Oh Mum. Sophie smiled.
That’s better. Helen saw that Azizah had taken Sophie’s hand and she winked to Azizah while opening the door. She waved: Byyeeee, and stepped outside, closing the door behind her, and she called: Love you.
Sophie answered: Love you Mummy.
Then Helen was downstairs and out onto the pavement. It was raining. When had it started? Helen had looked earlier and it was dry. Anyway, the brolly was in the bag.
The old settee was still lying on the pavement near her house. Caroline and Jill would have noticed it this morning. How could they miss the damn thing? It had been there for three days and was saturated and horrible. Her street was an embarrassment. The old fridge there too, with the door hanging off my God. People just dumped things. They said it was for poor people, asylum-seekers or like whoever, just leave your old furniture. People who need it will come and take it. But that was an excuse. Sometimes it was true but not always. Who would have taken that settee?
Except like a homeless person. But where would they take it to? if there was no place, if they had no place, not if they were homeless. That was homeless, you had no place, just like here there and everywhere, you just wandered.
Sophie was at the window, waving. She was up on a chair. Azizah wasnt to be seen but must have been behind her. She must have been, making sure Sophie didnt fall. But it was true, children got excited and if she fell it would have been through the window. She didnt need to stand on a chair. She just did it because — why did she do it? Because she did.
And old fridges either. Who would take them? Nobody. They were useless. You would have to be daft. People were not daft, they just were from other countries. They had nothing. That was life, it was so unfair, really. Not always but often. Some had millions others had nothing.
She passed the fast-food kebab shop towards the corner of the street. It was busy. Evening trade. People did use it. Mo said the owners should have been arrested for serving gravy under false pretences but he was a food-snob. They served their ‘specialty gravy’ with chips. Children liked it. Why not? Once in a while. Nothing wrong with that.
Helen paused and half turned to wave once more. She couldnt see Sophie but she would still have been standing there, still waving until the last. Helen as a child. Who did Sophie take after! It was true but the wee soul, she so took after her mother. Never mind.
She enjoyed this part of the journey to work. She even looked forward to it! Walking. Yes! And she so hated it as a girl my God she did, really really, she did. And now, well, she quite liked it.
About fourteen minutes to the station. Twenty-three on the train, depending, a leisurely journey and really, a time to relax, it was, for her anyway it was, for other people perhaps not, not if whatever.
It was lazy. She liked that. The older stations too, she preferred them. There was something nice about them. You got on the train and that was that. Nothing you had to do. You just sat down and the window was there if you could get a seat and just stare out. She stared out. People worked on their laptops, or were on their phones, else texting, reading books or newspapers. Helen didnt, she was one of those who just whatever — stared, dreamed, who closed her eyes. She might have dozed. It was a private world, almost like a secret world, being in the middle of a city but not visible, in the back of the city, being behind. A peace descended. A ‘peace descended’ was her words for it.
So many railtracks and all the names, strange names, hundreds of wee towns and villages all filling the map, it was so unlike Scotland. How people lived! Their lives were so so different; quiet places and streets, little shops and beyond that too green pastures and bridges, canals and their boats. This was England. Helen didnt know England. South London wasnt ‘England’. Caroline said that; her family came from ‘the Cotswolds’. The Cotswolds. Where was that? Their trains must have been the fast ones. Trains to the back of beyond. Helen’s was an old thing that took its time and had to sit at the side until the fast ones passed. Helen imagined them full of businessmen in their bowlers and thick coats all being rushed into the city and the houses where they lived like the ones you saw on television with bedrooms and lounges, kitchens and gardens, patios, a ‘patio’, imagine a patio and the sun is shining and the seat is there in the garden and just sitting there and a glass of lemonade, where the murder takes place, the Chief Inspector arrives to take down the details and the housekeeper is there too, Yes milady, and the servant girl back in the shadows, at the kitchen door, and the ‘young master’ — what? what would he be doing? It is all men anyway.
The train moved through one area Helen knew from weekend visits. This was an old factory and warehouse area where a couple of the less dilapidated buildings housed market stalls at the weekend. Each time they went somebody would tell them next week was the last because the council was closing it down. You could find so many bits and pieces, all bits and bobs, anything and everything. A dream for Mo. When they went they took turns rummaging while the other watched Sophie. You needed two hands at the clothes-stalls in the main market areas, especially if some of these women with big elbows were about and trying to reach something in front of you. Manners didnt exist. If you let a child out your hand for one second she would be off wandering, lost in the crush.
It was like from a bygone age. The Russian man Lenin, from the politics of that time, the Russian Revolution. He visited with his wife to give talks to people. Lenin and the Russian Revolution. It reminded Helen of the Barrows back in Glasgow; the ideal place to find a z-bed. One stall specialised in computer relics, old cables and gadgets. Mo knew the stall holder by name. Most of the junk he brought home came from here. No wonder the man was friendly. Mo was his best customer. One old place they called the ‘warren’. If you disappeared in here you got ‘lost forever’. Mo told her this with a glint in his eye but the very last time here they had a row because of it. He got ‘lost’. It wasnt funny. Yes Helen was nervous. Of course she was nervous. Who wouldnt have been? He knew she didnt have her phone and yet he still disappeared, like for ages. He said he was only looking at things but my God. Eventually she and Sophie had to go inside to find him and men looking at her too. Even with a child beside you men ‘looked’. He didnt think about that. No, because men dont, they dont have to. Then when he did come back my God like sauntering, just sauntering, hands in his pockets, and winking at her. He hadnt even bought anything. He called her a born worrier. Yes, and not ashamed to admit it. If she was a worrier; if she was then he was a dreamer. He so didnt think. Imagine her ex. If he had known about Mo and was stalking them, and just waiting his chance. Mo was defenceless. Against him he was. He would have beaten Mo up. He was just like — he was horrible.
Even if he had told her he would be gone a while. Her and Sophie could have gone to a café or into the place with the good toy-stall. There was one where the guy did demonstrations and it was like entertainment; a young guy too but thickset and with a baldy head and a wispy beard. His patter was hilarious and he made everybody laugh, picking out individual children and winking at the mothers. The last time he had big sort of space-truck things that he operated by remote control but they kept dropping off the stall, making everybody laugh. He had a bowl of boiled sweets and threw them to the children. He reminded Helen of somebody. Some conjuror on television. Now you see it now you dont. Then it came to selling them. I’m not going to ask for this and I’m not going to ask for that. He always had a crowd round his stall for the demonstrations.