On the back carriage of a shuddering, jolting Northern Liner, I opened it, and flicked to page thirty-eight. The page you read as you approach the end of your very average twenty minutes.
The I Saw You section.
Clem had been out of the office for a couple of days with a chest infection so I’d used his computer. I’d had to be quick, had to make it happen while Sam was out having a fag, but I’d made it work. My own little moment of effort. Something to make me feel that, well, I’d tried, and even if the story ended here, today, then hey, I’d given it a go.
I’d been subtle and sensible in my approach. Nothing too full-on. That was the mistake some of these people made. Many’s the time Dev and I have sat around in the flat, reading them aloud and wondering what the other person must be thinking, as they realise the bloke who’d been staring at them on the train platform probably wasn’t just smitten, but also has a selection of sharp knives and a copy of The Catcher in the Rye.
So I’d learnt the right way to do things. Picked them up, as others tumbled around me. There’d be no I think I love you! (June 18), and no You’re the most beautiful thing I ever saw! (June 23), and absolutely no I must see you again we must meet I like to TOUCH YOUR FACE (Sept 4–9).
Nope. Just a good, honest, matter-of-fact thirty-word wonder.
I Saw You was popular, though mostly secretly. A third-of-a-page of love gained and lost in a second, of moments gone untaken, of dread and angst and most of all … hope. Thirty words is all you’ve got to plead your case. To tell the girl or boy you’ve never met that you’d love to meet them. To assure them you’re not a murderer or a thug or a born-again Christian. To suggest a coffee or a meal or a walk on the Heath. To convince them that the moment you shared must mean as much to them as it did to you.
And then you have to hope they see it. And that’s some hope. Thirty printed words on page thirty-eight of one edition of a freesheet in a city of seven million. It feels like speaking thirty words out loud in the Arctic, and praying the wind might take them to the one person in the world you wanted to hear them. From the Arctic to the second carriage of a Central Line train. And all because you saw them, once.
And yet it works. Sometimes, it works. You hear about it all the time, usually in things like London Now. Stories that begin with sentences like, Commuter Darren Howe, 32, knew at once he’d seen the love of his life in Julie Draper, 33, as he boarded his train home to Tottenham one night. Problem was, Julie was getting off!, and end up with details of their wedding and what their colleagues thought.
And these small successes, these tiny triumphs, give every other single person being buffeted about a carriage on another Groundhog Day something more to hope about.
I hope she reads it. I hope she feels the same.
I hope someone saw me. I hope we’ll meet again.
My eyes scanned down the page.
I saw you. On the 182 past Neasden Shopping Centre this Monday. I looked at you but you were looking out the window. Coffee sometime?
Yeah, good luck with that one, mate.
I saw you. Fetish party, Covent Garden. You were the giant nun slapping a small Asian boy. I was appalled.
As was I.
I read on, now no longer just scanning, but actually taking them in, understanding their hope, but hoping equally that I wasn’t like them. Because surely my moment was special. Unique. Deserving of resolution.
London Now gets sixty appeals a day. As many from men as from women. And each appeal gets maybe twelve replies. People desperate to be seen. To be chosen. To be The One. Anyone’s One.
As I read, I realised, with sickening excitement, that part of me was hoping – expecting – to find myself in there. The mysterious man on Charlotte Street. You held my bags, you kept my heart, that kind of thing. That would be right. Romantic. Maybe I was the kind of guy who’d get noticed. Maybe I didn’t have to dress as a nun and slap little Asian boys to be worth a second glance.
I kept reading, quicker now.
I saw you and I see you every day. I greet you every day. Can you read my eyes? I miss you every day. I love you every day.
What was this guy’s story? Doorman? Bus driver? Receptionist? Who’s the girl? Has she noticed him? Is he anyone to her, or just the fella behind the counter at Benji’s?
Why doesn’t he say something to her?
But I knew why. Because there’s the creeping fear that these moments don’t actually exist outside your own head. No eyes meet across a crowded room, no two people think precisely the same thing, and if only one person actually has that moment, is it even really a moment at all?
We know this, so we say nothing. We avert our eyes, or pretend to be looking for change, we hope the other person will take the initiative, because we don’t want to risk losing this feeling of excitement and possibilities and lust. It’s too perfect. That little second of hope is worth something, possibly for ever, as we lie on our deathbeds, surrounded by our children, and our grandchildren, and our great-grandchildren, and we can’t help but quickly give one last selfish, dying thought to what could have happened if we’d actually said hello to that girl in the Uggs selling CDs outside Nando’s seventy-four years earlier.
It’s the what if? The what then? And we know that if we go for it, if we risk it, we immediately stand to lose it. But weirdly, some part of us believes the feeling is two-way, because it must be; it’s too special not to be. We believe that something’s been shared, even if the evidence we have is … what? A look that lasted a breath longer than we’re used to? A second glance, when the glance could easily have been to check whether there are any cabs coming, or whether the jacket we’re wearing that’s caught their eye would look good on their boyfriend, or why it is we seem to be staring at them.
I saw you. You don’t use overhead handles on the train. Hoped it would jolt and you would fall to me. But no.
I smiled. These small moments, never said out loud, as formed and perfect as sweet little haikus, romance and longing carved out in the dust of a grubby city.
And finally, there was mine.
I read it.
I saw you. Charlotte Street. You were climbing into a cab. Think I still have something of yours. Get in touch if you want me to give it back to you.
There.
Practical. Not astonishing, not mind-blowing, probably not something we’d read out at our wedding, but fine.
It was my stop.
I read one more I Saw You …
I saw and kissed you near Chelsea Bridge. It felt like a moment forever. I had to run but left you my number. Maybe you lost it?
… and then folded the paper.
I stood, leaving someone else’s hope on the seat next to me, but taking with me a little of my own.
As I arrived at the office weighed down by coffees and croissants (a little more streamlined now … Clem’s on a diet and Sam makes her own crumbly muffins), I felt my phone vibrate in my jacket.
A text from Sarah.
Thanks, Jase … a lovely gesture. Drink soon? (non-alcoholic of course) x
I smiled a small smile. The other thing I’d done yesterday, while pootling around on the Internet pretending to research, was send Sarah some flowers. Nothing too fancy. Just a standard bouquet with a tiny card congratulating her and – of course – Gary on their news. There was no point feeling slighted by a pregnancy. The minute babies start getting the better of you it’s time to give up the fight.
I’m not suggesting you should fight babies.
I replied.
No prob. Congrats again. Sorry about … everything. Coffee would be nice.
I pressed send and stared at the screen for a second. It had been the right thing to do. But I still didn’t think I could meet her. Not yet. Maybe when her baby was … what? Eighteen? Starting university? Still too soon.
Maybe when it retired.
As I got in, Zoe was just sitting down.
‘Who were you texting?’ she said, smiling. ‘Walked straight
past you, outside. You seemed engrossed.’
‘Just, you know …’ I stalled. ‘Sarah.’
‘Sarah?’ said Zoe, and there was a flash of something I couldn’t quite place. ‘So you guys …?’
‘No.’
‘You’re not …?’
‘Nope.’
A pause.
‘Shame.’
I flipped the lid of my coffee and sat down at my desk.
‘You guys were good together,’ she said, pretending to find logging on more difficult than it is. ‘It’s a shame you … you know, couldn’t work it out.’
And there it was. The familiar pang of guilt and regret, but stronger this time. Stronger because all this was coming from Zoe.
‘Yeah. Well,’ I said, brilliantly, demonstrating this was the end of the conversation. I stared at my screen and made a mental list of things to do.
Clem was next into the office, noisily clattering the door against the wall, all black slacks under a flood of gut, having used his few days in bed to experiment with an underbeard, it seemed.
‘Morning!’ said Sam. ‘Coffee?’
‘Yes, I am a little coughy, actually!’ he said, beaming. ‘This bloody chest infection!’
I had slowly discovered that Clem wasn’t the quiet, self-effacing man I’d considered him to be when merely popping into the office. Here was a man who hadn’t made it into his forties without being very proud of his powers of punnery, observation and topical satire. I’d go so far as to say too proud.
‘Trains were late again,’ he said, sighing. ‘That was a big surprise.’
He left a pause where he considered the laughter should have gone, and then said, ‘Bring back British Rail, that’s what I say!’
I made a polite ‘heh’ sound. But then he turned to face me fully. Now he’d found his target.
‘You know what I call First Great Western, Jase, when I travel with them? Worst Great Western. And then I’m like, well I’d hate to be on Second Great Western!’
He stared at me, willing my response, but all I could manage was another weak ‘heh’ noise. But this was cool. Maybe he’d exhausted his First Great Western material. And then he tried some First Hate Western stuff that seems to be work-in-progress, but didn’t seem to mind when I simply stopped looking, and swivelled back round.
I had press releases all around me, and a couple of reviews I fancied doing myself. The new Jim Jarmusch, for a start. I liked Jim Jarmusch. Or rather, I liked his name. Made me feel I knew about films, just saying it. Made me feel I was the kind of guy who’d buy obscure Colombian coffees instead of Maxwell House, because I ‘can’t abide instant’. Made me feel like someone at a dinner party boasting that ‘we don’t even own a television, actually; we can’t abide the thing’.
Made me feel impressive.
Maybe I’d just find out what other people had written about his new film; get a sense for the general reception. No sense standing out on my first few days.
I headed for Google, and as I typed ‘Jim Jarmusch’, I couldn’t help but notice that that wasn’t what was appearing in the little search box. Because I hadn’t typed those words. I’d typed:
Alaska Building London
I checked no one was watching.
I clicked search.
‘Erm … ‘scuse I?’ said Clem, swivelling round on his chair, a moment later. ‘Someone been using my computer?’
I froze.
‘Not me,’ I said.
‘Not you, Jason? Then why is your name in my login box? Unless of course it was not you and was instead the actor from the 1990s television programme Beverly Hills 90210. But I have not seen him in the office so methinks it must be you! But it seems strange your name should be in my login box if you’ve not, you know, logged in in it.’
All right, Clem.
‘Ha. “Logged in in it”. Logged in, innit. That is after all the purpose of a login box. To log in. Innit?’
Fine, yes, okay.
‘Is there a login fairy I don’t know about? A wee sprite, who logs in at random, wherever hence they do wish?’
All right.
‘It was me, Clem. I logged in once while you were off. I just remembered. My computer froze. I needed to log in somewhere else.’
Clem looked satisfied.
‘Mystery solved, methinks!’
He looked delighted, like a man who’d worked out that just by saying ‘methinks’ at the end of a sentence, you turn it into a joke.
‘So let’s see what you did on here,’ he said, turning back to the screen.
‘What?’
‘Let’s check the computer history. I can see every move you made. Hope it wasn’t kiddie porn, Jason. There’s a law against that now, and quite right I say.’
He chuckled, and started to click around, and a prickly, embarrassed heat began to burn my neck.
‘Mate, I was checking my email.’
‘Hmm … let’s see.’
‘Clem …’
He was enjoying this, now, and scrolling through God knows what. I was instantly, sickeningly nervous. What was I going to say if he found out? If he announced it out loud? I Saw You is an office joke, a space for weary sneering and easy cynicism, a space for look-at-the-state-of-these-people!, which is an irony, considering the amount of meals-for-one this place goes through, but still, I’d be hung out to dry. I’d be the new boy at school, the one everyone is desperate to slip up, even just once, so that they’ve got a nickname they can use on him for all eternity.
‘Clem, so help me God, I was checking my email. Come on.’
‘Little touchy there, Jason. Mind if I keep looking?’
‘Clem, there’s nothing—’
‘I’ll be the judge of that, Jason! It’s my computer, methinks!’
And then I lost it. I don’t know what it was. The raised eyebrow? The patronising territorialism? The innocent jokey stumbling into someone else’s life? I needed to stop him.
‘Clem, you are the least funny man I have ever met, so why not stop fucking around with your shitty little jokes and do some fucking work?’
He sat stiffly in his chair.
You know those moments where you say something terrible that you didn’t know you were going to say and you’ve maybe three or four seconds in which to work out how to make it all seem a lot more lighthearted than you intended? Well, I blew my three or four seconds thinking about that.
‘Jason, shall we have a chat?’ Zoe was standing next to me.
I nodded, and stood up. Clem still hadn’t turned round. I looked at his screen. It remained at the login page.
‘Couldn’t have done it even if I wanted to, Jason, which I didn’t, because I value people’s privacy,’ he said, quietly.
Sam arrived, razor-burned and carrying a terrible muffin.
‘So I think we need to talk about you and Sarah and all that that entails,’ said Zoe, in the Starbucks round the corner.
‘I’m not sure I’m comfortable talking about personal things like that with my boss.’
She smiled. But it was a good out; she knew that. My heart sank when I saw she wasn’t giving up.
‘It’s understandable, you being down … especially after all you guys went through.’
She made a pained face.
‘And—’
‘We don’t need to talk about this, Zo. And I’m not upset about Sarah. It knocked me about for a bit, but the best thing to do is just push forward. Find the next moment to look forward to.’
‘Come on, Jase. You get a text from her. Five minutes later you’re blowing up at poor Clem.’
‘The man’s a berk.’
‘Yes, he’s a berk, but he’s a nice berk,’ she said. ‘Methinks.’
I smiled.
‘Do you fancy a bite tonight?’ she said. ‘It’d be good to catch up. Hang out, like old times?’
‘I can’t tonight. I’m down to see a gig.’
‘Send someone else. You have that enormous power now.’
> ‘I’d like to do it myself. It’s a band. Happen to be playing in South London, so I thought I’d swing by.’
‘“Happen” to be in South London? Why are you going to be in South London?’
‘I’ve … something to do. See. Something to see,’ I said.
She looked at me, curious.
‘Do me good,’ I said, nodding at myself, like I’d considered it and maybe she was right, and actually, this might be the best thing for me. Like it was her idea.
She cocked her head.
Flats.
The Alaska Building in Bermondsey is flats. Flats tucked away from South London, and hidden behind the old gates of the converted factory, but flats all the same.
Maybe she lived here.
In, well, an old seal fur factory. I’m not sure I’m usually drawn to people who live in old seal fur factories. Or any place formerly packed with blubberers and fleshers and dyers. The clue was on the brick gates, with a dark and damp carving of an Alaskan seal. There was a pub opposite – the Final Furlong – which was chequered and blue but closed down and boarded up. No one on the streets, though. And no sign of life from the factory.
But still. Maybe she did live here. Or near here. Maybe she drank in the Final Furlong.
Actually, if she drank in the Final Furlong, this was never going to work.
I had the photo on me. My great idea was that perhaps I could ask someone. Keep things as lo-fi and natural as that. ‘Have you seen this girl?’ People do it all the time. They do it for cats, for God’s sake. And it’s not like I’m in Bermondsey all the time. It’s not like I’ll get a reputation for it.
I walked a little further down the street, until I saw the only real sign of life, in a kebab shop. I looked at the photo again.
This girl didn’t look like a girl who ate kebabs. She looked like a girl who probably bought an M&S salad for lunch, along with a Milky Way if she was feeling naughty. I liked that about her. She seemed … healthy. There was a glow. But that didn’t take away from the truth that is universally acknowledged, that once in a while, even Mr Motivator needs a kebab.
‘Hi,’ I said, when the man behind the counter finally turned around. ‘Listen, this’ll sound a bit odd, but does this girl ever come in here?’
Charlotte Street Page 13