London Underground, 1985 Gail Westerfield Wouldn’t it be good to be on your side? The grass is always greener over there. / Wouldn’t it be good if we could live without a care? / Wouldn’t it be good to be in your shoes / Even if it was for just one day? / Wouldn’t it be good if we could wish ourselves away? --Nik Kershaw When I passed, they laughed low and all together, a warm rumble like an echo from the Underground tunnel where they sat. There were three of them there, and they all called each other Phillip. Their skin was dinged and dented and florid; their paunches and thick legs in all those layers overflowed the benches they sat on. They smelled like hard cider and vinegar, sharp smells from the fish and chips place up the road. Sometimes one Phillip, the one with the black stocking cap, would lie on his side along a concrete ledge half his size, breathing hugely, sleeping under tented pages of The Sun while the other two muttered and grunted and yelled: “Oh, look, Phil! It’s our ray of sunshine, come to bring us...a pound?” “What’re you? An anarchist you won’t talk to us?” “Where you goin’, green eyes? He can’t be as good-lookin’ as me that you should hurry off like that!” I liked believing I was the only woman they spoke to all day, though I knew they made their living there, flattering or disgusting or shaming commuters into dropping their change, eyes straight ahead, there but for the grace of God. I’d walk the three blocks from my flat in the morning and whoever spotted me first would take his gummy yellow mouth from his morning quart of cider, greet me as “love,” or “our dear one,” and offer his hand while I grinned, silent, suddenly ashamed of my perfect, privileged American teeth. “Good God, why won’t you ever talk? Are you mute, you beautiful child? That mouth’s too pretty not to sing. Sing for me. Take your money back. I don’t want it. Sing me somethin’.” “You’re right. We cannot take no money from a mute. You poor unfortunate thing. Though just this once I think we might accept your gift. Don’t you agree, Phillip? Play the lady a song, at least, you fat cunt.” And the fattest Phillip, yellow curls going as white as his whiskers, would pull a harmonica from layers of stained wool, spit delicately into the hedges, and blow; I once thought I could hear something very much like “When Irish Eyes Are Smilin’.” He tapped his gray sneakered foot to the breathy squeaks and honks he produced. The Phillip in the black cap would rouse himself and sit with his red-bearded brother, reverently, like critics of fine symphonic music. Sometimes they threw their heads back, eyes squeezed shut, or bent as far forward as their guts would allow, and, elbows on thick knees, swayed, creaking. I would stand in their small corner of the plaza in my ridiculous gingham dishwasher’s outfit, dreading going to the train station or back to my dark, cold apartment. With my new New Wave haircut, now three years passé, I’d slouch, grateful for some company. My head and hip cocked, both hands clutching my backpack strap or crammed in my pockets, I could feel the suburbanites staring, grim Londoners with their long jaws set, hurrying to get to the Tube and out of this neighborhood the guide books called “trendy poor.” That meant “slated for gentrification,” full of Pakis and students, would-be artists and old bums. I wasn’t any of these things. I was a middle-class American girl, barely out of adolescence and about to lose my college scholarship money. Depending on the mood I was in, I told myself I had come to London either to hide out or to find myself, neither of which were very “80's” lifestyle choices. When I felt as if I would have to speak to the Phillips, I would rush to the Underground entrance. As I headed down the steep steps, one of the Phillips would always yell, “Good-bye, dearie. See you this evening.” I never spoke because I couldn’t stand the thought of all the questions about why I was living there; I guess I wasn’t really sure myself. The year before, I’d tried to get a fellowship to study literature at Stratford, but I didn’t really have the grades it took, and I didn’t have all the requisite activities scholars are supposed to have. I just wanted to read books in another country. Not that impressive, I suppose. Then I saw an article in the Rolling Stone about working overseas for six months. I wanted to take the semester off, anyway, because I was sick of my tiny school, and I couldn’t imagine spending the summer with my father and his new child-bride, just six years older than I was, so I applied for a work visa. I hadn’t figured out how to say this to the few people who bothered to ask, or how to say, “I’m here because I believed this place would be magical and exciting, politically and culturally rich. And I’m here because I really don’t have anywhere else to go.” The waiters at the Victoria Station café where I worked cared about why I was working in London. Sometimes after work, as they pulled on their leather jackets, I’d think maybe they were going to ask me if I wanted to go ‘round to the pub with them, but they’d look away from me and ask: In America, did I live like on Dynasty? Why was I taking work away from poor British people? Was “slummin’” part of my university course? Was I a cheerleader? Were all American girls really sluts? Was I? I slept in the living room of an apartment above a liquor store and a dentist’s office. My roommate was a Polish film student who left a copy of The Story of O on the kitchen table for the first three months I lived there. He was rarely home. I’d sit at the kitchen table at night with the gas oven on for heat, eating slices of loaf bread I’d stolen from the café that afternoon, drinking milky tea and playing with the handle of a huge knife that remained deeply embedded in the table for weeks after my roommate had chucked it there. The night I moved in, I had asked what he studied, and he’d slammed the knife into the plywood, screamed “American cinema is Fascist bullshit!” and stomped out of the house for three days. In the dim kitchen at night, I would smoke the Players cigarettes people occasionally left on the tables I’d bussed and listen to Radio One, pretending I was in cool dance clubs, sophisticated and unapproachable. Sometimes I’d go to the liquor store downstairs, splurge on a cheap bottle of sweet red wine, and toast myself and the fantasy lover the winos thought I’d gone home to and was gazing at, adoringly, mutely. I often thought I should write in my journal or read Shakespeare or Woolf, but I usually ended up leafing through The Story of O, again. When I first came to London, I would spend the weekends in towns like Oxford and Cambridge, staying in seedy youth hostels, but treating myself to books and the best food I could manage to find. I wanted to go native, to mix into the culture and disappear. I wanted to stop on a walk through a village and really mean it when I told myself how lucky I was to be there. I wanted to feel myself changing, feel myself being strong and free, feel all the history around me that I had the unique opportunity to experience. But it grew more and more difficult to get out of bed on Saturday mornings to get to the early train. I told myself I should be working all the extra hours I could, anyway, so I could save up my money and travel later, when my work visa was up. In fact, I could no longer stand the sight of couples kissing on The Bridge of Sighs or the laughter of families punting down the Thames with a picnic basket. So I spent seven days a week at Victoria Station, bussing half-eaten scones and cleaning teapots with three other silent aliens. None of these men spoke English at all, so they were spoken to even more loudly and rudely than I was by our twitchy, mohawked supervisor. Silently, for hours, we’d dump the tepid tea in clogged sinks and scrub the stained pots with steel wool. My hands were copper for months after I left. After four months at this job, I asked if I could work up front at the counter, where the money was better. The supervisor, who wore white pancake make-up and thick black eyeliner, told me my stained hands made me “unpresentable.” I told her that if she knew anything about her country’s colonial history in India, she might have said “untouchable.” She glared at me, silent, for at least a minute, until I’d quit grinning and was staring down at my damp black shoes. Then she told me that if I thought I was too good for a menial job, there were plenty of other people waiting in line for it. I didn’t even know what would come out of my mouth when I opened it. I quit. My three co-workers in the back shouted and applauded when I threw my apron on the counter. “You can go with ‘er, ya know!” my supervisor screamed at them. “You’re plenny replaceable, too!” They bowed their heads and resumed dumping and scrubbing. I rode home triumphant, a little loony, smiling at strangers who shrunk back in their vinyl seats. Near Camden, a fat Pakistani man in a trench coat and black striped pants sat in the seat beside me. At first I thought he might be Al, who ran the liquor store below my flat, but then he turned to me and smiled, saying, “You American?” I smiled back. “Yeah. I work here.” I pointed to the uniform I still had on. “I wouldn’t dress like this otherwise. How did you know I was American?” “You’re very beautiful.” “That’s how you knew I wasn’t British?” I laughed. He was staring at me, and I decided to stare back, at his curly mustache, at his big pores, at everything above his shoulders, because it suddenly occurred to me that he could be a flasher. He sniffed--snorted, really--and asked, “What sort of work do you do?” “I just quit my job, actually.” “You did? What sort of work did you do, actually?” “I was sort of a waitress...sort of a dishwasher.” “Oh, God,” he groaned, and slapped his knee. I looked down for a split second. His trench coat remained closed. “How I hate to hear that. What a shame. What a waste. Well, this, as you Americans say, is your lucky day. I have an offer for you. I have a proposition.” “Uh...I don’t know...” “Oh, God! I am not making the come-on to you! I am not making love to you, if that’s what you think. I would never do that, though you are very beautiful. You are.” He paused a few seconds, still staring at me. I looked at my watch, crossed my ankles. He snorted again and began: “Here is my proposition. There is a great deal of money to be had here in London for beautiful girls like you. I am the owner of a dating service. There are many diplomats from other countries, rich men, business men, rock musicians--very powerful--who look for escorts for functions when they are here in London. Did you know that? There is a great deal of money to be made in conversation and in modeling. American girls especially. They love American girls because they are so much more...free with themselves...less of the inhibitions of British girls. Rich men love them. The clothes are beautiful, and the cars are very nice. There is a great deal of money to be made. Wouldn’t you like that? It is the life you must be used to; you are an American. You should not be slaving at some dishwashing when I could start you out with this work. It is very glamorous, very sophisticated. I am thinking you are educated. You are a mature, experienced girl, are you not?” I shook my head from side to side, staring at the gray grooved floor. All I could hear was the screech and rumble of the train as he continued to talk. It was so dark in there, and too warm. I had no idea where I was, what stop was next. I felt pressure on my knee, looked down at his hairy veiny hand, at his fingers drumming and creeping. I wasn’t sure I could stand. The train jolted and swayed, and I could hear him again, far away, saying, “Just come with me. Come with me now and I’ll show you. You must have a job to stay here. You want to stay here, don’t you? You must get lonely. You might even meet a nice man for your lover. I can help you. I’ll be a friend to you. Come with me...” The train slowed and jerked me to my feet. I was at the doors before they opened, clawing at the dividing rubber. I ran across the platform, past the “Mind Your Head” sign, and halfway up the perpetually broken escalator. I stopped, panting, my throat raw, and looked back at the departing train, then up toward the gray London sky, felt the damp air rushing down from above. I trudged the rest of the way up. The Phillips were there, all three crammed onto the bench that might ideally seat two of them, their Saturday night feast of greasy cod and fries in newspaper cones spread out on their laps. None of them noticed me as I stood in the archway, watching the Phillip in the black stocking cap loudly lecturing the others about The War. “Nobody knows how we suffered. Do they?” The other two nodded and chewed, mumbled and gulped. “The deprivation and the bombin’s. Nobody knows. Wasn’t nothin’ to do but wait it out. Fuckin’ kids with their green hair and their anarchy. They don’t know. They got everythin’ now. I was all alone. They don’t know. Do they?” I dug in my backpack for the six Marlboros I’d found on a table that morning. I held the crumpled pack out to them, wiping my nose with the back of my other hand. I cleared my throat as I stepped toward them, and all three looked up, ready to swing into action. “Ah-ha!” said the fattest one, rubbing his hands on his knees and reaching out, either for my hand or the cigarettes. I handed him the remains of the pack, cleared my throat again and said, “I’d like one, too, if you don’t mind. If you don’t mind.” All three of them, still chewing and swallowing, gazed at me. “It speaks,” said the red-haired Phillip, finally, raising his eyebrows. I nodded. “And it’s been cryin’.” I nodded again. “Bad day in our fair city, eh? Well, give the lady a seat and a cigarette, you fat cunt. Where’s your manners?” The harmonica player scooted off the bench, laying his cone of fish carefully on the sidewalk beside him, but I’d already sat on the concrete. Smiling, he handed me a bent cigarette and said quietly, “I remember you.” “You do?” I asked, looking into his eyes, red-rimmed and wrinkled. “Sure.” “He’s a bit of an idjit,” said the Philip in the stocking cap. “Of course you remember ‘er, you idjit. She’s the green-eyed one from up the road. Very generous, aren’t you, dear?” “I’ve played for you,” the harmonica player continued, lighting my cigarette with a wooden match. “Yes,” I answered. “Several times.” He laughed, shuffled over behind the phone booth and proceeded to take a piss in the bushes. “He’s a bit of an idjit. You’re not from here, are you?” I shook my head. “Australian? From Down Under?” I smiled a little. “No. American. Usually people guess.” “Awful quiet for an American.” They all laughed, including the peeing Phillip. “You wanna drink?” he called over his shoulder. “Give ‘er a drink.” I sniffed and shook my head. “I should go. Really.” I took a long drag off my cigarette and made no effort to leave. “Someone waitin’ for you?” “No. Not really.” “The boy who made you cry.” “No. No.” “Then stay wif us awhile. We was just havin’ our supper and talkin’ about The War. Bloody awful time.” I nodded. “Yeah. I heard. I’ve heard that.” “Just had to wait it out. Lost me whole family. But look at me today. I ain’ the fuckin’ Prince of Wales, but I’m doin’ awright. They’s people what look down on me, but I can’t be bothered wif ‘em. I ain’t starvin’. I got me friends. I’m doin’ awright.” His friend laughed, smoothing out the newspaper with his shoe. “Prince Phillip,” he said quietly. “Right,” the Phillip with the black stocking cap chuckled. “We’re three Princes Phillip. Makes you a princess, I guess, sittin’ ‘ere in our kingdom.” The Phillip with the yellow curls waddled back from the phone booth. Hitching up his huge pants with one hand, he patted my spiky hair with the other. “Don’t be in too bigga hurry to go, now. I like your hairdo. You’re a lovely girl. Yeah,” he sighed. “I remember you, awright.” © Gail Westerfield 2005