253

by Geoff Ryman

  Protect your briefcase, handbag and computer carrier from the filthy floor by crowding them all onto your lap.

  Then sneeze, unable to cover your mouth.

  Demand that people move further down the cars without seeing the baby carriage in the aisle.

  Speculate on the nature of the yellow fluid in the Lucozade bottle rolling around the floor.

  Fart.

  Pound helplessly on the chocolate machine as your train arrives.

  Pick at the loose skin around your fingernails.

  Twiddle your earring round and round through your ear until someone wails: ‘Please! Stop!’

  Nibble your hair.

  Check for split ends.

  Clean your ears with a biro top.

  Sweat.

  Take surreptitious notes about your neighbours—the lurching train will make them illegible.

  Read the Blistex ads and marvel that anyone could publish illustrations that bad.

  Spot the foreigners. They are the ones who:

  hold onto each other instead of the handrails when the train lurches.

  crowd on in a panic, holding the doors open.

  smoke.

  bellow across the aisle trying to talk over the noise.

  have to get off laughing at the next stop, going the wrong way.

  Yes, hours of fun await you on London Underground…with 253!

  146

  MISS AMELIA APJOHN

  Outward appearance

  Early twenties, small, sturdy, sits on tiptoe as the seat is too high. Black stockings, stubby, soft black shoes. Tan overcoat with corduroy collar. Blue dress peeking through underneath. Sits looking at the rings on her fingers. Begins to take them off, one after another.

  Inside information

  A trainee nurse at St Thomas’ Hospital.

  What she is doing or thinking

  She is not allowed to wear rings or wristwatches at work and so is removing them.

  Amelia hates being around sick people. She dislikes the old, particularly old men. She didn’t know that men’s body hair continues to grow, on their shoulders or chests. It gets very long, and then it goes white, a grizzled mat over withered dugs. Their arms look like crepe paper. Their lips go thin, their ears fat. She didn’t realize they get covered in little brown spots. She has to plug colostomy bags or feed gurgling pipes down into their bellies. Old men make her feel continually sick.

  A fine time to find that out; after you’ve decided to become a nurse. Yesterday, an old man collapsed in the toilet, and Amelia ran out to fetch the ward sister. ‘You can’t panic like that,’ said the ward sister.

  ‘It’s not panic,’ Amelia said before she could stop herself. ‘He’s just so…UGLY.’

  ‘This isn’t a beauty contest,’ said the sister.

  Amelia became a nurse with images in her head of healing the pathetic, the young, the sad, the handsome. Something clicks. It’s young hunky soldiers she wants to heal.

  She could always join the Army.

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  147

  MR DANIEL RICHARDS

  Outward appearance

  Small, slim, young black man. Thick-framed glasses. Short, white overcoat, dark suit, blue shirt with white bordered squares, black and yellow tie. Shoulder bag made of tan leather, slumped between feet. He prods chin thoughtfully, reading Coningsby by Benjamin Disraeli.

  Inside information

  Works for Dun and Old. Should be studying the documents in his bag on qualifying for tax accountancy, but sometimes the soul gravitates to what it truly needs.

  What he is doing or thinking

  Coningsby’s a bloody awful novel, but its siren call is this: Disraeli was a Jew who decoded Britain enough to rule it. Daniel has not had an easy life. He’s small, not physically strong, and comes from a family of robust brothers. They are proud of him now. They used to beat him up. When he was a child, his favourite bible story was Daniel in the Lions’ Den.

  When Daniel was ten, his calm and funny mother collapsed while the boys were at school. No one told them she was in hospital and their father, not a resilient man, disappeared from grief. The boys were left on their own to cope for a week. Little Daniel emerged as the brightest. He decoded the cookbooks; he found where Mum was; he found the way to the hospital. When both parents finally returned, Daniel was head of the family.

  His brothers defended Daniel after that. He found that wit could marshal strength. He is still small, still in the Lions’ Den, still learning. Daniel has a vision of Britain, one in which he fits. Rules.

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  148

  MISS HELEN THISTLETHWAITE

  Outward appearance

  As slim as Audrey Hepburn. Wiry red hair in careful disorder. Clothes all black except for the raincoat. It looks like a shopping bag, lime green with huge white dots.

  Inside information

  Works in Horse(clothes?), a shop on the Cut that specializes in restrained fashion—beiges and blacks, usually long, knitted, and baggy.

  Helen’s sister Pearl has been missing for twenty years.

  What she is doing or thinking

  Helen is shamed by the raincoat. It’s cold today and both of hers were being drycleaned. She found this in her closet: she thinks it’s her mum’s.

  She looks at the sleeve and can’t help but think how different fashion is now. This must be from the early ’70s. Even in mid-winter, women went about the streets in miniskirts (though they wore long, long boots when it was really cold). They were either cheerier, bolder or stupider.

  It was about then that Pearl disappeared. She was six years older than Helen, a teenager, with long hair and tight-ribbed sweaters. Helen lived through Pearl: boyfriends, fashion, fun.

  She disappeared, no news, no body. Mum never gave up trying to find Pearl: mediums, sniffer dogs. Arrested serial killers got a letter with a photograph, pleading to end a mother’s suspense. Nothing ever did.

  For the most part they never talk about Pearl, though her photograph is on top of the telly. Helen has only just been able to leave home, and Mum has never thrown out the old clothes.

  Neither one of them ever wears strong colours. Something lurches.

  This is Pearl’s coat.

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  149

  MISS SELIMA HAYDIR

  Outward appearance

  Nearly middle-aged, beaky woman, with neatly tied scarf over her head, wearing a suit that the Queen might wear: navy blue with white polka dots and a pleated skirt. Flicks through Introduction to Assessing Environmental Impact. The tops of the pages have been stamped, ‘University of the South Bank’.

  Carries an empty cloth bag. A printed panel on it shows a hand draped in the American flag holding a bouquet of Planet Earths. The Ninth International Conference of…it says, July 1995. The main word is an unintelligible hippy logo.

  Inside information

  Well-known Bosnian film critic. Selima’s career has suffered a certain amount of disruption. Her father is prosperous and has paid for her to do a degree in safety in Britain.

  What she is doing or thinking

  Selima aches like a loose tooth that needs to come out. Her home city is under siege, the landscape of her childhood is being blown up. Is that Environmental Impact enough? Films bore her, everything makes her feel like a coward, safe, away.

  And alone. Her English, which everyone told her was excellent, is fine on theoretical matters, but she doesn’t know words like ‘bicarbonate of soda’ or ‘mushrooms’. The embassy has no work for her. Her father has gone underground, and the Muslim men she meets are all Arabs. The bag is empty so that it can be filled with shopping, which she will eat alone. The conference it refers to is for Peace. It has not happened yet.

  What she really wants to do is pick up a gun.

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  150

  MISS CAROLINE ROFFEY

>   Outward appearance

  Discreet black coat, brown suit, dress a bit short. Honey-highlighted hair, luxurious make-up. New, slim leather case. Badge just visible on inside jacket. Reading the FT.

  Inside information

  Director of Training for Pall Mall Oil.

  What she is doing or thinking

  Scanning the paper when she senses something out of kilter next to her.

  ‘Caroline! Hello!’ says a deep, rich, posh voice. Looks up to see a grey-fingered, grey-faced man with unwashed locks spilling over a re-stitched jacket collar. He asks, ‘How’re things at Pall Mall? Still doing the training?’

  Who is this? An ex-colleague? Pall Mall has downsized twice. Caroline frantically tries to place him, re-imagining him in clean clothes and short hair. ‘I’m fine thank you, how are you?’

  He bellows, ‘Couldn’t be better. You know I’m working on the Internet now? In fact, I was speaking yesterday at the Marketing on the Internet Conference.’

  ‘What a coincidence!’ she says. ‘I was at that conference.’ Back, very far back, at university Caroline knew the band Genesis before they made it. She is beginning to wonder if this is one of the original members—one who left too soon.

  He pats his pockets. ‘I used up all my cards yesterday. Do you have one of yours?’

  Something tells her no. She chuckles. ‘I used up all mine too.’

  She gets out at Waterloo and walks quickly away in case he follows. She feels sorry for him and awful about her reaction. I used to know him, she thinks. Who, who, who?

  And why?

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  151

  MR DANNY DODDING

  Outward appearance

  Filthy middle-aged man. Uncut hair and beard, Frankenstein boots. Suit repaired with thick white thread. Enters at Embankment, scans the carriage, and promptly sits next to a woman.

  Inside information

  Begs for money and travels all day on the Underground to keep warm. Grew up in Barnado’s and drifted ever since, buggered off as he puts it, except for a brief period in university. Danny studied philosophy. Proved to his own satisfaction that it was illogical to wear shoes.

  He is to be seen in summer walking along country lanes. Likes to talk to people, but has to scheme to gain and hold attention.

  What he is doing or thinking

  What a pretty woman, the kind he went to university with. He spots a forgotten conference badge on her jacket. Marketing and the Internet, it says, Caroline Roffey, Training Director, Pall Mall Oil. Oil huh? Well all the trendy little girlies went into business and became like their dads only not bald and fat.

  ‘Caroline!’ He greets her like a long lost friend. He would like to take her for a six-month walk, show her the stars from under a hedge. He would like to put his hands on a fully operational warm radiator. He might just get her card, if he asks.

  But, no, her caution is automatic.

  ‘I’m in the book,’ he calls out as she leaves. Her smile looks clear, unforced. That was all he wanted. He sits back content.

  Then the man opposite sits forward. Oh good, someone else to talk to. His lucky day.

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  152

  MR TERRY MACK

  Outward appearance

  Small, handsome man. Kindly face, red moustache. Green jacket, bilious sweater, hiking boots. Holds open The Daily Express, but his eyes are fixed elsewhere.

  Inside information

  A member of the IRA posted to London during the ceasefire to recruit Irish men who already live here. The mission has changed. A friend has identified the wife of an informer.

  Terry is tailing Passenger 74, Christine Marre.

  What he is doing or thinking

  He knows Christine will get out at Waterloo to work in Epik. He has seen the way she travels, nervous, looking over her shoulder. She’s an informer’s wife all right, in a permanent state of nerves.

  He’s been in her flat, looking for photographs or letters. She’s thorough. Obviously trained—not a letter anywhere. She must read them and eat them. He looked through the wastebin for torn paper. He looked at her phone bills, from Mercury, itemized. No Irish calls. Everything in the flat looks temporary, like she doesn’t really live there.

  He wants to fuck her. She’s the kind of woman he likes; there is something delicious and theatrical about her face. He wants to have an affair with her, and find out all about her husband. And then one night, with his dick up her, he’ll tell her: I’m a Provo.

  That will make her come; he knows that from her face, from its avidness, its blank stare. She’ll be terrified, thrilled. Middle-class British bitch.

  He decides. Today on the platform, they’ll meet. He stirs himself as the train slows, ready to catch up with her.

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  153

  DR ANTHONY JAMIESON

  Outward appearance

  Grey hair, but young, pink face. Aran sweater, black trousers. Voluminous, shiny overcoat. In boisterous conversation with his companion, legs apart, apparently holding an invisible cup of coffee.

  Inside information

  A GP with an enthusiasm for boating. He and his companion crew together. Both are visiting Buntleys Coachworks to hire a trailer to haul a very particular boat to The Boat Show.

  What he is doing or thinking

  Telling his friend about a video conference from on board a ship in the Fastnet boat race. The chairman kept lurching in and out of the picture. Tony mimes it. ‘He kept disappearing out of shot. Then he’d swing back in and start talking about sponsorship.’ Less experienced participants were flung about in the background. One of them suddenly leant overboard and vomited in shot.

  ‘But there was this one old man. Nothing fazed him. He just stood there like this, absolutely unmoving. He looked a bit like a drunk, only he had a cup of coffee. And he stood there drinking it, like this…’

  Tony mimes a superior looking man, with his coffee tacking back and forth across the air in slow progress towards his lips.

  ‘He never said a word, he just kept looking at all these berks trying to have a serious business meeting in the middle of a boat race.’

  Tony’s wife is a serious middle-class woman tormented by the children’s education and ecological issues. His work consists of prescribing happy pills to lonely old people.

  ‘So,’ he suddenly says. ‘What’s our next little adventure going to be?’

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  154

  MR NEIL SYLVAN

  Outward appearance

  Balding, fit, chinless. Brown sweater, trousers and boots, but his tartan shirt collar is in vibrant colours. Neil nods, laughs, crumples forward as his companion completes his story.

  Inside information

  Analyst for a City merchant bank, who captains Passenger 153. They are selecting a trailer to haul one of Neil’s boats to The Boat Show at Earl’s Court.

  It’s all a bit of a laugh. The boat is a six-foot dinghy from an old cruise ship. They have entered it in the Classical Yachting exhibition. It is, after all, by definition a classic boat. They’ve had a lot of fun pretending to be insulted that the Show doesn’t want it. Now the Show has agreed to exhibit it. They can’t wait to see the look on people’s faces.

  What he is doing or thinking

  His chum asks: so what’s our next adventure? ‘The Club Supper,’ Neil replies.

  ‘Oh, you’re joking,’ says Tony. ‘I said adventure, not a wake.’

  ‘You haven’t heard about our outfits,’ says Neil. ‘I reckon tuxedo tops. Tailored shorts. And yellow wellington boots.’

  ‘With waterproofs?’

  ‘And Sou’westers,’ says Neil. ‘Very elegant.’

  ‘Now what will the wives wear?’ They exchange a gleam of understanding. The real reason for being a sailor is to get away from patients, bosses, aggressive barrow boys, wives, spreadshee
ts and diaries.

  This could be the last year for Neil. Running a boat costs money. Things at the bank aren’t good. Something funny seems to be happening with some of their futures in the Far East. Mind you, nothing they haven’t seen before at Barings.1

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  Another helpful and informative 253 footnote

  1 In case you live on the moon or somewhere similar such as West Los Angeles, Barings Bank, the guarantor of David Niven’s trip Around the World in 80 Days and less salubrious imperial activities, met its end at the hand of one of its own traders, Nick Leeson, the next month. It was one more nail in the coffin of the 1980s, but very far from being the last. Those nails fell like rain.