Mornington Crescent > Somerset, February 2024
You won’t make it, the cabby says to me, rain cantering down his windows. I immediately regret the drinks I persuaded my team to go for.
I thought you didn’t like work drinks, my husband will say to me later. I’ll shrug.
It’s only a ten-minute journey, I crack, my voice raising and splitting in a way I don’t particularly like. My Uber driver’s wearing a beige jumper with brown stripes that circle taut around his waist. I’m scanning him for details – thin lips, acne scar – filing them down as women always do, for a police report that hopefully never happens.
He gestures at the knot of brake lights, the diversion signs glistening under streetlamp by way of saying, forget it lady. It’s ordinarily a ten-minute journey to Paddington from my office, and I’ve left myself double that.
Fuck sake, I swear, quietly enough to sound discreet, loudly enough to ensure he’ll hear. We’re barely moving but he hits the brake pedal with a quickness that swings me forward; knees hitting front seat. My bag spews itself across the floor.
No. He says firmly, eyes still fixed on the road. No. My job to drive you safely. Go quick? He swings now, to look at me. His eyes look sad, not angry. Accident will happen.
I remove my palm from the headrest, having instinctively thrusted it there and begin to pick my belongings from the footwell.
Sorry I want to say, sorry for being a dick. I have a five-star Uber rating, did you see it?
I text my husband – unlikely to make my train, prob home late, sorry – and wait for his reply, willing his annoyance to displace mine.
We pull into the wrong side of Paddington station, the clock now grazing 3-minutes to spare. I have a burning urge to tell the driver he’s a prick for dropping me here, having asked him numerous times for Praed Street.
Thank you, I say, thank you, have a good night.
I’m sprinting across the concourse. Too tight loafers on shiny tiled floors. People wearing sensible shoes; people who are neither early, nor late peel their heads toward me incrementally.
What? I want to yell. It’s a fucking train station, never seen a woman running for a train?
I hurl myself into the first open carriage, panting and cumbersome, knocking someone’s water bottle as I hustle myself into the last remaining table seat. Why don’t people just move over? I spit internally while smiling at them gratefully.
The train is full. But people continue to pile on. Nylon coats, backpacks, elbows and cursing.
We apologise for the late running of this service a coddled voice commands over a broken speaker.
Opposite, a young couple eat chicken wraps from Leon. They hold hands across the gangway. I roll my eyes without rolling them. The woman next to me – fuzzy hair, polka dot wrap dress – is part way through a Maggie O’Farrell novel. I’m certain she feels the same.
I want to ask her if she’s read O Farrell’s memoir, I Am I Am I Am. I picture us nodding in agreement at the brilliance of its structure, about that chapter in the Italian hills, how haunted we are by it, the one with the binocular strap.
She looks at me squarely, then down toward my bag – quilted, bulging – now sagging toward her shoulder. Sorry I say, mouthing without volume, pulling it back toward me.
I stare out the window.
Awkwardly plug my phone in to charge.
Scroll Instagram.
Remember I’ve packed the book I keep meaning to read.
I claw through a paragraph, wondering if the couple opposite, now discussing Traitors, have read Heartburn. I make a show of tracing its swirly embossed cover with my finger before placing it down beside their Leon wrappers, and returning to Instagram.
Why is Wrap Dress wearing a disposable mask (strapped like a cone to her face), I wonder? Public transport, I scoff (to no one), it sort of means you have to deal with the fucking public. The couple opposite lean across the aisle to kiss.
I tug my coat off, suddenly feeling the wine from earlier push on my impatience like a hot compress.
Someone’s eating Chinese food. The smell swills and sticks. I raise up meerkat like and look over my shoulder but can’t locate who it is.
Swindon. I take a picture of the sign to send to my friend.
A man gets on, and for a moment I think I recognise him. He grips each headrest in turn while looking for a seat. I search his face trying to locate a memory. He stops by our table. I realise I don’t know him.
Music rattles from his EarPods. People look up and look away, huffing to themselves. It reminds me of a story I saw on TikTok last week where someone’s dog had swallowed their EarsPods, only discovered when music began playing from the its bowels.
I check my phone. My husband’s still not replied. I check my 5G.
I’m thirsty but also need to piss out the two glasses of wine I had earlier. I take a swig of water from the bottle I had the foresight to fill before leaving the office and assess the gangway. The girl opposite returns from the loo. Was it ok? I want to ask her, but don’t.
It is what it is, I think. Laughing at myself for saying what my friend Y in the States would refer to as the most pointless of all British phrases. I consider Whatsapping her, then realise it’s too complicated a scenario to explain and not a very good story either.
The next stop is Chippenham.
Thank fuck. Nearly home.
You won’t make it. The cabby’s voice returns to me as I smirk at my reflection in the train window – lipstick now congealed in the corners of my mouth.
My stop, I say (without saying anything), to the woman in the polka dot wrap dress. We smile, as I clamber over her legs, so she needn’t stand up. At least I think she smiled – her eyes suggest what her face mask forbids.
I huff impatiently waiting for the train doors to open. The woman in front of me hits the round yellow ‘open’ button repeatedly even though we both know the doors are automated.
A caterpillar of people waddle onto the platform, slick and grey from rain. We push politely on the stairs, kind eyes and silent swears, hoping to be first at the taxi rank.
You made it, my husband will offer enthusiastically fifteen minutes from now, as he watches me de-robe in our narrow hallway. Hair wet from London rain, armpits damp from GWR’s off key thermostat.
Yeah. Nightmare journey. Two secs. I’m about to wet myself. I’ll tell you about it later.
But we never do.
This has been in my head ever since I read it two days ago, you are so good at capturing a moment and everything inside it. x