Novel Project 2010 - Chapter Eight

Waterloo station in rush hour. You could fit hundreds of thousands of people in the space, although most of the space was between the floor and the rarely-cleaned glass roof, so these people would need to be piled on top of each other like a vast and hopelessly complicated game of pick-up-sticks. With the smallest people at the top, so to more easily fit them between the metal supports. As it was, people didn't really appreciate that manner of stacking, and so fought for the choicest pieces of floor space - namely those around the departure boards and on the way to the bottleneckiest of exits. Physics dictates that fluids get faster when pushed through a small gap. People don't do that. As a result, its a bad place for three kinds of people: agoraphobics, antisocials and anyone who doesn't like walking. Although if you are the sort who enjoys crowds, being jostled by hurried commuters and coming into the main station concourse to discover your platform is right at the other end of the building, you'd be right at home. I fell somewhere in between, and just about tolerated the place, with the added bonus that I didn't mind a little walking, so I had no qualms about taking the less-conveniently placed yet slightly earlier train just to minimise the time I had to spend in the place.
    On this particular occasion I wasn't actually planning on setting foot on a train. Anne, my date for the evening, had been working out of town for the past couple of days, and this was the most convenient place to meet at any reasonable sort of hour. We'd arranged to meet under the large clock hanging prominently in the centre of the station. Which just happened to be where everybody arranged to meet. I had arrived slightly early, and had managed to occupy the final piece of under-clock real estate, which happened to back onto a major thoroughfare. Were I to move an inch to my left or right, I would either have to apologise for bumping into the person next to me, or get swept up into an ant-like file of office workers and find myself on the 18.15 to Guildford with neither a ticket, nor, slightly more annoyingly, a seat.
    I wasn't entirely sure which train Anne was likely to be on, so I hunted through the processions of the recently-arrived, pausing briefly on any person who looked anything like the picture I'd seen.   
    That's not her.
    That's not her.
    Dear god, I hope that's not her.
    Thinking she may have already escaped the platforms and snuck up behind me, I wheeled around, taking in the landscape of faces, carefully scanning the throng of commuters, greeters and unsubtle pickpockets. I immediately caught sight of a large, burly, angry-looking gentleman rushing towards me. At least, I thought it was a gentleman at first. As he drew closer, and his features came into sharp focus, I become less and less sure. I began to worry that this may be the individual I came to meet, the picture posted online having been a clever subterfuge. I was meeting a person who would be considered frightening regardless of whatever gender they turned out to be, and whose meaty arms and legs we, were currently pumping towards me like a freight train constructed from a combination of excessive weight training and overeating. I'm almost on the verge of flinching, when the orc-like creature made a surprisingly swift and graceful dart to the left - creating a slipstream that nearly knocked me over just as deftly as an actual collision. This course correction led to an encounter with a tiny gentleman who seemed entirely prepared for the impact. Maybe I was being too superficial. I'm sure she had a really great personality.
    I'd barely regained my composure when I felt a tap on my shoulder, and simultaneously, I both jumped three feet in the air, and span to face the person on the other end of the finger.
    I was faced with a mischievous grin surrounded by dimpled, slightly freckled cheeks. I was standing much too close. I stepped back so to see the rest of the person.
    "Scare ya?" Anne asked, her grin not letting up.
    "Yes…No…Maybe." I replied, unsure of the answer she was looking for.
    "Oh, I saw you jump, Ben." She said, a knowing and playful look in her eyes. I half expected her to offer a friendly punch in the shoulder. Which, as it happens, she did not long after.
    "You seem remarkably upbeat for someone who's just come from work."
    "Well, weekend starts here, can't wait." Anne said, rubbing her hands together in anticipation, somehow managing not to make it look like a pantomime.
    "It does indeed. So, where shall we get the weekend off to a start?"
    "There's a nice bar near here, not the trendiest of places, but they do good cocktails."
    "Sounds great, lead the way."
    Anne grabbed my hand and led me through the crowds to the exit, with all the speed and grace of a figure skater…provided that skater was required to slalom other people and jump the occasional suitcase. I had some small talk all lined up and ready to go, but held my tongue until we had traversed the escalator down for fear of breaking her concentration.
    Our pace slowed as we broke into the fresh air - fresh meaning outside as opposed to pleasant, let's not get delusional, it is a city after all.
    "So how was work?" I asked, once I had caught up and was walking alongside.
    "Oh, same ol', same ol'. Desks, paper, all that sort of thing."
    "Guess you're firmly in the work-to-live camp?"
    "Oh god, yes. What's the point of doing something you hate just so you can get some extra cash you've never got the time to spend?"
    "Not much, I'll admit."
    "What about you? You spending every waking hour chained to your desk?"
    "Far from it, although I don't sleep much."
    "Too busy partying, eh?" Anne said, nudging me with her elbow.
    "Too right." I lied, unless you counted a cup of Earl Grey in the bath as partying it up. Most nights, I wasn't so much a party animal as a partly granny man. I couldn't even come up with a decent pun for it.
    "Even on a school night? I'd much rather have a cup of tea and a long soak."
    Holy crap! I thought. She's a telepath!
    "Now that sounds like a good night in." I agreed.
    "I hope you mean separate baths." She said, the mischievous grin returning to her face.
    "Of course, I'm a gentleman."
    "Suuure you are."
    "Don't question me, woman." I joked. Immediately, Anne adopted a slightly irked look.
    Was that going too far? I wondered. Christ, it was, wasn't it? She's going to walk off, isn't she? She folded her arms and everything, that's a sure sign she's mad.
    As my face no doubt began to display my worries, Anne began to chuckle and rapped me lightly on the shoulder.
    "Had you going there."
    "I'm going to have to watch out for you." I said, suddenly feeling surprisingly relaxed. This was going to be an interesting night.

    We arrived at the almost-humorously named "Bar Ry" and worked our way to the back of the room through the post-work crowd to grab a table at the end of a long, heavily padded bench. The majority of surfaces in the room were black, from the faux-leather of the seating, to the faux-marble of the table tops, right down to the suits worn by the businessmen entertaining their clients - faux friends.
    "Interesting place."
    "Its somewhere to go, maybe they try too hard, but they make a good mojito."
    "Gotta get those priorities right."
    "Totally, and it can be quite cozy if you get a table by the fire." Anne said, pointing to a flatscreen TV mounted on the wall, playing an endless loop of a roaring fire. As the image registered in my mind, we both burst out laughing.
    "I wondered why it was so warm in here. So what can I get you?" I said, my laughter subsiding as Anne deposited her coat and bag on the back of a chair, and I took a seat on the bench opposite.
    "I'll give you three guesses."
    "Does it involve mint?"
    "You got it."
    After watching a drink-mixing spectacle involving a lot of crushing, shaking, straining and two sprigs of mint, I returned to the table with a pair of mojitos, heavy on the crushed ice and heavy on the wallet.
    "Brilliant, been waiting all week for this." Anne said, as I set the drinks down.
    We each took an exploratory drag on the dual straws sticking out of our drinks, and Anne opened the next round of talk.
    "You doing much this weekend?"
    "Not a whole lot. Got someone to come look at the flat on Saturday, other than that, nothing much planned."
    "You're moving?"
    "Nah, one of my flatmates is moving out, so we need to find a replacement."
    "I see. Many people been round?"
    "A couple, although it didn't go too well."
    "Really? How come?"
    "One didn't seem to like the flat." By which I meant, we scared him off. "And the other was, a bit unusual."
    "Unusual?" Anne asked, clearly excited about the prospect of some juicy gossip on someone she didn't know.
    "He was pretty quiet, never took his coat off, and we think he might possibly have been an axe murderer."
    "Might have been?"
    "Well, he had an axe."
    "He brought it with him?"
    "No, said he had one in his toolkit."
    "My cousin has an axe, doesn't make him a murderer."
    "Well, what does it make him?"
    "A fireman."
    "Oh. That makes a lot more sense."
    "That said, I wouldn't want to live with my cousin, so you're probably better off."
    "So what are your living arrangements like?"
    "Usual thing." Anne said with an air of nonchalance, "Eating, sleeping, occasional courses of antibiotics."
    "Heh." I half-laughed, trying to strike a balance between showing approval at the joke, and not sounding particularly forced. "I meant are you sharing, renting, stuff like that?"
    "I know what you meant." Anne said, giving me a light slap on the knee. "I'm sharing with a friend."
    "Nice place?"
    "Yeah, bit of a way from the tube, though. Tend to take a bus late at night."
    "Scary area?"
    "Not really, but you know, young woman, alone, at night."
    "Can't say I'm familiar with the situation. You'll be happy to know I've never been in the position of being a woman, nor a rapist." My second attempt at humour of the evening seemed to go down slightly better, although I immediately conceded to myself that "rapist" was probably not a word to use on a date.
    "That is good to know." Anne said, before taking a long pull on her drink, draining the remaining liquid from amongst the crushed ice. "Another drink?"
    "I won't say no." I said, and with that, she departed to the bar.
   
    I whiled away some time taking in the surroundings while hoovering up the remainder of my drink. The "straight from work" crowd of business suits had been peppered with more colourful individuals who'd taken the time to go home and change into their "play clothes" - as well as some who hadn't actually been to work at all, whether through lack of employment, or feigned illness. Gradually, flashes of blue, pink and a curious example of what I believed could be called plaid would appear amongst the black and white figures huddled around the bar. I began to wonder who might be considered the truer party animals: those who had prepared a look specifically for the occasion, or those who were so eager to get a drink in their hand they wasted no time in preparation after the working day. I pondered this briefly, then realised I could be making more effective use of my time and deleted some old messages on my phone.
    Anne returned with two brightly coloured drinks (each a different shade of mauve) and placing them on the table, slipped into the seat next to me, ignoring her previous perch on the opposite side of the table.
    "Was looking over the menu, thought we should see how many different ones we can try."
    "Didn't your mother tell you not to mix your drinks?" I asked, trying and completely failing to raise one eyebrow. Although this was preferable to actually putting my tongue in my cheek, which makes speaking difficult.
    "Of course, but these are already mixed."
    "Touche."
    "I like it when I win." Anne said, twirling a lock of her hair around her finger in a manner that I wasn't entirely sure whether or not to describe as flirtatious.
    The conversation continued in much the same way, although with an increasing air of inebriation. We discussed our jobs, our social lives, hobbies - more specifically Anne's hobbies, which were far more interesting than my occasional forays into online poker - and were just about to reach our primary school educations when we suddenly became aware that we were one of only two couples left in the bar. We looked around at the staff circulating, up-ending chairs onto the now vacant tables, then we turned back to each other and burst out laughing.
    "When the heck did everyone leave?" I asked, glancing around in case they were about to jump out as some kind of obscure prank.
    "I have no idea. Guess we were having too much fun chatting." Anne replied, nudging me with her shoulder.
    "Guess so, think they want us to leave." The staff had now finished with the rest of the room and were standing over us, the only obstacle to them closing up for the night.
    "Ok, think I've about used up about a month's worth of calories with all those cocktails anyway."
    "Yeah, my teeth are stinging a little. Worth it though."
    "Definitely." Anne said as we gathered up our coats and other effects and began to head towards the door.
    "How you getting home?" I asked as we got outside, wondering which direction to go.
    "Tube." Anne replied, leading us to the right.
    "Great, me too."   
    We started down the main road towards the station, and I got a crazy notion that I wanted to stretch the night out a little.
    "Hey, here's an idea, want to take a little long-cut?"
    "Long-cut?"
    "Take the long way round, up by the river, shouldn't take much longer."
    "Ummm, sure." Anne said, sounding intrigued.
    I led us down a side street advertising a "Thames Walk", which took us to a pavement running alongside the river. Surprisingly enough, as we came onto the path, I had to dodge out of the way of an approaching jogger.
    "Wow, bit late to be exercising." I said, bemused.
    "Well, maybe its because the view's better at night."
    "It is." I said, taking in the lights of the buildings across the water.
    "Nice way to end the evening."
    "Glad you think so."
    We walked on towards the station, trying to guess the names of the buildings and realising our knowledge of London's geography was sorely lacking. We quickly started making up fake names before we had to turn off for the station. I was slightly relieved that we'd already passed the Gherkin by this point, lest I devolved into sophomoric humour relating to certain male parts.
    We entered the station and suddenly became aware we were travelling in opposite directions. There was a corridor running between the two platforms, so we paused there briefly and I was just about to say goodnight, when Anne beat me to speaking first.
    "Its going to take me ages to get home now, gonna need to change three times."
    "That sucks, does that include the bus from the station?"
    "No, but you could always ask me back to yours." Anne suggested, sidling up a little closer. Her inebriated state turning it into a weird parody of an amorous crab.
    "I don't know, don't you think its a little soon for that?"
    "A little soon for what?" She asked, drawing sufficiently close that I could suddenly see two of her.
    "Soon for going back to the same flat, maybe." I said, less and less sure of myself with every word.
    "Come on, I know you don't really mean that."
    "Well maybe not, but its the decent thing to say."
    "What makes you think its the decent thing?"
    "Well, I don't want you to think I'm, pushing for anything?"
    "If I did think that, there's a little word we girls use, called 'no'."
    "Yeah, but then I'd get all awkward and embarrassed."
    "More or less awkward than right now?"
    "Maybe a little more."
    Anne stepped back a little and looked at me quizzically. "Let me give you a little tip. Girls aren't too fussed about 'decent', girls don't want 'polite', girls definitely don't want you to play it safe. Take a risk, make a move."
    "So, um, do you want to come back to my flat?"
    "Not when I suggested it first. I'm not a slut." At which point, she walked off to a waiting train, stopping only to throw me a cheeky, flirtatious wave as the doors closed. I stood there for a moment, completely nonplussed. Did she actually want to come back home with me? Was this for coffee or something that I was until recently positive was not on the cards for a first date. Women are complicated, no wonder dating is so hard.