Check 1, check 2.
"I kissed a girl and I liked it!"
But that’s not very surprising because I’m a boy (young man actually).

Before I leave out I check my email, only two spam messages, 'hello my dearest' and 'ypaymor pharmacy'. Two checks from fellow Fazers. Two amongst a multitude, additional invites to join be-friend world wild web haunts every day – well, except for today. I’m going to meet a physical friend today, yes, only one (how many does this count for in the cyberplaces of broadbandlands?) but as we go back and she’s phat -no, trust me, it’s not really like that-, I’m looking forward to this hook-up.

I’m on foot to the station. I pass the bstops with folk huddled disorderly, hopefully, dependently under and about the shelters. Their linked signs pronounce things like  route 122 Plumstead ten mins, 108 Stratford twelve mins, scrolling, 178 Woolwich too many mins.  I don’t study the 'wanna-be' passangers too hard, as I know their matter-o-fact looks and can hazard their 'don’t think just wait' thoughts. The signs may be linked but the signs lie, and as I pass one stop, as if to prove the point, a display freaks; it’s glaring orange pixeled text blinks urgently and declares  v43.2 this is a test  v43.2 this is a test, scrolling over and over.  The sign then seems to lose all faith in its reliability and random characters and digits are thrown-up. The bstops just crashed and my decision not to catch the B is vindicated.

The station platform is mainly empty, it’s 11ish in the soon to be afternoon. No one is going to college. No one is going to work. No one is going anywhere much that requires them to journey. They are thinking about munch, most likely. I will have munch with my old-skool-girlfriend, and this consideration cheers me further and adds to my contentment. On the station platform there’s another of those linked signs. These, I know from experience are more reliable – you can expect the train to arrive anywhere either side of 1 to 10, a minute before (very rare) or up to 10 minutes after (not so rare) but at least you can expect a train to arrive.

With certainty, the train does arrive. But before it can reach the platform a linked pre-recd female announcer declares,   'The train now standing at platform 1 is the...'.   I wonder if this announcement has been sent from a cyberplace because the train clearly hasn’t reach the platform yet but the linked announcer has clearly marked its arrival. Perhaps it’s arrived somewhere; a world like the world I occupy four to six hours most days. There, even Bs run on time. Really! Well, I’m not so sure about that - I was, half convinced by the idea until that thought pitched in.  Anything that has to negotiate other vehicles, driven by other people and then has to rely on the variousness of colourful people boarding and disembarking, can never run on time. Too many variables. Too much humanity.

I board the modern train (doors auto closing if left open for too long) and take my choice of two-seat – another advantage of travelling at munch time – I lean my head back, gently to rest, feeling the call of unfinished sleep. I close my eyes by chance to...and some tin-tin sounds, bad-a-din-bad-a-don into being all about me. In moments my little mod-train haven has been joined by four down-town-dudes on a messy mission. They wear combat inspired stuff, a couple of baseball caps, others have hair-as-u-go. They hit the seats, three to a four and one to a two – the two-seat adjacent to me.
"***k, yea dough, do dat, man, yea." The two seater.
"Come up ere, man, up ere, space, hey yo, space up ere, dall." One of the four seats.
"***k, na, dis too col up der joel." The two seat reply, from the young man (younger than me) who is broadcasting the tin-tin bad-a-din bad-a-don from a mobile fone.
My reflexes are rapid-txt-fire-fast. I have the earplugs to my stick thin player in my head 'like that' and the volume comes up, and I barely seem to have moved from by chance to rest. My lids fall, as the train’s doors obey the pips and clang shut. The mod-mode of transport whirs and starts to roll. A pre-recd female announcer starts to speak, the down-town 3 chatter as if they weren’t sharing seats. ‘Dats eight gran for 3 fifty bags, man, 3 fifty, no darr mus a said sumink like 4 fifty yo, 4 fifty bags you know for eight gran...’. Over the top of this the two-seat dude barks out stuff, competing with all the other noise, including the bad-a-din of his slide-fone.
In my ears a presenter is interrupting the celeb infested convo of "1selector" (the Nubian Herban Station) and talking 'news-for-dummys' style about an economic crisis, billions of pounds lost, and guilt yields. Whilst the train’s automated announcer is clearly lying, 'we will shortly be arriving at London Bridge...'  (we’ve just left Lewisham).  And two seat’s voice is still the loudest, ‘darren man, dough, dats darr, foo chat me abou ***King bags.’ One of the 4-seaters hollas back, nothing offensive, keeping it inclusive despite the distance.

At last tunes are restored – music to my –
‘Coming closer now, fighting for the crown, coming closer now, fighting for the crown, coming closer now, fighting for the crown, coming closer now, fighting for the crown’ (repeat with a repetitive beat, repeat with a repetitive beat, repeat with a repetitive beat).

And, for the duration I reside between walls of near and far and background (in no particular order) vocals and music and noise and snatches of thought, until. ’We will shortly be arriving at Waterloo East...’, the announcer states accurately. We stop and the down-towns reform (3 plus 1) and get off. All I can hear now is the fruitylooped-beats of the "Selector" and once I’ve faded this, I get the closest to silence (on a mod-mode, on a city-platform, some light chat off behind me and minus prerecd announcements).
The pips sound, the doors clang, the inevitable announcement comes and goes.  I know, the next stop really is the end of the line.




Words © Lewis ' the Lou' Harris 2009 (all rights reserved)
Freelanced writing for unheardwords.com.    "This is a neat urban slice of life, imaginatively conveyed and saying a lot about a lot of all our todays."

© editor@unheardwords.com 2009 (all rights reserved)