by Alyson Rudd
On Wednesday he spotted her on the tenth train. He boarded as nonchalantly as possible, sat down and pretended to read the morning’s free newspaper. He was fairly relaxed. There were thirteen more stops until they reached Leicester Square, fifteen until Holborn, although he was surprised to see her put her book in her bag – a different title, it seemed – as they pulled away from Barons Court. But then she stood up. He looked to see who she was giving her seat to, but there was no one obvious and she tiptoed her way to the double doors. As they opened at Earls Court, he stood abruptly. He was confused. He had always left her seated when he alighted at South Kensington and he suffered a small surge of panic that she was testing him. Nonetheless, Ryan left the train as well and calmed himself down. People have to go to all sorts of different locations all the time, he thought. She might have a meeting in a different building, that’s all. There was bound to be a simple explanation.
He kept his distance, expecting her to pause to look at signs or maps, but she walked unhesitatingly until he found himself ten feet away from her as she boarded an eastbound District line train that was headed to Edgware Road. It was a train seemingly without carriages, one of the long, snake-like trains you could walk the full length of if you so desired, so he kept his distance, stealing glances only as it slowed before each station. She stood as it pulled into its final destination and he followed her onto a Circle line train that extended their journey to busy Baker Street, where she alighted and headed along the crowded platform, turning towards an exit that brought together a mass of tunnels and steps and people. He looked up at the myriad signs and then looked ahead and she had vanished. He would have to guess, hope he would strike lucky, and he followed signs for the Bakerloo line but he could not see her anywhere. He had lost her in the crowds.
A boy, tall and slender and rather beautiful with silken ivory hair, pushed past him and Ryan frowned in brief, mild recognition before a woman touched his elbow.
The boy was Isak and he, like Ryan, had a week off. To have a week off was always a test, he thought, and he assumed he was supposed to spend as little money as possible if he was to pass the test but sometimes that was hard and so he had devised a plan. If he could shop somewhere miles across town then he would spend so long getting there that he would have little time left in which to spend his cash. Always cash. You couldn’t trust cards. Cleverer yet, he would sometimes get lost on purpose to delay his arrival at the store. Today’s store was one that had opened just a month earlier and although it was painfully trendy, it was expensive and therefore quiet and the staff had not seemed to mind that he carefully felt the texture of all its swimming trunks. He knew perfectly well the store was closest to Covent Garden station but Isak let the train take him in the opposite direction, to kill time. At home, his mother, Ulla, slid open the huge wardrobe in Isak’s room and wondered where all the swimming trunks her son bought ended up. There were only ten pairs that she could see.
Ryan had stood stock-still as Isak sped past, looking so hopeless that a short, round and rosy, kindly woman touched his elbow and asked if he needed help with directions.
‘Oh, no, but thanks,’ he said. He was lost but not in the way the woman imagined. Why on earth would Millie take such a circuitous route to Baker Street? And was he a very bad tracker or deliberately losing her?
He was now seven stops from Dollis Hill and his mother’s house. He decided to surprise her and even bought a small bouquet of flowers en route.
Grace was so delighted he wondered why he was not more generous with his time for her.
‘Oh my, this is nice,’ she said several times.
He told her about his trip to Spain.
‘You’ve always kept in touch with that Paul,’ she said. ‘I’m assuming, if you were to wed, he’s to be your best man.’
‘I hadn’t given it any thought, but probably,’ Ryan said.
‘Putting it another way,’ Grace said, her Dublin accent to the fore, ‘if he got wed and he didn’t choose you, would you be getting upset about it?’
‘Nope. It’s not a big deal, Mam, it’s women who fuss over wedding dramas.’
Grace sighed good-naturedly.
‘Well, maybe you’ll find out for sure one day,’ she said. ‘And anyway what is it with my children and their travelling? Hana is staying in a castle somewhere in Kent this weekend with her new man, not that I’ve met him yet.’
Chapter 8
That night Ryan dreamed he was running through dark, clammy tunnels without end towards a woman he thought was Millie but who, the closer he got, gradually turned into Ellen.
He woke, his heart racing, his feet twitching from all the phantom running. The closest to this feeling he had had before was the day of her funeral. He had never been to a funeral and he had not wanted to go to this one. Paul had taken him, made him put on a suit, but they had got lost and as soon as it seemed likely they would miss the service, Ryan panicked that he had to be there and when he did arrive he was sick in the car park. He remembered how everyone was so kind to Ellen’s mother. He avoided her. She had been driving and driving carelessly, stupidly. Fat, murdering cow, he thought then and had no reason to soften his view of her now.
And then it was over. They had been so in love they would stop to kiss in the street in the way that only the truly in love know the moment to kiss can happen to couples at any time and in any place. And then she was not there any more. He was yet another student suffering a break-up, only his was a properly clean break. No changing of minds, no playing of games, no flirting with strangers in front of one another. It was over forever. He didn’t hate her for dying but he hated her mother for killing her. Fat, murdering cow.
He did not bother with porridge on the Thursday. He ate some toast smothered in butter that was gritty from previous toast smotherings and took up his position. Six trains trundled by and then he saw her in the seventh. She made her move at Leicester Square. He was feeling alert now after his trembling awakening. He decided the dream was a sign he should continue with his quest. He had nothing to lose except his dignity. Losing her at Baker Street had, in any case, riled his pride. That was no kind of story to tell to Paul or Naomi. He was determined not to let her vanish again.
Her steps were serene, always serene, he noted. This was not a woman who succumbed to panic. She was neither rushing nor dawdling. As she walked onto the platform the wind signified a northbound train was imminent and she paused, so he paused, and then she walked a few steps to a thinning of the crowd and entered the carriage. In order not to lose sight he was almost directly behind her, buffeted by two cheap-suited men wearing lanyards. He was forced to almost hide behind them because there were no seats and he could not be sure which direction she would look to next. They were on the train for just the one stop. She jumped delicately onto the platform at Tottenham Court Road. Ryan looked at the map as if trying to work out his route and made a fake last-second dash to leave the carriage. This, he was sure, was where she would leave the Underground altogether, but he found himself following her towards the Central line.
They were heading east and Millie looked settled. She took out her new book. He tried not to stare. He tried to fathom why the windows were tinted as if to protect from the glare of a Saharan sun. He decided he did not much like the vibe of the Central line. It was gloomy and it was miserable. There was no Saharan sun. They travelled through Holborn and Bank and as Liverpool Street approached the vast majority of people in their carriage shuffled to their feet; she did not even look up. At last she put away her novel as they neared Stratford. She was having another bad day, the sort of day without hope. Nothing had happened on the Central line, just as she knew it wouldn’t, and yet this huge weight had kept her there. It was like being in prison and whenever she felt this way Sylvie became claustrophobic. She needed the Underground version of the exercise yard. She was shy but she needed, she assumed, someone to see her, someone to tap her arm, someone to have need of her, and so she had to be patient until
they did.
Ryan had begun to wonder why he had not brought a bottle of water with him. The Tube in summer could be dehydrating but Millie was still calm and composed. Stratford was as baffling as the last time he had been there. The concourse was almost overwhelming. There were staircases everywhere with people scurrying on different levels, bumping into each other. He had no idea what came next but she turned towards the sunlight and the Docklands Light Railway. He missed the fact that she lifted her face to the light and exhaled. Perhaps it was because he was embarrassed that he was so thirsty, so obviously in need of mothering, of the need to be reminded to take a drink on a long trip, that he felt he had been sucked into a children’s TV show. The DLR was like a toy-town train and, more worryingly, not moving. He scuttled quietly further from view not at all sure in which direction they would be heading. It bothered him that he had not expected Millie to stay on past Stratford, that she had become utterly unpredictable.
The LED display told Ryan Pudding Mill Lane was the next station, which only confirmed that he was in some alternate reality, that some puppets would soon appear and speak to him in gibberish. They travelled past All Saints and West India Quay and then Millie rolled her shoulders. They would be changing at Canary Wharf. Or leaving. God, I hope this is where it ends, he thought. It was not. Millie headed for the Jubilee line. He followed. She took a train earmarked for Wembley Park. He followed. She stepped off at Waterloo and as the escalators took them higher and higher he breathed a sigh of relief.
They were leaving the Underground.
As he tapped his Visa card on the exit pad he thought how much value he had taken from the system and whether it mattered to the economy of Transport for London that he had spent almost three hours going nowhere in particular for the price of one single fare, unless the system was tracking him and charging him extra for breathing in all that subterranean air.
Millie’s body language changed as she walked out onto the station concourse. He was not sure what it meant but she looked less sure of herself, hesitant. He hung back, she turned left. He followed. She turned again, and he saw that she was entering the Ladies toilets. This represented an opportunity for him to buy some water but he needed to buy it while keeping an eye out for her return to the concourse. He looked to his left and to his right. He needed a shop opposite the Ladies but there wasn’t one. A Starbucks was situated next door but if he went inside he might miss her exit. He decided to risk it but there was a queue. He found a £2 coin and darted to the till.
‘Sorry, emergency,’ he said and handed over the coin while holding the water in front of his face. He darted back out again and leaned against the wall, glugging back the water, too thirsty to feel foolish, too tired to care that he might look as if he was trying to re-enact the sniper scene set at Waterloo station at the start of The Bourne Ultimatum.
Three minutes later, she emerged and turned left. She did not glance in his direction and he believed himself to still be completely unnoticed. She took the escalator that led up to a sort of mezzanine level. He followed. She sat at a banquette that overlooked the departure boards and she picked up the menu. He took a seat two rows behind her. She must be meeting someone for an early lunch or a drink, he thought. No one else came. She spoke to the waitress, who, a few minutes later came to him. He ordered a croque monsieur and an orange juice. He had already finished the bottle of water. Millie opened her book. Ryan ate without appetite. He was at a loss to explain what was happening. He watched her pay her bill, having already asked for his. She stood up sooner than he expected which meant he had to leave a larger tip than was necessary.
She walked towards him so he turned his head away as if seeking out the time of his train to Poole or Teddington and then saw her head dipping out of sight as she took the down escalator. He followed. She followed the signs to the Jubilee line and they travelled together, but not really together, to Green Park whereupon she stepped on to a northbound Victoria line train. This was the stuffiest line so far. He was hot and bothered and confused. At Warren Street, she alighted but sat down on a seat and took out her book.
This presented a problem. He could not loiter on the same platform even though she was not looking around her. He began to realize that her body language was that of someone waiting not searching. She was not even really travelling, this endless traveller, she was waiting, he thought, waiting for something that would make her stop moving.
He walked to the southbound platform and then strolled back again. She was still there, still reading. He worried that he was being watched on CCTV so on a whim caught a train to Oxford Circus – now beginning to feel he really was a sub-standard Jason Bourne – got off and headed back to Warren Street. She was still there so he quickly stepped back onto the train to the next stop, Euston, and repeated the trick. She was still there. He ran his hands through his hair, exasperated. He needed the bathroom. He left Warren Street station, used the Gents in the nearest pub, ordered a bottle of Becks, drank it quickly, reciting to himself the mantra that he was solving a mystery, and then returned to the Northbound platform. She was still there. Still serene. Still waiting.
He walked to the southbound platform and examined the Tube map. Camden was not far away. He had not been for a long while. He would wander around Camden for half an hour or so, return, and then make a decision if she had not made it for him by vanishing. He wandered, aimlessly, unimpressed by the diversions of overpriced urban fashion and returned to Warren Street. She was still there, not reading now, but gazing towards the far end of the platform. He began to feel twitchy and uneasy. ‘I am solving a mystery,’ he muttered, far from convinced he was close to any such thing. She reminded him of art students who sit on a bench in a gallery and stare too long at a single painting, as if the talent of the artist might snake its way into their soul. He took the next southbound train to Green Park, changed to the Piccadilly line, alighted at King’s Cross and took the Victoria line back to Warren Street. It was, by now, 3.20 p.m.
She had gone.
There was a voicemail from Hana. Her voice was trembling. She was sorry to do this to him but she was going away with Ed the following weekend and could he stay with Mam, who had insisted she would be fine the previous time, but Hana could tell she was exhausted by it.
Ryan was gripped, momentarily, with panic. What if Hana left home altogether to live with this Ed in East London? Would he have to move back to Dollis Hill, take Grandpa to the toilet, eat bacon sandwiches, sometimes fluffy, sometimes toasted, to give his life variety, every day before work?
He texted her not to worry, that he could move in again for a few days and he thought, later, that to add the word ‘again’ was mean-spirited of him. Hana deserved some freedom, some fun. In fact, he was forced to concede, if he was being neutral, she really ought to leave home right now and let her brother take up the slack. It was his turn. She had spoiled him.
‘Lovely tan,’ Hana said breezily as she handed over the reins. Grace was quiet. She had expected Ed to pick up Hana from the house. She had expected to meet him at last but Hana had a few minutes earlier told her they were meeting at Euston station. Ryan squeezed his sister’s arm in solidarity and then remembered he had given her a copy of the book he had seen Millie reading for a reason.
‘How was that novel I gave you?’ he said. ‘Rubbish?’
‘Oh, not too rubbish, all very melodramatic with a child, illegitimate of course, killed in a train accident and the mother mutilated and therefore unrecognizable when she lives with her husband and his new wife. Standard Victorian highly plausible plot.’
‘Oh,’ Ryan said. He was disappointed and also unsettled by the mention of train accident.
Hana, still bemused, if touched, that her little brother had bought the strange book in the first place, gave him a quick, strong hug before putting on her backpack. She had another hour before needing to leave but he could not blame her for dashing away. Neither could he blame Grace for feeling disappointed. After all, he too wante
d to vet Ed, to check that his sister was not one of those people who repeated their mistakes, who had a weakness for the wrong relationship.
Grandpa was staring at the television. He held up his hand when Hana shouted her farewell as if absorbed by a complicated plotline that needed his full attention. Ryan glanced at the screen. Grandpa was watching a shopping channel.
‘He seems to think he knows that one, Sandra Something,’ Grace said as Sandra whizzed some fruit to make a smoothie, a drink Grandpa had never ordered, never tasted but appeared to be an expert on.
‘Smashing girl,’ Grandpa said as Ryan took his bag to his room where, as usual, everything was spick and span for him. Clean sheets, fresh duvet cover, space in the wardrobe. Photographs of his grandparents on their wedding day, of them holding Hana, holding him, holding Tom. Hard to tell really, he and Tom looked so alike. They might both look like their father but Ryan could not be sure. He had never met him, not properly, not that he could remember.
His brother had loved him, so he was told. As for the truth of Tom, he had no idea really. He had pieced together his death so meticulously it held the vibrancy of a pop video but the information was gleaned from so many different sources, from snippets spoken by his grandfather, his mother, his sister, the neighbours, the cousins they rarely visited. No one had ever sat him down and told him everything, beginning to end, the whole truth of it, and he had never asked. He had never wanted to make his mother cry.
What he thought he knew was that it started with him in a high chair screaming for a ‘barna’ and his father taking Tom to the shop to buy bananas and while they were there some milk and, with a nod and a wink, some cans for when the kiddies were in bed. It was April and the sun was shining on the fresh puddles and it was warm enough for Tom not to need his coat, which was excellent news for Tom hated wearing jumpers let alone extra layers with buttons or zips. And so off they bounced, Dad and Tom, while Ryan yelped for a ‘barna’ that never came.