Keith opened the backseat passenger door and poked a thermometer in Barry’s ear. Although he was swaddled in three blankets and clasping a fourth mug of tea, the cold blast of air combined with the peculiar ear sensation to set Barry’s core juddering again. His temperature was rising but not all that quickly, according to Keith. He wanted to take him in to get checked out, just as a precaution. Barry had wanted to leave the scene immediately before realising he couldn’t. All the services were on their way. But he was recovering fine and definitely didn’t want to stay overnight anywhere. A quick check-up sounded sensible enough.
Twenty minutes earlier the Paramedic had first appeared in front of him, a dark green-uniformed bald bloke in his early-forties of just below average height with a dark goatie. Like everyone in a uniform, he’d spoken clearly about the situation and EXACTLY what was happening, like Barry was still under water. Keith had been the latest in a reel of quick-changing people that started with the three figures who’d steered him away from the sea. One was a dog-walker who hadn’t been either of the men directly propping him up as he staggered inland. He had relieved Barry of his sodden camera, still slung round his neck, and carried it for several yards – perhaps so it felt as if he contributed in some way. Then he gave it back to Barry and left the scene.
Another, a hard-faced middle-aged man, had stayed awhile and led him to a quiet corner behind the pub, away from the crowd of onlookers. He’d seemed unsympathetically dutiful, as if he thought Barry another idiot but would serve him well. He helped Barry out of his wet clothes, draped him with one of those foil capes marathon runners wear at the end of the race, told him to keep moving and ordered a mediterranean looking barman to make tea. What was he doing in Wales?
The third man immediately on the scene, he couldn’t remember who the third man was at all. Nothing about him came to mind.
A siren had grown louder outside before stopping altogether. A siren for me, Barry thought, that in itself was deeply unsettling. They’d moved into the pub’s empty conservatory extension, a dining room, and sat down, Barry still trembling, disgusted and humiliated at all of this. Another uniformed man entered with Keith, a boxy machine, and blankets. Barry was swaddled further and hooked up to the bleeping machine via several antennas suckered to his body. The line-graph looked regular enough and the medics appeared content. The ungraceful man who thought Barry an idiot excused himself at this point and Barry thanked him profusely for everything.
Barry kept thanking everyone around him profusely for everything, and apologising, keen not to miss anybody, not even the mediterranean looking barman for his excellent neverending supply of tea.
Unsuckered from the machine, Barry went to a toilet to take off his jeans and swaddle himself in more blankets. Keith had shouted in after him to check he hadn’t collapsed. Barry was trying not to think too hard about the secondary drowning thing Keith explained where swallowed sea water retrospectively swamps the lungs. He hadn’t swallowed any, had he? Another mug of tea was forced into his hands as he exited the gents and was shepherded to the car park and into the van of the Sea Rescue people.
There were three, or four of them? Did they need that many? One had an aggressive style of care: you do NOT worry about wasting all our time! This is what we’re here for.
He was seated down in the heat-blasted van behind Miriam, another of the sea rescue team. Hi, I’m Miriam, said Miriam, a kind-faced, early middle-aged lady. Hi Miriam, said Barry. Lovely sunset isn’t it? And it was, still blazing down over the sea, firing embers into the last whispy clouds. Her sympathy was more traditional and they spoke amiably of London, having lived in similar areas.
Barry glanced at himself in the rear view mirror above Miriam’s head. Pale, washed-out, stupid prick.
That was when Keith opened the door and shoved a thermometer in Barry’s ear. Warming slowly, Barry agreed to climb into Keith’s Paramedic van and be taken to a local hospital for a once over. They spoke of Keith’s career and his football-playing aspirations, his new hobby of Squash, which he’d become good at too.
After an initial check requiring more suckers and machines, the main two-minute check, courtesy of a young affable Doctor, took about three hours to arrive. Wear armbands next time, was his reassuring advice. By this time Barry was tired and hungry and really wanting to be home. He vaguely wondered if he was being missed at all, it being unusual for him to be unreachable for such a long period of time.
Keith returned to ferry Barry back to his car on the pitch-black, ice-cold seafront. The sky was densely starlit but the sea, mere yards away, skulked silent, black and invisible.
His car was frozen over by the subzero temperatures and seawater had killed the remote locking of his key, meaning the vehicle was only accessible through the passenger door. Having shuffled over the handbrake and experienced a freezing blast under the hospital dress chilling to his undercarriage, he sat in the driver’s seat.
He really hoped the engine would start.
He turned the key in the ignition and, except lights on the dashboard, nothing happened. He slowly headbutted the steering wheel.
It wasn’t the best of days. But obviously it could have been much worse. That could be used as a caveat for every bad stroke of luck forever now, he supposed. At least he didn’t die that one Sunday afternoon… How long would that last?
Barry plucked the breakdown rescue card from the windscreen holder and, still swaddled in two blankets and a loose hospital garment of the kind women give birth in, he gingerly padded back over to Keith’s warm van. After summoning the rescue service using the Paramedic’s mobile phone, Keith asked if he’d told anyone, if anyone should know. It made Barry consider his parents, the one phone number he did know off the top of his head. If they had tried calling, it was possible his Mum could be nervous.
Hello Mum, sorry to call so late.
Oh hello – she said cheerily – how are you?
Oh, fine – he bunched the blankets around his shoulders and wriggled his chilly bare feet – you?
Yes, all well here.
Good good. Um, just a really quick one, Mum, I’m browsing online looking for Christmas presents for Amy. Any ideas?
No, it’s hard buying for a one-year-old isn’t it? Well I’m going up to see them all next week and I was planning on talking to them about it then because we’ll…
Barry’s attention drifted off at this point but a sixth sense enabled him to inject interested sounds which suggested he was listening, before clicking back in when his mother eventually paused.
- Oh, ok, that’s fine. I just wondered, Barry said, importing finality and closure into his tone. Sure I’ll think of something.
He ended the call with a cheery promise to speak soon and placed the mobile on the driver’s arm-rest. Thanks Keith.
Wouldn’t wanna play you at poker, said Keith.
The rescue van only took twenty minutes to arrive. A burly thick-set man named Darren. Barry told him they suspected a flat battery, but after hearing the long story Darren figured that the key’s waterlogged electronics were responsible. After surgery involving dismantling, air-conditioning powered drying, scraping, tweaking – all of which Barry thought took considerable dexterity for someone who looked like a bull, like Peter Crouch having a good touch for a tall man – the engine woke.
From the backseat of the Paramedic van, Barry saw the lights of his car ignite and the silhouetted chunky outline of Darren raise two jubilant arms aloft like he’d scored a winning goal. Keith made a small, impressed whooping sound, Barry nearly cried with relief.
He could go home.
Saturday, 11 December 2010
Thursday, 9 December 2010
depth
Dumbstruck by the play of dipping golden winter sun, clouds and waves
You crept in behind my back
Several captured images later I turned to leave the island
and saw what you’d done
what you’d begun to do.
Your current already slopped across the causeway, rising steadily
meaning my return would be wet
A short drive home in soggy pants would be all.
Still hurry now, you demanded
Casting your line for a confused urgent impulse
hooking it with aplomb
You weren’t that deep, you wouldn’t rise that far or fast, but get a move on
Wet shoes
Shins
Quickly now
Knees
Thighs
Just get across
Waist
So panicked I barely felt your temperature
Chest
What the fuck
Neck
Head
Incredulous, I swam
How had this happened?
Was this It?
So you were Death’s courier?
Please not yet, please not yet
I had more to offer, just wasn't sure what it was
Still
Winter-dressed legs and arms challenged your current
A hard long loud yell for help
You pressed and pushed me down:
splash
glob
deep breath
salt spat
“..on their way!” called from the shore
Adrenalin fought back: I dug and pushed and slapped
Small progress, toes flailing for a small edge of rock
Slipped by, gone again.
Land was close, I could beat you
Three specs growing larger, running down the beach
Again pointed tip-toes reached for rock
This time toes held, a stubbly slippery gradient met to the full surface of feet
Reintroduced me
You crept in behind my back
Several captured images later I turned to leave the island
and saw what you’d done
what you’d begun to do.
Your current already slopped across the causeway, rising steadily
meaning my return would be wet
A short drive home in soggy pants would be all.
Still hurry now, you demanded
Casting your line for a confused urgent impulse
hooking it with aplomb
You weren’t that deep, you wouldn’t rise that far or fast, but get a move on
Wet shoes
Shins
Quickly now
Knees
Thighs
Just get across
Waist
So panicked I barely felt your temperature
Chest
What the fuck
Neck
Head
Incredulous, I swam
How had this happened?
Was this It?
So you were Death’s courier?
Please not yet, please not yet
I had more to offer, just wasn't sure what it was
Still
Winter-dressed legs and arms challenged your current
A hard long loud yell for help
You pressed and pushed me down:
splash
glob
deep breath
salt spat
“..on their way!” called from the shore
Adrenalin fought back: I dug and pushed and slapped
Small progress, toes flailing for a small edge of rock
Slipped by, gone again.
Land was close, I could beat you
Three specs growing larger, running down the beach
Again pointed tip-toes reached for rock
This time toes held, a stubbly slippery gradient met to the full surface of feet
Reintroduced me
Wednesday, 8 December 2010
affair ground
A long five months ago our Hammersmith pub conversation opened up with “How do you KNOW?” or “can you ever know, that somebody is The One?” Doesn’t it always degenerate, get tired and dull, don’t you always end up boring one another?
After which he’d crumbled. He told me how he was having an affair with a girl in the office, who he was crazy about. He explained how he was cheating on his wife of a year, which was horrible and hateful but he couldn’t help it, and how the other girl herself was also married.
Now, a long five months later he told how he’d allowed the affair to turn his life upside down. A divorce was proceeding, although he said he wasn’t really reading the letters, and he’d not only moved in with the new woman, they also were moving back to her native America after a month travelling in Thailand over Christmas.
His ex-wife was heartbroken and had wanted reconciliation even after everything became known. Her father had visited him at his workplace and tried to persuade him to try again, even speaking of sex and how such things can dwindle but men have ways of coping, other outlets.
My friend rejected this. He liked the other girl. He loved her in fact, and no longer loved the woman he’d married. This was difficult for them to accept and he received hate email, both from her and from her sisters.
In a separate, dark twist his new partner’s husband died suddenly, overnight. A verdict is still pending.
The original concealment of the affair from his wife was less forgivable, but the manner with which he followed his heart (I can find no less trite way of saying it), grasped a very painful nettle and dared to change his life; I found it peculiarly admirable.
We spoke briefly in the South Kensington pub, before his new partner arrived to join us, about fear and self-doubt, our shared concern of boring people eventually.
If you’re seeing someone younger with plenty of those exciting 20-something years ahead of them – years when they’ll do exciting new things, go to novel or exotic places and meet interesting cool people – how can you not worry that you won’t stand up? You will appear jaded, lazy and uninteresting, old. You will eventually bore. It’s a risk, like everything is. Like “How Do You Know?” You don’t, you can’t.
She arrived in the South Kensington pub after about half an hour: pretty, blonde and slightly nervous of me (as he’d admitted to me beforehand that she was – not having met any of his friends before). He’d been attracted by her quirky creative bent, her desire to make her own clothes and her practicality, the fact she wasn’t a girly girl. None of that came across.
We spoke of the Interpol concert they were heading to from here, how I’d heard good reports and there was a favourable review in the newspaper. From the half hour spent, my impression was positive. She appeared like someone who’d over-lived for 25, had many things happen including the possibly premature first marriage.
I left the couple to head south of the river to my work function, pleased for them and their convictions – more his than hers? – perversely envious of their dramatic, romantic year, sad I might never see them again.
After which he’d crumbled. He told me how he was having an affair with a girl in the office, who he was crazy about. He explained how he was cheating on his wife of a year, which was horrible and hateful but he couldn’t help it, and how the other girl herself was also married.
Now, a long five months later he told how he’d allowed the affair to turn his life upside down. A divorce was proceeding, although he said he wasn’t really reading the letters, and he’d not only moved in with the new woman, they also were moving back to her native America after a month travelling in Thailand over Christmas.
His ex-wife was heartbroken and had wanted reconciliation even after everything became known. Her father had visited him at his workplace and tried to persuade him to try again, even speaking of sex and how such things can dwindle but men have ways of coping, other outlets.
My friend rejected this. He liked the other girl. He loved her in fact, and no longer loved the woman he’d married. This was difficult for them to accept and he received hate email, both from her and from her sisters.
In a separate, dark twist his new partner’s husband died suddenly, overnight. A verdict is still pending.
The original concealment of the affair from his wife was less forgivable, but the manner with which he followed his heart (I can find no less trite way of saying it), grasped a very painful nettle and dared to change his life; I found it peculiarly admirable.
We spoke briefly in the South Kensington pub, before his new partner arrived to join us, about fear and self-doubt, our shared concern of boring people eventually.
If you’re seeing someone younger with plenty of those exciting 20-something years ahead of them – years when they’ll do exciting new things, go to novel or exotic places and meet interesting cool people – how can you not worry that you won’t stand up? You will appear jaded, lazy and uninteresting, old. You will eventually bore. It’s a risk, like everything is. Like “How Do You Know?” You don’t, you can’t.
She arrived in the South Kensington pub after about half an hour: pretty, blonde and slightly nervous of me (as he’d admitted to me beforehand that she was – not having met any of his friends before). He’d been attracted by her quirky creative bent, her desire to make her own clothes and her practicality, the fact she wasn’t a girly girl. None of that came across.
We spoke of the Interpol concert they were heading to from here, how I’d heard good reports and there was a favourable review in the newspaper. From the half hour spent, my impression was positive. She appeared like someone who’d over-lived for 25, had many things happen including the possibly premature first marriage.
I left the couple to head south of the river to my work function, pleased for them and their convictions – more his than hers? – perversely envious of their dramatic, romantic year, sad I might never see them again.
Sunday, 5 December 2010
dangerous tides
Barry was stung with new waves of emotion as he carefully negotiated the car back into its space outside his flat. Stunned relief, mainly; as well as gratitude and a lingering incomprehension. He sat in the newly silent car for several seconds, air freezing around him. He contemplated the past few hours and called himself lucky stupid, lucky fucking idiot, out loud. And he breathed.
He’d had plenty of time to ponder alone in the single ward, waiting three hours for a two minute chat with the Doctor. Yes he was fine now, yes he wanted to go home. He had enough time to almost forget the afternoon completely, pawing through niche interest magazines and old newspaper supplements, hearing the raucous applause from the television in the waiting room next door as game show followed game show. He had time to grow bored and tetchy at the long wait. It’s best, for your own peace of mind as much as anything else, the Paramedic had told him. His mind was tetchy when it should have been immensely grateful – which it was, but it still became tetchy again.
*
I could really die here, Barry had thought to himself as he thrashed around in the freezing sea, fully clothed, a large coat on and his camera still around his neck. This could be it. Time up.
His head went under for a moment as he prepared a heaving diagonal stroke towards land. He recalled that handsome lead actor from the film he watched the evening before. He’d played a wayward character whose life was belatedly showing signs of coming together when it was snuffed out. Life does that, Barry supposed. It’s uncaring about human self-regard or interruption. It can end whenever.
Drowning though? he argued, pushing more water behind him and gasping for air, feeling with his toes for rock, land, anything beneath his feet. Nothing. Drowning: really? That was a horrible way to go, traumatic and slow.
Barry stopped paddling for a moment and treaded water, took a deep breath and yelled for help as loudly as he could. Hearing his own foghorn blare out tightened the terrifying grip of reality and he began swimming again.
Seconds passed, or minutes. Who knew?
Faintly aware of a podcast still chirruping in his right ear, he heard a shout returned from land: “..on its way!” That should give some cause for hope. He unpopped the earplug and instantly came to terms with the probable death of his new iPod, BlackBerry and camera: beloved gadgets. He'd trade them.
Was it payback for the disproportionate glee he took from that part of Rich Hall's comedy set a few days earlier? He had satirised Irish news coverage, and particularly the headline "Cork Man Drowns". Barry hadn't considered the plight of the man (apparently named Bob), or even wondered if it was comic fiction or not. It hadn't mattered.
Barry switched from his favoured front crawl to a breast-stroke. Parting the waves seemed more effective that way. Should he take his coat off? No time. The current still swept across him, demanding.
So he worked.
Was he making any ground?
He must have been.
Anything beneath his feet?
Nothing.
He spat out cold salty water and wished he’d wake up. This could NOT be happening. Not to him. Wake up, wake the fuck up. It was all too real.
At no point had Barry considered turning around and going back, or even waiting on the island and calling a rescue boat for help. It simply never occurred to him as an option. He had imagined that he might have to wade a short distance across the rocky causeway which connected to the mainland, but the water would be no higher than his waist at most - and it wasn't THAT long a stretch to land, then he’d make the ten minute drive home in wet pants. No massive deal. He had been impelled forward by his nervous misguided momentum, blind panic and the lunatic strength of his conviction.
Until he was swimming against a reverse current. Holy fucking cow, he was swimming, in all his clothes, a large coat, a camera round his neck, his iPod still playing. How the hell had this happened?
This could really be how he was to die.
The light had been sharp and bright all afternoon, the sun dazzling off the ocean to give a not inconsiderable glowing warmth for the time of year. A peculiar zen-like state had blanketed him as he sat on a rock an hour before on a different stretch of the bay, a gentle hangover from the night before slowly subsiding. It had been an enjoyable evening with football team-mates he didn't know that well. The echoing din of a nightclub often left him with an unusual acoustic clarity the next day.
Now in the sea, beating against waves, that blissful calm and peace appeared foreboding, a punctuation mark.
Was he making any ground? Perhaps, and people, distant dots were racing down the rocky beach towards him now. One with something, a leash of some kind. But, hang on… there, there it was. Like a high-rise suicide in reverse, he found rock beneath his toes. Beautiful rock, and a more of it, toes to feet, more of it still. The surface dipped suddenly and a rock thudded into his knee but he felt nothing, numbed to the pain. He might not die! Back to wading, wading. The men were upon him, the leash thing now unnecessary. Barry staggered bambi-like, up and out of the water. Ocean slopped off the shoulders of his thick coat, his knees buckling under the weight. He fell back down and wanted to stay lying, spent on the rock like a beached whale but a voice told him to get up, keep moving, he wasn’t safe yet. The voice was right. He rose again, accepting the props of two men either side of him, one of them the owner of the voice, and carried walking up and away, freezing and soaking head to toe.
A small crowd of thirty or so had gathered in the main pub for the nearby caravan park. Mostly young, pale faces gawked at him and he half covered his own, humiliated by the attention, trembling and exhausted. But breathing out, breathing out. A siren grew louder.
He’d had plenty of time to ponder alone in the single ward, waiting three hours for a two minute chat with the Doctor. Yes he was fine now, yes he wanted to go home. He had enough time to almost forget the afternoon completely, pawing through niche interest magazines and old newspaper supplements, hearing the raucous applause from the television in the waiting room next door as game show followed game show. He had time to grow bored and tetchy at the long wait. It’s best, for your own peace of mind as much as anything else, the Paramedic had told him. His mind was tetchy when it should have been immensely grateful – which it was, but it still became tetchy again.
*
I could really die here, Barry had thought to himself as he thrashed around in the freezing sea, fully clothed, a large coat on and his camera still around his neck. This could be it. Time up.
His head went under for a moment as he prepared a heaving diagonal stroke towards land. He recalled that handsome lead actor from the film he watched the evening before. He’d played a wayward character whose life was belatedly showing signs of coming together when it was snuffed out. Life does that, Barry supposed. It’s uncaring about human self-regard or interruption. It can end whenever.
Drowning though? he argued, pushing more water behind him and gasping for air, feeling with his toes for rock, land, anything beneath his feet. Nothing. Drowning: really? That was a horrible way to go, traumatic and slow.
Barry stopped paddling for a moment and treaded water, took a deep breath and yelled for help as loudly as he could. Hearing his own foghorn blare out tightened the terrifying grip of reality and he began swimming again.
Seconds passed, or minutes. Who knew?
Faintly aware of a podcast still chirruping in his right ear, he heard a shout returned from land: “..on its way!” That should give some cause for hope. He unpopped the earplug and instantly came to terms with the probable death of his new iPod, BlackBerry and camera: beloved gadgets. He'd trade them.
Was it payback for the disproportionate glee he took from that part of Rich Hall's comedy set a few days earlier? He had satirised Irish news coverage, and particularly the headline "Cork Man Drowns". Barry hadn't considered the plight of the man (apparently named Bob), or even wondered if it was comic fiction or not. It hadn't mattered.
Barry switched from his favoured front crawl to a breast-stroke. Parting the waves seemed more effective that way. Should he take his coat off? No time. The current still swept across him, demanding.
So he worked.
Was he making any ground?
He must have been.
Anything beneath his feet?
Nothing.
He spat out cold salty water and wished he’d wake up. This could NOT be happening. Not to him. Wake up, wake the fuck up. It was all too real.
At no point had Barry considered turning around and going back, or even waiting on the island and calling a rescue boat for help. It simply never occurred to him as an option. He had imagined that he might have to wade a short distance across the rocky causeway which connected to the mainland, but the water would be no higher than his waist at most - and it wasn't THAT long a stretch to land, then he’d make the ten minute drive home in wet pants. No massive deal. He had been impelled forward by his nervous misguided momentum, blind panic and the lunatic strength of his conviction.
Until he was swimming against a reverse current. Holy fucking cow, he was swimming, in all his clothes, a large coat, a camera round his neck, his iPod still playing. How the hell had this happened?
This could really be how he was to die.
The light had been sharp and bright all afternoon, the sun dazzling off the ocean to give a not inconsiderable glowing warmth for the time of year. A peculiar zen-like state had blanketed him as he sat on a rock an hour before on a different stretch of the bay, a gentle hangover from the night before slowly subsiding. It had been an enjoyable evening with football team-mates he didn't know that well. The echoing din of a nightclub often left him with an unusual acoustic clarity the next day.
Now in the sea, beating against waves, that blissful calm and peace appeared foreboding, a punctuation mark.
Was he making any ground? Perhaps, and people, distant dots were racing down the rocky beach towards him now. One with something, a leash of some kind. But, hang on… there, there it was. Like a high-rise suicide in reverse, he found rock beneath his toes. Beautiful rock, and a more of it, toes to feet, more of it still. The surface dipped suddenly and a rock thudded into his knee but he felt nothing, numbed to the pain. He might not die! Back to wading, wading. The men were upon him, the leash thing now unnecessary. Barry staggered bambi-like, up and out of the water. Ocean slopped off the shoulders of his thick coat, his knees buckling under the weight. He fell back down and wanted to stay lying, spent on the rock like a beached whale but a voice told him to get up, keep moving, he wasn’t safe yet. The voice was right. He rose again, accepting the props of two men either side of him, one of them the owner of the voice, and carried walking up and away, freezing and soaking head to toe.
A small crowd of thirty or so had gathered in the main pub for the nearby caravan park. Mostly young, pale faces gawked at him and he half covered his own, humiliated by the attention, trembling and exhausted. But breathing out, breathing out. A siren grew louder.
Wednesday, 3 November 2010
an ice-cube tray
Ah, I thought, just before heading to the checkout, I wonder if they have any ice-cube trays? Surely they must have, this supermarket is huge and has its own separate kitchen accessory department. But maybe it’s not in there.
Here, I’ll just ask this..
“Excuse me?”
..young, really hairy and quite peculiar looking man. He looked up from stacking a low shelf.
“Do you sell ice-cube trays? You know, for.. making ice-cubes.”
“Oh yeah probably do you want me to come and show you where?”
“No no, just point me in the right direction.”
He pointed.
“Over that way?”
“Yes about aisle 38 are you sure you don’t want me to come and show you?” his teeth seemed to reverberate when he spoke.
“No no, I’m sure I’ll be fine thanks.”
He scared me a bit.
I pushed my trolley down to aisle 38, which wouldn’t be it. Perhaps 40. Yes, this looked more like it.. But where. I trailed up and down an aisle of Tupperware. I couldn’t see it. There was another green uniformed man…
“Excuse me?”
This young man looked urgent and fraught and busy and redfaced. He stopped all the same.
“Do you sell ice-cube trays here? You know, for making ice-cubes in.”
“I don’t work in this bit. They keep moving stuff everywhere.”
He went and walked off down an aisle which homed crockery and cutlery, rather than the one we were standing in, which seemed appeared most likely. But what did I know?
“No,” he mumbled. “They keep moving stuff around. I don’t work in this section.”
“Dyou think you could find me someone who does work in this section?”
“Wait there.”
He scuttled away. I wasn’t hopeful of ever seeing him again. I hung out at the top of the Tupperware aisle with my trolley. It was a crap aisle. He didn’t come back.
I drifted downheartedly towards the adjacent clothes section. Last try. A middle-aged woman stood around but not at a checkout, looking spare. She wore a darker T-shirt which signified that she belonged to the clothes section.
“Excuse me,” I asked, hope flailing. “I don’t suppose you know where the ice-cube trays are kept?”
“Now,” she said. “Are they a band?”
I took a breath. Something inside me simmered, boiled, bloomed, ticked over. I breathed out.
“No. Doesn’t matter actually, thanks.”
I went to the checkout.
Here, I’ll just ask this..
“Excuse me?”
..young, really hairy and quite peculiar looking man. He looked up from stacking a low shelf.
“Do you sell ice-cube trays? You know, for.. making ice-cubes.”
“Oh yeah probably do you want me to come and show you where?”
“No no, just point me in the right direction.”
He pointed.
“Over that way?”
“Yes about aisle 38 are you sure you don’t want me to come and show you?” his teeth seemed to reverberate when he spoke.
“No no, I’m sure I’ll be fine thanks.”
He scared me a bit.
I pushed my trolley down to aisle 38, which wouldn’t be it. Perhaps 40. Yes, this looked more like it.. But where. I trailed up and down an aisle of Tupperware. I couldn’t see it. There was another green uniformed man…
“Excuse me?”
This young man looked urgent and fraught and busy and redfaced. He stopped all the same.
“Do you sell ice-cube trays here? You know, for making ice-cubes in.”
“I don’t work in this bit. They keep moving stuff everywhere.”
He went and walked off down an aisle which homed crockery and cutlery, rather than the one we were standing in, which seemed appeared most likely. But what did I know?
“No,” he mumbled. “They keep moving stuff around. I don’t work in this section.”
“Dyou think you could find me someone who does work in this section?”
“Wait there.”
He scuttled away. I wasn’t hopeful of ever seeing him again. I hung out at the top of the Tupperware aisle with my trolley. It was a crap aisle. He didn’t come back.
I drifted downheartedly towards the adjacent clothes section. Last try. A middle-aged woman stood around but not at a checkout, looking spare. She wore a darker T-shirt which signified that she belonged to the clothes section.
“Excuse me,” I asked, hope flailing. “I don’t suppose you know where the ice-cube trays are kept?”
“Now,” she said. “Are they a band?”
I took a breath. Something inside me simmered, boiled, bloomed, ticked over. I breathed out.
“No. Doesn’t matter actually, thanks.”
I went to the checkout.
Thursday, 28 October 2010
six people behind
There she was again. About half a dozen people behind him in the passport queue, snaked back around the partition. Had she noticed him? Should he try and catch her eye? He turned his eyes back to his book and shuffled forwards again, smiling at the old lady in front. They had exchanged a few words when her husband was allowed out of the longer queue to pass through the empty gateway reserved for those with new electronic passports. “Just make sure he doesn’t get on the wrong flight now,” he'd told the lady. “It’s ok, I have his tickets. He can't go anywhere,” she said.
Now he glanced back over his shoulder at her again, she was looking away.
“Maybe see you on the flight back,” she had said when the taxi dropped him off a week ago. They’d shared a cab because no buses were forthcoming. Her friend was going to take an earlier return flight, she’d said, so now she was travelling alone. He didn’t find her attractive but she’d appeared clever and chatty a week ago, she was around his age, and he’d barely conversed with anyone for a week, not properly.
He shuffled forwards again, the old lady in front was beckoned to have her passport checked, before passing through to the gate. He resigned the pretence of reading the heavy book, and waited.
For fifteen minutes he sat under a small television screen with his laptop, half watching football highlights, half checking his emails, surprised there was a free connection in the lounge next to the runway.
Realising he was still quite alone and the seats around him hadn't filled with other waiting passengers, he checked over his shoulder. Fellow passengers were already queuing for the door, staff were tearing ticket stubs and people were slowly trickling out onto exposed concrete, towards the metal vessel. Still the queue back into the lounge was bottle-necked, a mess of fifty or so people straggled back out. Seats near the line were occupied by those apparently unfussed about the choice positions aboard the aircraft. He had wanted a window seat for the return flight but this now seemed unlikely. He slumped down onto a seat and waited for the clot of people to thin out.
She was sitting on a seat backing onto his. “Oh, hello,” he said, genuinely surprised because he hadn't noticed her when he'd decided to sit. “Hi!” she smiled, though she couldn’t have escaped if she’d wanted to. She wore wooden jewellery – earrings and a necklace. He didn’t know what he thought of it. Ikea?
They exchanged the story of their week, fast-paced and generally positive. He grew giddy with freely speaking to another person, aware of speaking unnecessarily fast, blurting. He slowed and let her speak. He noticed she was reading a chunky serious book he’d also read and would comment on, if time and circumstance allowed.
They kept chatting: the holiday, areas of the island, walking, the day when it rained, tourism, travel, vehicles, motorbikes, driving. This took them through the door and out onto the runway where the plane waited. They took the rear staircase into the aircraft, had their ticket stubs checked a final time and looked for seats in the mostly full plane. There weren’t two together anywhere, even across an aisle. She took an aisle seat; he found a window seat further down with extra leg room, sandwiched between an emergency exit and an old couple.
*
The aircraft came to a halt at its destination terminal and the aisle seated passengers lumbered out first, unlatching the overhead compartments to withdraw their hand luggage. They stood waiting while the window-seated sat waiting, and the middle-seated hovered half up, half down, waiting.
He saw her standing waiting further back. They exchanged brave, tired smiles.
During the flight he’d considered giving her a business card. Her line of work wasn’t far removed from his. He had clients like her employers. He had no other ulterior motives, although if she did, would he be averse..? She was bright and interesting. He often wondered if he could convince himself to do that, compromise on physical attraction, block it out and pretend it wasn’t an issue if there wasn't any, as long as someone, one reasonable enough person liked him. If he could go through the motions because it was better than continued, protracted, maddening solitariness. Perhaps he could do it, for a while.
Finally at the aisle, he turned to collect his bulky hand luggage from the overhead locker. Just out of grasp, it was slid in his direction by a fellow passenger: the nervous looking young man who he’d almost dropped the bag on when hoisting it into the locker before take-off. He’d put an apologetic hand on his shoulder and said that he thought he’d distract him from any fear of flying. People around them had laughed. There was a warm buzz. He felt briefly liked.
Now standing in the aisle with his bag, he realised that he was about half a dozen people in front of her again. Would he stop somewhere and give her his card, mention business, 'if your employer needs..?' He paced down the aircraft, down the steps, across the new exposed concrete, into a door and on down the long connecting corridors. He felt free and fast, unshackled by too much trailing hand luggage, children, babies or companions to keep pace with. Finally he was halted by the final passport control.
It wasn’t long before she joined the same queue, snaked about half a dozen people behind. Another exchange of tossed eyebrows; this whole passport nonsense eh?
He was summoned, boredly checked and waved through.
Having no other luggage to arrive on the carousels, there was nothing stopping him from walking out and away. But he paused, waited to see if she’d enter the baggage area soon. She wasn’t that far behind, after all, only six people or so. He waited for ten more seconds, gave up and passed under the Nothing To Declare sign.
Now he glanced back over his shoulder at her again, she was looking away.
“Maybe see you on the flight back,” she had said when the taxi dropped him off a week ago. They’d shared a cab because no buses were forthcoming. Her friend was going to take an earlier return flight, she’d said, so now she was travelling alone. He didn’t find her attractive but she’d appeared clever and chatty a week ago, she was around his age, and he’d barely conversed with anyone for a week, not properly.
He shuffled forwards again, the old lady in front was beckoned to have her passport checked, before passing through to the gate. He resigned the pretence of reading the heavy book, and waited.
For fifteen minutes he sat under a small television screen with his laptop, half watching football highlights, half checking his emails, surprised there was a free connection in the lounge next to the runway.
Realising he was still quite alone and the seats around him hadn't filled with other waiting passengers, he checked over his shoulder. Fellow passengers were already queuing for the door, staff were tearing ticket stubs and people were slowly trickling out onto exposed concrete, towards the metal vessel. Still the queue back into the lounge was bottle-necked, a mess of fifty or so people straggled back out. Seats near the line were occupied by those apparently unfussed about the choice positions aboard the aircraft. He had wanted a window seat for the return flight but this now seemed unlikely. He slumped down onto a seat and waited for the clot of people to thin out.
She was sitting on a seat backing onto his. “Oh, hello,” he said, genuinely surprised because he hadn't noticed her when he'd decided to sit. “Hi!” she smiled, though she couldn’t have escaped if she’d wanted to. She wore wooden jewellery – earrings and a necklace. He didn’t know what he thought of it. Ikea?
They exchanged the story of their week, fast-paced and generally positive. He grew giddy with freely speaking to another person, aware of speaking unnecessarily fast, blurting. He slowed and let her speak. He noticed she was reading a chunky serious book he’d also read and would comment on, if time and circumstance allowed.
They kept chatting: the holiday, areas of the island, walking, the day when it rained, tourism, travel, vehicles, motorbikes, driving. This took them through the door and out onto the runway where the plane waited. They took the rear staircase into the aircraft, had their ticket stubs checked a final time and looked for seats in the mostly full plane. There weren’t two together anywhere, even across an aisle. She took an aisle seat; he found a window seat further down with extra leg room, sandwiched between an emergency exit and an old couple.
*
The aircraft came to a halt at its destination terminal and the aisle seated passengers lumbered out first, unlatching the overhead compartments to withdraw their hand luggage. They stood waiting while the window-seated sat waiting, and the middle-seated hovered half up, half down, waiting.
He saw her standing waiting further back. They exchanged brave, tired smiles.
During the flight he’d considered giving her a business card. Her line of work wasn’t far removed from his. He had clients like her employers. He had no other ulterior motives, although if she did, would he be averse..? She was bright and interesting. He often wondered if he could convince himself to do that, compromise on physical attraction, block it out and pretend it wasn’t an issue if there wasn't any, as long as someone, one reasonable enough person liked him. If he could go through the motions because it was better than continued, protracted, maddening solitariness. Perhaps he could do it, for a while.
Finally at the aisle, he turned to collect his bulky hand luggage from the overhead locker. Just out of grasp, it was slid in his direction by a fellow passenger: the nervous looking young man who he’d almost dropped the bag on when hoisting it into the locker before take-off. He’d put an apologetic hand on his shoulder and said that he thought he’d distract him from any fear of flying. People around them had laughed. There was a warm buzz. He felt briefly liked.
Now standing in the aisle with his bag, he realised that he was about half a dozen people in front of her again. Would he stop somewhere and give her his card, mention business, 'if your employer needs..?' He paced down the aircraft, down the steps, across the new exposed concrete, into a door and on down the long connecting corridors. He felt free and fast, unshackled by too much trailing hand luggage, children, babies or companions to keep pace with. Finally he was halted by the final passport control.
It wasn’t long before she joined the same queue, snaked about half a dozen people behind. Another exchange of tossed eyebrows; this whole passport nonsense eh?
He was summoned, boredly checked and waved through.
Having no other luggage to arrive on the carousels, there was nothing stopping him from walking out and away. But he paused, waited to see if she’d enter the baggage area soon. She wasn’t that far behind, after all, only six people or so. He waited for ten more seconds, gave up and passed under the Nothing To Declare sign.
Thursday, 21 October 2010
getting away
I solemnly kicked the tyre one last time and told it not to be flat when I returned. It rested snug and full on the gravelly airport car park, but at half past eleven the following Monday night I did not want to be calling roadside rescue. On discovering the flat tyre, a neighbour had loaned a fancy electric pump, I had pumped the tyre, and despite parking it a short limp away from the closest garage overnight, pumped it had stayed. By not reporting the previous evening’s finding to a garage, it was a possibility I was gambling with and an outcome for which I should be prepared.
In the litany of queues which led to the aircraft, in front of me was an unnecessarily urgent, twitchy woman, the air of spinster about her, but with a man her age; and an elegant, attractive, solo-travelling woman was at my rear. I knew which I preferred to be sitting next to, and which not.
As it turned out, it was neither. By the time I boarded the sleasyjet budget flight, only aisle seats remained. I plonked myself next to an affluent looking couple and, specifically, a man with a boastfully loud voice and proud collar and tie. I was sure to give him no encouragement at all to speak to me, nodding a polite hello before opening a book.
The book was David Mitchell’s latest, highly rated, booker nominated effort. Only a short way in, I was struggling and disappointed with it. Little was going in. Half way through the flight I swapped it with Tom Perrotta’s debut (awful cover), which I’d picked up cheaply a couple of months earlier. As predicted, it was an easier read.
A sense of traveling inside a flying television advert was transmitted through most of the journey; that relentless cajoling of Stewards and Stewardesses to buy unnecessary and overpriced items. I’d never heard the term ‘ad-funded’ applied to flights, but saw no reason why it wasn’t. It seemed equally as applicable here as everywhere else. I wanted them all to leave me alone, yet there were folk like the affluent, proud but airy couple next to me who appeared to buy almost every time. Drinks, snacks, lottery tickets. “You’ll buy anything, won’t you?” I cheerfully commented to my neighbour at one point. Not sure he was too pleased.
The other surprising source of amusement was a generally well behaved eighteen month old. Confident, loved an audience, did little short of marching up and down the aisle towards the end, introducing herself and waiting to be cooed at – which she predictably was. I saw her father donate her mother his iPhone across the aisle, and attempt to entertain her with.. photographs (photographs?) – apparently unaware of the glut of iPhone applications which cater to tots. I donated my iPod, pointing out the Wheels On The Bus app. This was gratefully accepted and kept the infant entertained for a good half an hour. Further tips were given to mother and father when the plane came to a halt.
My hefty sports holdall had survived the crate size test without too much of a squeeze at departure, so had been allowed aboard as hand luggage, much to the surprise of my neighbour when I swapped Mitchell for Perrotta. “However did you get that on as hand luggage? It’s massive!”
This allowed me what would’ve been a quicker exit, had it not been for my need to buy a plug adapter, forgotten twice earlier in the day, and the need to rehydrate – having spurned all offers of heinously priced sleasydrinks.
Once this was done I exited the building and broached a hazy, sticky evening. No buses or commercial bus stops were quickly evident. I saw the two plain girls who’d been sitting around me on the plane inspecting a solitary signpost. “Have we figured it out yet then?” I asked as I approached. They turned round, smiling and human. One of them was half Portuguese so spoke the lingo. She also dressed like an old lady, a cardigan done up to the neck. We agreed to share a cab into town. During the twenty-minute ride I chatted with the other one in the back, a London born software engineer. Smart, well-travelled, interesting, not quite as plain as her friend. There was the unspoken potential of swapping details and meeting up while we were both in the area, and I was clearly alone. I considered offering a card but didn’t. We settled up the fare at a narrow old street which the cab driver assured me led to my hotel. “Maybe we’ll see you on the flight back!” one of them said. I nodded maybe, waved and clunked the door shut, before embarking on yet another frantic inventory-check of pockets. I had everything, yes, didn’t I? Yes. I had everything. They drove on.
The cab driver was correct; it was an easy, short walk. I was greeted by a plump, professional native receptionist with huge breasts and a low cut top. All that quite necessary leaning over the desk at forms was rather traumatising, the dark lolloping parting staring me out. Paperwork completed with the minimum of fuss, she handed me a key to Room 101. I knew a few people who might put me there.
Room 101 turned out to be rather better than just one room of bad, wrong things cast into oblivion for all of time. A large, high-ceilinged, ensuite bedroom adjoined a separate kitchen and living space, enabling me to cook from my paltry canon of meals and keep a reasonable amount of food. This cheered me, although this was tempered by finding that the power-points failed to match the adapter I’d bought in the airport.
However, that provided the next exchange of note. After a small grocery shop at a nearby supermarket I asked the checkout girl who was dutifully packing my bags for me. A short girl with a pretty cherub’s face, she somehow immediately knew my nationality and spoke to me in perfect English. I explained the plug dilemma and she wanted to help so much I was almost compelled to hug her. I said that I’d looked in the appropriate aisle but I didn’t see one, so not to worry. She seemed sure there were and, as there were no other customers, we walked back over. She was crestfallen to find there were none. I was sad and touched that she was so sad for me and I wanted to take her home. The customer service difference compared to back home bludgeoned me over the head with a baseball bat.
Zigzagging back through the muggy damp, hue-moistened streets to my apartment, I was stopped. “Eh, Amigo,” the handsome young guy of a handsome young couple said to me, before opening a map to consult. “Ai! Ingles, desculpe!” I shook my head, he tutted and shook his; his cute girlfriend smiled and we walked our separate ways, me floating lightly on the perverse thrill of being taken for a local here of all places, where most people are tanned and beautiful.
In the litany of queues which led to the aircraft, in front of me was an unnecessarily urgent, twitchy woman, the air of spinster about her, but with a man her age; and an elegant, attractive, solo-travelling woman was at my rear. I knew which I preferred to be sitting next to, and which not.
As it turned out, it was neither. By the time I boarded the sleasyjet budget flight, only aisle seats remained. I plonked myself next to an affluent looking couple and, specifically, a man with a boastfully loud voice and proud collar and tie. I was sure to give him no encouragement at all to speak to me, nodding a polite hello before opening a book.
The book was David Mitchell’s latest, highly rated, booker nominated effort. Only a short way in, I was struggling and disappointed with it. Little was going in. Half way through the flight I swapped it with Tom Perrotta’s debut (awful cover), which I’d picked up cheaply a couple of months earlier. As predicted, it was an easier read.
A sense of traveling inside a flying television advert was transmitted through most of the journey; that relentless cajoling of Stewards and Stewardesses to buy unnecessary and overpriced items. I’d never heard the term ‘ad-funded’ applied to flights, but saw no reason why it wasn’t. It seemed equally as applicable here as everywhere else. I wanted them all to leave me alone, yet there were folk like the affluent, proud but airy couple next to me who appeared to buy almost every time. Drinks, snacks, lottery tickets. “You’ll buy anything, won’t you?” I cheerfully commented to my neighbour at one point. Not sure he was too pleased.
The other surprising source of amusement was a generally well behaved eighteen month old. Confident, loved an audience, did little short of marching up and down the aisle towards the end, introducing herself and waiting to be cooed at – which she predictably was. I saw her father donate her mother his iPhone across the aisle, and attempt to entertain her with.. photographs (photographs?) – apparently unaware of the glut of iPhone applications which cater to tots. I donated my iPod, pointing out the Wheels On The Bus app. This was gratefully accepted and kept the infant entertained for a good half an hour. Further tips were given to mother and father when the plane came to a halt.
My hefty sports holdall had survived the crate size test without too much of a squeeze at departure, so had been allowed aboard as hand luggage, much to the surprise of my neighbour when I swapped Mitchell for Perrotta. “However did you get that on as hand luggage? It’s massive!”
This allowed me what would’ve been a quicker exit, had it not been for my need to buy a plug adapter, forgotten twice earlier in the day, and the need to rehydrate – having spurned all offers of heinously priced sleasydrinks.
Once this was done I exited the building and broached a hazy, sticky evening. No buses or commercial bus stops were quickly evident. I saw the two plain girls who’d been sitting around me on the plane inspecting a solitary signpost. “Have we figured it out yet then?” I asked as I approached. They turned round, smiling and human. One of them was half Portuguese so spoke the lingo. She also dressed like an old lady, a cardigan done up to the neck. We agreed to share a cab into town. During the twenty-minute ride I chatted with the other one in the back, a London born software engineer. Smart, well-travelled, interesting, not quite as plain as her friend. There was the unspoken potential of swapping details and meeting up while we were both in the area, and I was clearly alone. I considered offering a card but didn’t. We settled up the fare at a narrow old street which the cab driver assured me led to my hotel. “Maybe we’ll see you on the flight back!” one of them said. I nodded maybe, waved and clunked the door shut, before embarking on yet another frantic inventory-check of pockets. I had everything, yes, didn’t I? Yes. I had everything. They drove on.
The cab driver was correct; it was an easy, short walk. I was greeted by a plump, professional native receptionist with huge breasts and a low cut top. All that quite necessary leaning over the desk at forms was rather traumatising, the dark lolloping parting staring me out. Paperwork completed with the minimum of fuss, she handed me a key to Room 101. I knew a few people who might put me there.
Room 101 turned out to be rather better than just one room of bad, wrong things cast into oblivion for all of time. A large, high-ceilinged, ensuite bedroom adjoined a separate kitchen and living space, enabling me to cook from my paltry canon of meals and keep a reasonable amount of food. This cheered me, although this was tempered by finding that the power-points failed to match the adapter I’d bought in the airport.
However, that provided the next exchange of note. After a small grocery shop at a nearby supermarket I asked the checkout girl who was dutifully packing my bags for me. A short girl with a pretty cherub’s face, she somehow immediately knew my nationality and spoke to me in perfect English. I explained the plug dilemma and she wanted to help so much I was almost compelled to hug her. I said that I’d looked in the appropriate aisle but I didn’t see one, so not to worry. She seemed sure there were and, as there were no other customers, we walked back over. She was crestfallen to find there were none. I was sad and touched that she was so sad for me and I wanted to take her home. The customer service difference compared to back home bludgeoned me over the head with a baseball bat.
Zigzagging back through the muggy damp, hue-moistened streets to my apartment, I was stopped. “Eh, Amigo,” the handsome young guy of a handsome young couple said to me, before opening a map to consult. “Ai! Ingles, desculpe!” I shook my head, he tutted and shook his; his cute girlfriend smiled and we walked our separate ways, me floating lightly on the perverse thrill of being taken for a local here of all places, where most people are tanned and beautiful.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)