The smile that had been creeping across my lips during his nervous monologue suddenly vanished at the mention of the word ‘work’. A guttural sob exploded between us accompanied by a rather unattractive (I’m guessing from the expression that flashed across his handsome face) stream of tears and mucus.
‘Oh no, I’m so sorry, did I say something wrong? I did, I said something wrong. Forgive me, I have a habit of doing that. Especially with women as it turns out. Or so I realised last night when… well never mind. What did I say? Was it train?’
I shook my head, still sobbing.
‘Tunnel? You have a fear of tunnels? No?’
I shook my head again.
‘Extremities? Work?’
A second cry burst from my throat. I couldn’t control myself, or the nasal snorts resounding from my face.
The man riffled through every pocket in his smart jeans and grey wool coat as if looking for change and then held out a packet of tissues. I accepted them silently and squeezed one against my eyes to hide my shame.
‘These are pink,’ I sniffed, ‘and they smell of strawberries.’
‘I know, embarrassing. I grabbed them in a hurry. I made the mistake of thinking all tissues are unisex but apparently not these days. I love the smell of strawberries though, and the taste. Probably my favourite of the red fruits, in fact I’d go so far as to say of all fruits, but these definitely scream ‘gay pride’ or ‘I am a girl underneath this stubble’!’
I surprised myself by laughing. He laughed too, his hand coming to rest on his – now he had mentioned it – deliciously stubbly chin.
‘Not that there’s anything wrong with gay pride of course. My brother’s gay and he’s great.’ He held up both thumbs. ‘Malachy Doyle has got the enthusiasm and energy of three men and he’d think nothing of handing out strawberry scented pink tissues just to add a bit of sweetness to someone’s day. Mind you it did come as a bit of a surprise. Nearly finished my dad off. He was an Irish Catholic so he never understood it. Blamed it on the fact that my mum had made him listen to Cliff Richard while they had sex.’
He pressed his lips shut and finally took a breath. His lips were soft and beige, I noticed, like fudge. He raked a hand through his floppy fringe.
‘I do apologise again. Here I am droning on about myself and my entire bloody family and you’re the one in tears on the Metro platform.’
I smiled and waved the pink tissue.
‘Don’t worry about it, it’s better we don’t concentrate on my life right now to be honest.’
‘Right, get it, oh dear. Is there anything I can do?’
‘Give me a job. Find me a direction.’
He opened and closed his mouth.
‘Well I…’
I interrupted before he launched into another rambling tale.
‘I’m joking. You’ve already helped just by being kind. It’s rare these days for someone to be kind to a stranger.’
‘Is it? Well that’s a sad indictment on our world isn’t it? If we all did a good deed a day the world would be a better place.’
‘It would, you’re right, but I’m no better than most. You know somebody jumped in front of my train yesterday and I swear the majority of us on the platform were too busy stressing about it making us late for work to care about the poor suicide victim. As if that matters now. Maybe I should have been late for work more often. I might have had more of a life to fall back on when I was made redundant.’
He watched me blow my nose.
‘Well at least you’re honest. That’s a start.’ I jumped when he made a fist and knocked on my head as if rapping on a door. ‘There’s a conscience in that pretty head somewhere.’
Taken aback, I smoothed down my hair where his hand had been and tilted my head up to look at his face. I guessed he was in his mid to late thirties but beyond that he was difficult to pigeonhole, which was unusual for me because my job was to read people, assess them and place them in the right job.
Was I already losing my touch? My mind began to drift.
I closed my eyes as the next train bound for the city centre blew a cloud of dirt across the platform. When I opened them again he was standing between the open doors, his hand outstretched for a second time.
‘Jump in or you’ll be standing there all day.’
His smile and my feet drew me towards the train, but I stopped at the painted yellow line on the edge of the platform.
‘This one is for Monument via Percy Main and Byker,’ he said, ‘where are you going?’
I swallowed and blinked at him, my jaw frozen.
‘Stand clear o’ the dooors please,’ said the heavily accented Geordie train announcement.
I had heard it every day for years and had never paid much attention before, but today it was as if the voice was talking directly to me.
‘You there in the pinstripe shirt and swanky suit, where the hell do you think you’re going trussed up like that? Stand clear o’ the dooors please and let the good working folk of Newcastle get to their jobs.’
‘I’m… I’m not going anywhere,’ I croaked.
A buzzer sounded and the doors slid shut between us, barring me from entering the going-to-work club. The train slowly departed, taking Malachy Doyle’s brother, whoever he was, with it.
CHAPTER THREE
1 ½ tsp baking powder
Over the course of the day I visited every café in the village. Hugging endless cups of coffee, I spent long enough to pass the time, but not so long that I might be mistaken for someone with nowhere to go. Which of course I was, but I was not ready to admit it, even to myself. While passing the bakery, my stomach rumbled to let me know I had missed lunch. I paused and considered popping in for a comforting, hot, flaky sausage roll, until Shirley spotted me while she was busy scraping frozen chewing gum from the front step.
‘Ee look out, Janice, here comes Her Ladyship,’ she hollered through the open door over the heads of the people in the queue, ‘better get the twelve-tiered sponge out of the gold plated oven, pet.’
I stalked proudly past her into the adjacent mini mart where I proceeded to spend around twenty minutes staring at the dog food.
A lady reached past me for a bag of Pedigree croquettes.
‘What sort is yours?’ she asked brightly.
Her black coat was covered in a fine layer of cream fur like a light snowfall.
‘Pardon?’
‘Your dog. What breed is it?’
‘Oh I don’t have a dog, I don’t like the hair everywhere,’ I replied without thinking.
Her face contorted as if I had just said – ‘I only like dog in my chow mein’ – and she clutched the bag of dry food protectively to her furry chest.
I shuffled away without making a purchase and I wandered back out onto Front Street. I glanced at my watch. It was just before three o o’clock and I had run out of cafés, which meant I could either work my way back through them or go home, neither of which appealed. If I went back to the same places, the staff would realise I was at an end so loose it had started to fray. If I went home I would be entering the realm of daytime TV. Worse still, mid-afternoon TV, a world I was wholly unfamiliar with. I had it on good authority from Roxy, who could have a PhD in the debates of the Loose Women, that daytime television had improved since Doctor Quincy and Take the High Road. However, I was not ready to accept I had joined the ranks of the nine to five sofa surfers. Hence I found myself teetering on the edge of a precipice, quite literally. At the very end of Front Street were high vertical cliffs supporting the ruins of the Tynemouth Priory. I stood on the edge and stared down at the angry ocean crashing against the rocks far below.
When my family first moved North and I had no friends to occupy my time, I would spend hours after school sitting on the cliffs staring out at the distant horizon across the vast North Sea, which was the colour of oxtail soup. I would try to work out how far away it was and whether I could swim there. This was usually while my artist parents were off
painting a depiction of their souls or protesting against public funds being allocated to schools and hospitals rather than to an art installation made entirely of rabbit droppings, or other such creative drivel that occupied ninety-nine percent of their waking thoughts. I’d like to think the remaining one percent was dedicated to their only daughter. However, it didn’t take me long to deduce that I came lower on the scale than sourcing weed, smoking weed, watching Take Hart whilst harshly criticising the artistic efforts of six year-olds in a stoned stupor and then recreating those childish efforts with, as far as I could tell, very little improvement.
To the young, imaginative version of myself, the horizon meant opportunity and adventure. Watching the dented off-white vessels leaving the safety of the River Tyne to head for distant ports was thrilling to me. The fact these sluggish oafs of the ocean even floated was miraculous in itself.
Where are the passengers going? I would wonder as I waved enthusiastically from the stone pier at the mouth of the river as if I were sending Charles and Di off on their honeymoon.
What amazing careers will they find? How much money will they earn and in what currency?
The world was my oyster, which had always seemed to me a rather closed shellfish to choose to represent opportunity. Of course, I then grew up (something my parents failed to do) and I learned the horizon in relation to the average height of a man was actually less than three miles away. I also learned that these miraculous floating vessels of fortune were jam packed either with pissed Geordies off to investigate brothels in Amsterdam or with loud, blond Norwegians returning from a merry weekend pillaging our shops because they hailed from a nation where a packet of Digestives (or the Nordic equivalent) was paid for with a large note. Even the floatability of the ferries was simply a question of physics, explained away by dry mathematical formulas without even the slightest suggestion of magic. In hindsight, growing up was so depressing. By the time I had earned enough money to chase those heady dreams, my horizon had shrunk from infinity to a very manageable few miles and I had realised reality dishes up the same limitations and mundane issues whether you greet the day with a ‘Good morning’ a ‘Goedemorgen’, or a ‘Bonjour’.
‘I hope you’re not thinking about jumping, pet. I’m not big on funerals.’
I swivelled around to see Roxy standing behind me with a crooked smile on her flawlessly made-up face.
She blew smoke into the air and pouted.
‘Even if you do survive, don’t expect me to push you around in a sodding wheelchair, not in these heels.’
Roxy twisted her foot to display a pink satin skyscraper heel that even Gwyneth Paltrow would balk at. As ever, my friend was dressed as if she were on a celebrity magazine cover shoot. Despite the fact the northerly wind was cold enough to strip bare flesh from bones, Roxy’s skinny legs wore nothing but spray tan. They stuck out like two of Shirley’s overcooked baguettes from a fuchsia, tulip-shaped skirt a good metre above the knee. A tailored, blue satin jacket and orange bra completed the ensemble.
‘You forgot to put a top on, Roxy.’
‘Me nipples are covered,’ Roxy winked, wobbling her breasts with her hands as if she were juggling satsumas.
Roxy was built like a tiny mannequin. Every part of her was in proportion, with the exception of her mane of rich brown hair that had so many extensions it should have needed planning permission. She was compact and firm with no unsightly wobbles. The only wobble came from her 34DD breasts, which was a wholly acceptable wobble if the regular looks of male wonderment and female jealousy they received were anything to go by. The icing on the scrumptious cake was thick false lashes, glossy nail extensions, naturally plump lips and a waist small enough to wear bangles as belts. I admit it was fortunate I had got to know Roxy completely by the age of thirteen, when being friends with the sexy class troublemaker was cool. As a grown woman, I suspected I would either have been too scared or too jealous to approach this beautiful, feisty Geordie lass to be my friend. Which only served to highlight another flaw of adulthood, because as friends go, Roxy was the best.
‘Jesus it is chuffin’ chilly up here like. If you’re going to jump can you do it now before my tits fall off?’
I sniffed, suddenly realising I had been crying and looked at my feet. Trust Roxy to get to the point and make the whole scenario seem ridiculous.
‘How did you find me?’
Roxy waved a tango nail towards the village.
‘I followed the trail of scrunched up tissues like. I thought I was trailing a depressed Hansel and Gretel.’
‘Really?’
I glanced at the ground.
‘Nah, man, I’m joking. I called your office.’
I flicked my eyes up to look at her and then refocused on the ground as shame pricked my nerve endings.
‘Your secretary told me what happened. I’m so sorry, pet.’
I shrugged.
‘She was worried about you when I said I hadn’t seen you and oh yeah, she said to tell you the petition’s got well over twenty signatures but that Cheryl might be a problem.’
Roxy screwed up her nose. I didn’t elaborate. The waves crashed behind me, sending an icy spray up the cliff that wrapped around my lower back and made me shiver. Roxy pulled a second cigarette out of her soft, blue leather Balenciaga handbag (one of her many, many gifts from Thierry).
‘I don’t understand why you didn’t call us last night, Chloe. Heidi and I were well up for celebrating your birthday but when you didn’t answer your phone, we thought you must have had a secret hot birthday date.’ She paused. ‘You didn’t did you?’
‘Sure, Roxy, I celebrated my birthday redundancy with a champagne shagathon.’
She lit the second cigarette from the end of the first.
‘Now that would be good for you. Loosen you up a bit. Here.’ She handed me the cigarette.
‘I don’t need loosening thank you. I’m not uptight.’
Roxy rested one hand on the gold belt around her waist and pursed her lips.
‘So this is what you wear to chill out in is it?’
I fiddled with the cigarette.
‘No… I…’ my voice trailed away on the onshore wind.
‘Then why are you dressed like you’re going to work when you’re not, like? I’m hoping it was an interview.’
I shook my head.
‘A meeting?’
I shook my head again.
‘An audition for The fucking Apprentice?’
I concentrated on a family of ants carrying a cigarette butt across the grass. They looked like removal men lugging a sofa. The thought of never finding another job and having to move out of my flat suddenly hit me and a sob erupted from my throat. Roxy’s face appeared upside down in my line of vision.
‘You’re not gonna be one of them mentalists who goes to work every day even though their office burned down ten years ago are you? Because if you are I might have to review our friendship, pet.’
‘But it didn’t burn down, it’s still there. They’re all still there carrying on without me.’
I blinked as a tear tickled my cheek. Roxy sighed, wrapped her arm around my shoulder and guided me away from the cliff edge and back towards Front Street.
‘You know I would’ve come straight round and helped you drown your sorrows. I might not be good at much other than looking amazing, but if I’m champion at anything, it’s organising a piss up no matter what the circumstances.’
‘I know and I should have called you but I was embarrassed.’
She laughed.
‘Embarrassed? Howay, Chloe, you daft cow, I know everything about you. I was there when you bought your first giant bag of sanitary towels. Remember them? Like fucking duvets they were.’
I snorted, despite myself.
‘And when you went to get the morning after pill even though we later worked out you hadn’t actually lost your virginity.’
I giggled.
‘So don’t go getting all secretive on
me, man, I know what pants you wear.’
I ran my hands through my hair, which had been backcombed by the wind.
‘I’m sorry, Roxy, I don’t think I’m dealing with this very well.’
I held the cigarette to my frozen lips and inhaled. Seconds later I was coughing like an eighty year-old at Bingo.
‘Jesus,’ I gasped when I finally managed to clear my airway, ‘I can’t even smoke properly any more. What a loser.’
‘You could never smoke properly. But maybe now’s a good time to start.’ She looped her arm through mine and led me along the pavement. ‘It’ll add to your dark air of desperation, which is a canny lot cooler than denial, believe me. If you ask me, pet, you’re better off out of it. At least now you can do whatever the fuck you want to do with your life.’
‘But I liked doing that. I loved my job and my suits.’
She raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow.
‘Aye well, each to their own.’
We stopped outside our grimy local pub, The Stuffed Dog, which did not disappoint in that it did actually contain a threadbare, real stuffed dog in a glass cabinet. The building looked like a chipped ornament of a building from the outside and like a 1950’s pub time capsule on the inside. Roxy stubbed her cigarette under her shiny sole and pushed open the door.
‘We can’t, Roxy.’
‘Why the fuck not?’
‘Why not? Because it’s early afternoon. It’s early afternoon on a Tuesday. I can’t go to the pub in the early afternoon on a Tuesday.’
Roxy flicked her hair behind her shoulder and looked at the door as if checking for a sign.
‘Sorry, Chloe, but I must have missed the going to the pub in the early afternoon on a Tuesday moratorium.’
A man who had just walked up behind us squeezed past Roxy and winked.
‘That’s a long word for a fit lass like you, pet.’
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