad at running away?” She hasn’t updated her position since she was in the lift five minutes ago, which is dangerous, but if they’re checking each floor properly she should have a few minutes spare. It’ll be Phones4U or the Carphone Warehouse, she thinks, and she doesn’t have time to check both.

“I was the chaser,” he says. “I saw you leaving Burger King, but I thought it’d be more of a challenge to keep you to the end.”

She can’t tell whether it’s meant to be a threat that sounds like a compliment, or a compliment that sounds like a threat; either way, it’s probably a lie. “This yearning of yours for challenge,” she says, “never ends well,” and she hangs up as she passes Monsoon. In the door, and she updates her position to collect the powerup, with no idea how much time she has before someone finds her: it could be anything from ten seconds to ten minutes.

She starts running again, dodging oncoming pedestrians, down the long corridor towards victory or oblivion. The game’s been running for fifty-one minutes as she steps into Carphone Warehouse and calls down a storm.

Posted in Northern Line. Tagged with , , , , .

By Holly
March 25, 2009

7 comments

Bow Road

Bow Road, under renovation.

Picture by diamond geezer: Bow Road Station - April 2004

London is not a principled city. It doesn’t have straight-angled streets that bend to no master, it doesn’t have hills that none will level, it has no marshes on which none shall build, no uncrossable rivers, no unblockable horizons. London bows to any strong will, complies with any architectural fad, yields its soft earth constantly to the bore of new tunnels. It does as it’s told; and if this means that it’s capricious on occasion, that it layers new plans upon the old, that a thousand contradictory revolutions accrete and the city carries on regardless, undisturbed — well, that’s hardly London’s fault. It was only trying to please.

When the powerful stumble, London judders under the impact and puts forth new walls, softer grass, smooth paths. In 1110, Queen Matilda tried to cross the River Lee at a ford, and she tripped; and soon after, there was a bridge at Bow.

Others had tripped and crawled from the river, sodden and coughing, so many times before, but when it happened to Matilda, there was a bridge. The people of Bow learnt from this; and hundreds of years later, when their underground station started to crumble, they remembered. Old paint revealed the older paint beneath, pigeons descended to land on beams whose warding spikes had long since been blunted. The tubelines changed but the signs didn’t follow, crying METROPOLITAN where no Metropolitan had run for years. So in Bow they started to make important friends, and they invited their new friends round for dinner and served them salt and fat and other good things: brightly-coloured chestnut soup; asparagus and mozzarella wrapped in parma ham, crisp and melting and crisp again; whole rice-stuffed quails peeking from inside sweet peppers; tiny almond puddings that tasted of lilac and hyacinth and lavender, three to a plate.

Most particularly, they served quite a lot of wine.

Sooner or later, they knew, somebody important would trip down the stairs, a startled pigeon would flap into an important face and send important legs staggering backwards, important hours would be spent waiting for a Metropolitan train which never came.

It took a while, but eventually it worked. Someone tripped, London shivered, the station disappeared behind blue walls, and when it reappeared it was transformed.

Nowadays the people of Bow have let their important friends fall by the wayside, their purpose served. The paint at the station is still bright. It won’t last for ever, of course—London isn’t that sort of city—but it’ll do for now.

Posted in District Line, Hammersmith & City Line. Tagged with , , , .

By Holly
March 20, 2009

4 comments

Bow Church

The outside of Bow Church station, with sign.

Picture by Kake Pugh: Bow Church DLR station

Jessica is the Patron of Arbitrary Standards, and unlike the Patrons of pretty much everything else, she’s still going strong. At the moment she’s standing on the platform at Bow Church, holding a pale blue phone that goes very nicely indeed with her eyes and her Christian Louboutin python wedge pumps. The shoes aren’t comfortable, but they’re quite expensive, and the Patron of Arbitrary Standards does have to look at least moderately exquisite at all times.

A couple of metres down the platform, a man and a woman are leaning against each other. They look happy. They’ve been flat-hunting, and they’ve found somewhere (she knows, she’s been following them), and apparently it’s going to be “perfect”. There’s even a balcony.

It’s a good day, Jessica decides, to phone Taul.

“Hello?”

“Taul! It’s Jessica.”

“I told you to stop calling me.”

She smiles. “I know. I’m at Bow Church. Godforsaken fucking place, not a taxi in sight, it’s not even on the Underground. I’ve just about had enough of this DLR shite.”

“Jessica, I’m going to hang up now.”

“You always say that, but you never do. The buildings here, Taul! Have you been to Bow? They’ve got trees studded around everywhere but it doesn’t make any difference. It’s like earrings on a cardboard hog.” She has to shout as she finishes the sentence; the train’s drawing in.

“I’m going to hang up now. You’re overplaying it, anyway.”

“You always say that, too.” She stands in place on the platform as the man and the woman leave, but she watches them through the window as the train pulls away. They definitely heard her; they’re laughing about it, but all she wants is for a tiny bit of hesitation to stick. “You never understood me, did you? It’s not about plausibility, it’s about the niggling doubts. The worries you just can’t dismiss even though you know they’re absurd. Like the ones you have about Indira. She’s really nice, Taul, there’s no reason to think you’ve made a mistake.”

“I don’t think I’ve—”

“I’ll call you back,” Jessica says, and hangs up; the next batch of passengers is beginning to accumulate. A group of ten-year-olds; a middle-aged woman with a bag of shopping. Three girls in their mid-teens, which is a very easy target, but she’s feeling vindictive.

“Me again,” she says into the phone once she’s moved down the platform.

He’s silent. Doesn’t hang up, though. He never does.

The girls are laughing. “Actually I don’t care about looks,” one of them says, “as long as he’s got good teeth. And as long as his breath doesn’t smell.”

“How about fillings?”

“Fillings are okay. Not too many, you know? I’ve only had two.”

“Yeah, I’ve had… I dunno. I think two.”

Fish in a barrel, candy from a baby, peace of mind from a fifteen-year-old girl. “The thing is,” Jessica says, not loud but very very clear, “she needs to do something about her breasts. If your nipples are more than twenty-two centimetres from your shoulderblade then, you know, you have a responsibility to sort it out. Surgery’s not expensive any more, there’s no excuse for being a lazy pig.”

Taul tries to stifle his laugh, but she hears it anyway. “That’s ridiculous even by your standards,” he says. “What was wrong with the pencil?”

Jessica grins. “God, that’s an old one though. They keep that up on their own, nowadays, I don’t have to do a thing.” Generations of women standing half-naked in front of bedroom mirrors, each one placing a pencil under a breast, wondering if it will stay in place, waiting for gravity to make its judgement. “How does Indira stand up to that one, actually?”

“She hasn’t tried,” he says.

“Bet you she has.” She moves down the platform, spreading wisdom. Your annual salary should be at least a thousand pounds for each year of your age. Never sleep on your side, it gives you wrinkles. The middle-aged woman with her shopping has long hair in a bun; Jessica pretends Taul is her hairdresser, and makes an appointment. “I’m twenty-five now,” she says. “I can’t get away with hair below my shoulderblades any more.”

“You’re not twenty-five. You’re ten thousand three hundred and twelve,” Taul says.

“Sweetheart! You remembered!”

A few steps further along the platform and there’s a man reading; engrossed, even, but Jessica’s had a lot of practice and she judges her pitch perfectly to break through his reverie.

“Why don’t you just come back?” Taul says.

“Taul,” she says. “Is that a proposition?”

“Not that sort of back,” he says, “you know what I mean. Back home with the rest of us. You don’t need to do this any more.”

“That’s really sweet of you,” she says, speaking over his denial, “but I don’t think so. A man,” and she sits down one seat away from the novel-reader, judging him quickly: she wants to present a target that’s beyond his grasp, but not so far beyond that he can’t imagine it. “A man should have a six-inch penis and make fifty thousand pounds a year. I’m not as demanding as most women, Taul, I’m willing to consider trade-offs. Forty thousand a year and a seven-incher, fine. A five-incher with sixty thousand a year? That would also be acceptable. But you, darling, you fall short in both respects, so I don’t think I can accept your offer.” She hangs up, and smiles brightly.

The platform empties out; more passengers arrive. She’s getting into the swing of it now.

“If your first name is no longer available as a username on any given web service,” she tells Taul as she stands by a woman with an iphone, “you’ll just embarrass yourself by signing up. You’d be much better off trying to catch up with the zeitgeist and hoping you aren’t so slow next time.”

“Stop calling,” Taul says. “I don’t want to hear this.”

“No.”

Silence for a moment. “Indira and I are getting married,” he says.

“Sure you are,” Jessica says. “You’re a good liar, Taul.”

He doesn’t deny it.

“Indira’s never going to get married,” Jessica says. “Not to anyone worth marrying, anyway. Left it too late. Too fat as well.”

“She’s not—”

“She is. If you want to find a decent husband in London then either your age or your BMI had fucking better be under 27.” She glances for a moment at the girl two seats down, who’s pretending to read a text message on her phone. Dead on 27 for both of them, she’d be willing to bet: she’s a very good judge.

“Well, fortunately Indira’s not in London,” Taul says. “None of us are in London except you. Look, I’m hanging up now, and then I’m going to turn my phone off.”

“No you aren’t,” she says, and hangs up herself—not quite sure, this time, that he wouldn’t have done it, given another ten seconds.

She tries to comfort herself by shoving the 27-year-old in front of the next train, but that surplus BMI helps her keep her footing. In the end Jessica has to throw off her python wedge pumps to run from the transport police, and she can get another pair of course but it’s the principle of the thing. She phones Taul from a taxi; it goes through to voicemail.

“You know she’s just a rebound, right?” Jessica says. “It takes half the length of the relationship to really get over someone. We were together for four and a half thousand years, buster, so you’ve got a long time to go yet.”

Posted in Docklands Light Railway. Tagged with , , , .

By Holly
March 18, 2009

1 comment

Bounds Green

A train at Bounds Green station - rail, not tube.

Picture by Jovike: Shunting at Bounds Green

August Stokewell has filled three and a half ledgers with plans and suggestions and amendments, but he has uncovered no solution. The Stokewells do not give up, of course, and his enthusiasm remains unabated; but it’s true that the enthusiasm of his collaborators has declined over the months and then years. Nowadays only young Nate Brabicant (who depends for hat money on his stipend from the Rural Sanitary Authority) is in regular attendance.

Stokewell is still full of ideas. One morning he suggests that they limit the food supply to the area. “I understand,” he says, “that the problem for the most part proceeds from Colney Hatch, where the meals are, after all, under administrative control. Can we not ensure that inmates receive precisely the right amount of food to meet their needs, and therefore issue no waste?”

“The digestive system has subtleties beyond its arithmetical operations, and is perhaps not so easily fooled,” Brabicant says, but for six weeks the inmates of Colney Hatch are served cabbage, potato and broth in very careful measure indeed. The success or otherwise of the operation is clouded by the refusal of the wardens to adhere to the new diet for their own meals, but early indications are not unambiguously promising.

“I hold,” Stokewell says, “that the principle is sound, but admit the execution must wait for a similar problem among a more accommodating populace.”

Brabicant sighs. “It seems to me that all the adroit planning in the world will render less assistance to our cause than a week of simple ditch-digging. We are now three years into this investigation, and yet we have discovered no ingenious solution, any more than we have discovered the Philosophers’ stone.”

Stokewell frowns. “The Philosophers’ stone?” he asks. “I thought the Philosophers’ stone was of use in the transformation of base metals only. If it truly works on waste, then of course we ought to begin testing immediately. From the bowels of our lowest will proceed our new rural wealth!” He writes so quickly in the ledger that the ink smudges.

“No, Mr Stokewell,” Brabicant says, “you mistake me. There is no Philosophers’ stone. I was speaking symbolically—”

Stokewell looks up from his notes, disappointed. He puts the pen down. “Symbols are of little use when it comes to drainage and cleanliness, Mr Brabicant.”

Brabicant rubs his forehead. Outside, rain pours down, the puddles fill, the waters rise; paupers grow sodden in their shallow graves. Annabeth Morton and her brother Edwin try to dodge through the raindrops, hurrying toward the uncertain warmth of home. “I trust,” Stokewell says coldly, “you have suggestions of your own, since you care so little for mine as to resort to mockery and symbols?”

“We have not the finances,” Brabicant says, “to lay pipes as practicality urges, and the pipes that we have managed to lay sit alone in the middle of scattered fields, unconnected to their distant fellows. Perhaps several new earth closets?”

“We have built numerous new earth closets with little effect.” Stokewell indicates the page in his ledger which records the decision.

They sit, silent. The rain pours down. Annabeth and Edwin make it home, Edwin somehow far wetter despite his smaller stature. “Laggard,” Annabeth says, reaching the door first and standing just inside, blocking the entrance while Edwin grows damper still.

“Get out of the way, Annabeth, I want to come in,” he says.

“Well come in then,” Annabeth says, but she doesn’t move.

“Perhaps,” distant Brabicant says, “we could dam Bounds Green brook, whence the contamination proceeds.” He leans back in his chair.

Stokewell’s frown disappears, displaced by enthusiasm. He holds no grudges. “It would,” he says, “be an ingenious undertaking.”

They order maps and adjourn the meeting; next week, they pore over the line of the brook. In the end they plan the dam for a shallow pool that appears naturally, after the water flows through the graveyard and past Colney Hatch but before it joins up with Pymme’s brook. Brabicant doubts the plan’s efficacy—the capacity of a cheap dam is not, after all, infinite—but what else is he going to do?

Edwin coughs in bed; Annabeth, chided daily by the rest of the family, insists that he’s feigning, but she has trouble getting to sleep all the same.

Stokewell summons engineers, and plans his budget.

It’s that Saturday morning—a sunny day, with a fresh pleasant breeze—that cholera breaks out. Brabicant and Stokewell decline to continue their weekly meetings in such perilous surroundings, so their project falls by the wayside. Brabicant’s hats suffer. The Rural Sanitation Authority has taken too long.

Edwin, on the other hand, stops pretending to be sick, at least once one or two of the neighbours have died. Annabeth’s righteous fury fills the small house, dense and silent. It’s a very long time before he dares to be with her alone.

Posted in Piccadilly Line. Tagged with , , , .

By Holly
March 16, 2009

9 comments

Boston Manor

The space under the M4, all graffiti and trees.

Picture by Ewan-M, with permission: Under the M4

Somewhere near Boston Manor, and the sun’s bright. Gillian’s long since lost track of which way they came, and how to get back to the station, but there’s no rush: she’s seldom felt less urgent. The self-erecting volleyball net self-collapses again, as Kieren’s ambitious spike sends him stumbling into the pole at one end.

Tahani shouts out her victory, and flops onto the ground. “Water,” she calls out.

Gillian throws the bottle from where she’s sat, resting under the shade of the M4. It falls short.

Kieren sets the net upright again. “Your turn,” he says to her.

“Nah,” Gillian says, “I’m done.”

“Wuss,” Tahani says, stretching out a toe to hook the bottle towards her.

“I burn really easily,” Gillian says.

“You run away from losing at volleyball really easily, more like.”

That too. Tahani drinks without sitting, water splashing over her face, then she tosses the bottle up towards Kieren, who catches it (barely) and sits down. He squints in the sunlight.

Gillian likes it in the shade, the inland pier of the M4 above, the wide space below. The concrete pillars are huge and ribbed, stretching austerely from signs of life that cluster at the bottom (vines, sandwich wrappers, the three of them). She stands up, and reaches up to the tip of the graffiti, putting her hand flat on the concrete. It surprises her, how cool it is.

The spreading grass gives way to dirt, here. Probably just the lack of rain and sunlight, the edges are too ragged to signal intent, but the shape it traces under the motorway feels like a path. Gillian follows, looking back for a moment: Tahani and Kieren are lying on their backs, rolling the ball back and forth across the gap between them.

Further along the graffiti grows thicker, sharing its wallspace with vines and sprawling bushes. Birds sing. Cars roll overhead. After a few minutes the path dips (though the motorway above seems to stay level), and the quality of the sound shifts: there’s water ahead. It’s blocking the path completely, she sees as she gets closer; slow-moving, banked by concrete and pebbles.

It’s a hot day, and her sandals slip off easily. She pushes them away, along with memories from the day she spent fishing rubbish out of the Thames: something about rat urine, and flu symptoms, and see your doctor if. She looks away from the crisp packet and the broken bottle at the water’s edge.

Oh, it feels nice, though.

The whole meandering glade belongs to her, edges delineated by the breadth of the motorway. Across the water the pathway carries on and disappears, trees growing taller and impenetrable on either side, and there’s nobody in sight.

She heads back after ten minutes, not quite sure how far she’s come, but she recognises some of the brighter painted pillars as she returns. Here, was it? No volleyball net, though, and no sign of Tahani and Kieren, so maybe she hasn’t walked far enough yet; or maybe they’ve disappeared, subsumed into grass or graffiti. She traces painted swirls, looking for two stick figures and a ball lofting above them; or a TH 4 KQ 4 EVA in a bright circle.

Posted in Piccadilly Line. Tagged with , , , .

By Holly
March 13, 2009

No comments

Borough

Bond Street at night.

Picture by On Alien Cinema: Late night lines

For a couple of weeks the station’s quiet; Lottie assumes, a little sadly, that the tiny buskers have been caught at last. And then one Friday morning she heads back from Borough Market to find big-band swing filtering up the spiral staircase, jubilant and undimmed.

She skips the lift and runs down the steps in time to the music, grinning, but her arms are full of groceries and she resists the urge to dance — at least until the drum solo starts, when she transfers her bags to one hand, holds onto the banister with the other, and gives a graceless kick just as a station employee passes her on his way up. Oops.

The music speeds up as she gets to the bottom, and seven shin-high men dart across the corridor in front of her, running on black and white tiles, playing urgently as they go. A few seconds later another station worker runs after them. Lottie gets in his way for a moment, tangling his fishing net with her bag of cheese, not quite deliberately but not quite accidentally either. The buskers are so small: they deserve a sporting chance.

“It’s ridiculous,” a woman says to nobody in particular on the platform. “It’s been months, and that’s the best they can do? Butterfly nets? They should get the exerminators in at night.” Lottie moves further down the platform. As she does, she hears music again, quieter this time, and tense.

She can barely make it out, but she follows it toward a “no passengers beyond this point” sign at the far end. On the other side, tiny Benny Goodman clusters with his tiny orchestra, playing very softly.

He jumps as she squats down, and gestures for silence; the trombonists pause, the drummer holds his sticks suspended in the air, the trumpeter’s note stands alone. The whole orchestra is very very still.

“Guys,” Lottie says, “you’d have a much better chance if you actually stopped playing while you were in hiding.”

There’s no response; they stay frozen, staring at her. The trumpeter’s note fades.

“It’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you,” she says.

They still don’t move. Tiny Benny Goodman takes one step backward.

“Come on,” Lottie says. “I’m on your side, but you’ve got to be careful. They’ll come looking for you here in a minute. Are there some drains or something you can scuttle into?”

Tiny Benny Goodman frowns. “Do I look,” he says, “like a man who scuttles into drains?”

He doesn’t. His trousers are uncreased, his glasses set straight. He’s wearing a bow tie. He lifts his clarinet again, and taps his toes against the floor. The drummer begins.

“Shhhhh,” Lottie says loudly. The drummer pauses.

“Yes?” says tiny Benny Goodman. “Can I help you?”

Lottie sighs. “No,” she says, “I think I’m going to have to help you,” and she tips her grocery bags out, piling the bulkiest food out of sight behind the sign. Potatoes, half a dozen plantains, a pound of lamb hearts that she has no idea how to cook. Two punnets of raspberries; she hesitates and picks one punnet up again, squeezes it into her handbag. “Get in,” she says, holding the almost-empty bags open.

Tiny Benny Goodman looks at her. “It’s me or the butterfly nets,” she says. “Just get in, okay? The train’s coming.”

The second trombonist takes a step towards the bags, then stops when nobody follows him.

“You must have heard,” Lottie says, “what they did to the tiny London Sinfonietta.”

Benny Goodman finally lowers his clarinet. “Yes,” he says. “I did.”

“Then hurry up. The train’s coming.” And there’s a bustle at the far end of the platform that looks like danger.

She holds the bags open so that the band can climb in, then stands up, careful not to jumble them around. Oh, the groceries sitting on the grubby platform. Twenty-four pounds she spent at the market today, and what’s she going to have for dinner now? Maybe she can fit some of the vegetables in around the musicians — but the train draws in and opens its doors and she doesn’t have time to try.

As the doors slide shut and the carriage leaves, she looks out of the window to see three more station attendants with their nets, working their way down the platorm, one peering down corridors, the other two poking behind signs, pipes, posters, tapping at the ceiling.

A clarinet sounds triumphantly from her bag of cheese; she jiggles it into silence and smiles tightly at the rest of the carriage. With any luck, she thinks, she’ll be able to leave them somewhere safe when she gets off at Balham, or find them a place to live in the park. She’s not sure whether a tiny orchestra counts as a pet or a housemate, but she’s pretty sure the terms of her lease don’t allow for either.

Posted in Northern Line. Tagged with , , , .

By Holly
March 11, 2009

3 comments