by Sarah Bourne
By nine o’clock, Clare had managed to get both of them into bed. The stairlift they’d got for her father was a blessing. Her mother loved it, going up and down two or three times every night before she’d go to bed, laughing as she waved her hands in the air with the excitement of it all.
Clare flopped down on the sofa and stretched her legs out. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could go on like this. Marion was fantastic, but she didn’t want to work more hours. Nursing homes were expensive, and her father had always said he wanted to die at home, not in a urine-smelling, plastic-chaired facility people went into to wait for death to take them. She had money now, it was true, but how long would it last if she had to pay for a home for her mother and twenty-four-hour care for her father? Not long. A lifetime of having to be careful, of scrimping and saving had made her wary of spending. She wasn’t going to squander it on things she could manage herself.
She laughed at the idea she could go off on a holiday, leaving her parents at home. It wasn’t going to happen. A sob choked her. Nothing was going to be different. She had been wrong earlier when she thought this was the day her life changed. The reality was she was going to spend the next however many years looking after her demented mother and her frail father, wishing their lives away so hers could begin, hoping that by then she wasn’t too old to enjoy it.
She sucked in her lips, took a deep breath and heard May’s voice in her head telling her to put her feelings into a strong box and slam the lid on them. Of course, May only meant her to put her panicky feelings in a box, but Clare found it a useful exercise for any emotions she didn’t want to feel. It took a while to stuff them all in, but she was well practised. In her mind’s eye, she put the box of feelings in a safe and locked it away.
She got out her notebook and pen and started writing.
3
Tim
Tim was tired. He’d worked overtime for the last two weeks, what with Danny being off with one complaint or another. Danny was often off. Tim and the boys wondered if he was moonlighting somewhere, working on the trains not being enough.
‘Wouldn’t put it past him,’ Tim had said last time they talked about him. ‘He’s a sly one that Danny. Notice the way he’s never there when it’s time to buy a round? Always there to drink it though. Tight-arse. Wouldn’t surprise me if he was a millionaire on the quiet. Cash-in-the-mattress type. Not one to trust a bank.’
Frank had laughed. ‘Yer probably right there,’ he’d said, and scratched his excuse for a beard.
Frank was proud of his bumfluff. Tim had once laughed at him as he groomed it with a special brush in the Men’s. Frank had called him a worthless bastard and Tim hadn’t mentioned it again.
Tim hated the early trains. Too many wankers and uppity country types who were outraged in their uptight, going-puce-but-saying-nothing way if someone sat in their seat. As if it was their seat.
He rolled his shoulders to relax them a bit. They’d just left Milton Keynes, it was still before eight and he was doing a double shift. Wouldn’t be home till gone nine this evening. Three trips. At least he’d be sleeping in his own bed, not like last night when he got stranded in Manchester and had to kip at a mate’s place. What a dosshouse. He shuddered at the memory. Wouldn’t be surprised if he got fleas, and he scratched at an imagined bite. Still, at least it was free.
He made his way to the on-board food shop and got Sandra to make him a cup of tea the way he liked it – two teabags and a breath of milk. His mum used to say it’d put hairs on his chest. What did she know – when was the last time she’d seen his chest, or any of the rest of him for that matter? Must be more than fourteen years – he’d been about nine. They used to drink tea together in the evenings while she watched Coronation Street and he pretended to do his homework, in the peaceful time before his dad got home. He spent the first few months after she left believing she’d come back and the time since wondering whether there was anything he could have done to make her stay.
He downed the tea, thanked Sandra and headed off down the train. Ticket time.
Suddenly the brakes squealed and the train started slowing down fast. Either a twat had pulled on the emergency brake, or there was a problem. He braced himself against the wall just inside the first-class coach, closed his eyes and took several deep breaths. The screech of the brakes was like a knife in his head, and the air smelled of burning metal. Eventually the train stopped and Tim opened his eyes. The passengers were looking out the windows to see what had happened. There were paper cups and sandwich wrappers all over the floor, and spilt tea running across the aisles, but everyone stayed in their seats and quickly got back to their phones or laptops.
As he tried to make a quiet exit to find out what had happened, some pillock in a suit caught him by the sleeve, wanting to know how long it would be until they got going again.
‘I have a very important meeting. I can’t be late.’
‘I understand, sir,’ Tim said, in his most soothing voice, pulling his arm away from the man’s grasp, ‘and I’ll look into it, but right now I need to find out what’s happened and make an announcement for all the passengers.’ He emphasised the ‘all the passengers’, so this twat knew he was being an arsehole.
The man followed him along the carriage, badgering him. As they passed the toilet, Tim heard a thud and a groan from inside and knocked on the door. The Suit tried to push him forward, insisting that he find out what had stopped the train. Tim turned and glared at him. He wanted to punch him in the head and tell him to stop being such a tosspot, but he’d lose his job if he did. He sighed and shook his head. Then he heard a grating sound, like someone clearing their throat, and the door opened.
‘Are you okay, sir?’
‘What happened?’ The man leant against the sink. He had a cut on his head and blood was oozing down his cheek. Tim rolled off a wad of toilet paper and handed it to him.
‘Emergency stop, sir. You must’ve got thrown around a bit.’
He nodded. Blood was beginning to seep through the toilet paper.
Tim looked at the Suit again. ‘Please go back to your seat while I look after this gentleman.’
The Suit looked him up and down, a sneer on his face, but retreated back to first class.
What a tosser. Some people thought they were so important. He glowered and watched him go. He walked like he had a poker up his arse.
‘Better come along with me, sir,’ he said to the man in the toilet. ‘We’ll get you cleaned up.’
He wished the day was over. In fact, he wished he could get another job altogether. Trouble was, this one paid all right and at least it was inside. He’d done his time labouring, breaking his back for eight quid an hour, being told to stay at home when it was raining and they couldn’t do anything. You can’t plan for things when you don’t know how much’ll be in your pay packet each week. Nah, this was better, for now. And although sometimes it was challenging, dealing with the passengers, at least every day was different. He nodded to himself and made his way towards the front of the train to find out what was going on, keeping his head down and trying to be invisible so no one stopped him to ask any questions.
As if that’d work.
An elderly woman grabbed his jacket as he went past. ‘Excuse me, young man, but how long do you think we’ll be here?’
He gently pulled his arm away and put on his apologetic, representative-of-the-company smile. ‘Can’t say, I’m afraid. I’m on my way to find out more right now. We really are sorry for any inconvenience.’ Train conductor speak.
The old lady sighed and slumped back into her seat. She reminded Tim of his grandma; white hair, soft, creased skin, too much blue eyeshadow. But his grandma had never had a bruise like that on her jawline, all purple and swollen. He felt sorry for her. She must be shaky on her pins and taken a fall. His grandma had been healthy until the day she died. One massive stroke and off she went. Just the way she would’ve wanted, his dad said, but Tim knew she didn’t want to die
at all. She had more living to do. He shook his head and carried on towards the engine.
It seemed to take hours to make it to the front of the train. Tim had to fend off inquiry after inquiry until he wanted to scream he’d never know what had happened unless they let him go and find out. As he neared the front of the train he saw the flashing blue-and-red lights of police cars pulling into the field. A few minutes later he made it to the engine and saw Brian sitting on the engine step, the door wide open, talking to a policewoman and he knew there’d been a jumper on the line. Brian was wrapped in a silver blanket. He mumbled something and the policewoman wrote it down in her notebook. Why didn’t they record the shit people said instead of jotting it all down? Maybe it was about tradition. He was always hearing about ‘traditional policing methods’ on the news, like they were something to be proud of rather than outdated and cheap.
‘You okay, man?’ he asked when there was a break in the mumbling.
Brian turned to him and Tim suddenly realised what ashen-faced meant. Brian’s skin had turned grey and he looked ten years older than he had half an hour ago.
‘Shit, man–’ Tim didn’t know what to say so he sank onto his haunches and put his hand on Brian’s shoulder only to pull away when Brian let out a sob and crumpled in a heap.
‘I didn’t see her, honest, I didn’t see her. She was suddenly just there.’ He started rocking.
Tim put his hand back on Brian’s shoulder, feeling bad he’d taken it away in the first place. People in shock needed support – the comfort of a familiar face, the weight of a friendly hand. He’d needed those things when his mum left and when his grandma died. And when Tess dumped him. He took a deep breath. He didn’t want to remember any of those things.
‘It’s all right, man, no one thinks you did it on purpose.’
The policewoman was still standing around and he looked to her for support. He nodded at her, eyes wide, and then cocked his head at Brian, dragging a few words of comfort out of her. Stiff bitch.
‘Yes, that’s right. No one thinks that,’ she said with about as much warmth in her voice as yesterday’s tea.
‘Fuck,’ said Brian. ‘Fuck.’
‘You’ll be all right, man,’ said Tim because once again, he didn’t know what else to say and thought the words probably didn’t matter but the hand on the shoulder did. Brian had stopped rocking at least.
Tim peered out the door to see what was going on outside. Several men in disposable white overalls knelt at the front of the train. Scraping blood and guts off the engine, he thought, and imagined he could hear the scrape of spatulas and the pluck, pluck of tweezers. He wondered what happened to all the bits – did they pack them all up and give them to the family to be buried?
He also saw the police cars and vans parked untidily in the field next to the train. The policewoman was asking Brian if he was able to stand up.
Tim helped him, one hand under his armpit, the other round his shoulder. He could feel Brian shaking and struggled with the weight of him. He wasn’t a small man. Six foot four and liked his food. Tim wondered if he’d be able to hold him if he had to but once Brian was on his feet he leant against the door frame.
‘We’ll take you to the station to make a statement and drop you home after,’ she said, taking his arm.
‘What about the train – who’s going to drive it?’ he asked.
‘They’ll get a relief driver.’ She pulled on his arm to get him moving.
‘Off you go, man. Look after yourself, all right?’ said Tim and gave him a farewell pat on the back. He felt sick. Thinking about scraping the guts off the train had done it. And he felt angry. How fucking dare someone do that and make his mate blame himself. Brian would have to live with the vision and the memory of the woman’s last seconds on this planet for the rest of his days, wondering if he could’ve stopped if he’d seen her sooner. Course he couldn’t – it takes hundreds of yards to stop a train going at eighty or ninety miles an hour, and Brian would know that, but still… that’s a cruel thing to do to a man. And somehow it made it worse that it was a woman. Such a violent death.
Tim made his way slowly back towards the passengers. He didn’t want to talk to anyone but he knew they’d ask questions, and they had a right to know something.
An Indian man with glasses and a sharp parting in his hair was the first to stop him. His glasses made his eyes look bigger and Tim noticed he had the longest eyelashes he’d ever seen. They sort of curled away from his eyes, framing them darkly. Tess would kill for eyelashes like that, he thought, before he could stop himself.
‘What’s the problem?’ asked the Indian with the faintest hint of foreign, musical tones behind his polished English accent.
‘Unfortunately there’s been an accident,’ said Tim. ‘I’m going to make an announcement.’
‘Oh my Lord,’ said the Indian, and slumped into his seat, closing his eyes.
The woman next to him looked out the window, craning her neck to see if she could get a glimpse of the mess.
‘Best not to look,’ said Tim, disturbed by her eagerness to see, even though he’d done the same only minutes ago. It was human nature, wasn’t it, to be fascinated by blood and gore, to be interested in bad things happening to people? As long as they weren’t people you knew and liked. It was why horror movies so often did well at the box office and people slowed down to look at accidents.
Tim made his announcement about the accident and asked everyone to stay in their seats. He apologised on behalf of the railway for the inconvenience, then made his way towards first class murmuring responses to the passengers who asked questions, but kept moving so as not to get caught in long explanations. He wished he could take his uniform off and sit quietly in a corner seat. He was suddenly so tired, so heavy-limbed that he could barely make it to first class. Is this shock? he wondered. Or the effort of not telling the passengers to get stuffed. All they could talk about was how the delay would affect them. Not one of them had asked how the driver was, whether he would ever get over it.
‘Tickets, please,’ he said as he entered the carriage.
They were all there, in their usual places, copies of The Telegraph on their laps. The first man lifted his head as Tim reached him, sighed and pulled his wallet out of his inside jacket pocket as if it was the greatest inconvenience he could imagine. Tim glanced at the season ticket and nodded.
He moved on to the next person, the man he thought of as Mr Self-Important. ‘Thanks,’ he said when he flashed his ticket. He was turning away when he felt a hand on his arm. Here we go, thought Tim. Sir’s going to complain about the delay and tell me how important he is and how it’s vital to world peace or European security that he gets to London NOW.
‘Is the driver all right?’ he asked.
Tim wondered if he’d heard right. He turned, stared at the suited man with the polished shoes and said, ‘He’s gone to give his statement to the police.’
‘Yes, but is he all right? I mean it must have been one hell of a shock, poor man.’
Tim blinked. Once. Twice. He couldn’t form a sentence. The man cleared his throat and waited.
‘He’s – he’s very upset,’ said Tim.
The man nodded. ‘My grandfather drove a train. It happened to him once too. It really shook him. Will the company look after him? Is there a fund or something, to help him out until he can work again?’
Tim hadn’t thought of that, and didn’t know. ‘There’s sick leave.’
‘Yes. Of course. Well, I hope he recovers quickly.’
Tim felt guilty. This man may be an upper-class twat and wear a cashmere coat and scarf, but he was a decent sort after all. He thought about giving him back the expensive pen he’d left on the seat a few weeks back but decided not to. His gran had always said, ‘God helps those who help themselves’. And anyway, just because he’d been sympathetic today didn’t mean he was actually nice. And Tim liked that pen. It felt just right in his hand and although he didn’t write very
much, preferring to make notes on his phone when necessary, that pen made him think about writing. What he’d say about things and how he’d say it. Maybe one day he’d start a diary or something. He gave a little laugh. All because of a pen.
And why not? He’d always been all right at English. His mum, and later his gran, had read to him and then, when he could read himself, made sure he always had books. He looked at his hand, imagining the pen in it, then he looked at the other man’s hands – soft and white, tapered fingers, buffed nails. And small. Almost a child’s hands. They didn’t deserve to hold a pen like that. Tim’s own hands may be rough, but he always kept them clean and the nails short. Art was his great love though. His fantasies about the future always centred on having a solo exhibition of his works. Or being asked to paint a huge mural somewhere prominent. His art teacher had said he had talent. Maybe he’d use the pen to sign copies for his fans.
‘Are you all right?’ asked the man, and Tim realised he was still standing beside him, daydreaming and probably smiling like a loony.
‘Yeah,’ he said, and moved on.
Half an hour later, Tim was ready to quit his job and walk away. It didn’t seem to matter how many announcements he made, or how often he apologised, the passengers were getting antsy. He’d rung head office to find out what else he could do and even when he announced a discounted train journey for every passenger, there were still complaints. He felt like telling them all to take a flying jump but knew it would cost him his job which, much as he hated it right now, he needed to keep a bit longer. So he glued an apologetic smile onto his face and walked the length of the train again, listening to people go on about their important jobs, appointments, meetings, shopping, family reunions and God knows what else until he wanted to ask if any of them actually did anything that was a matter of life and death – did it really matter one tiny rat’s arse if they were late – would people die?
