The seats are assigned. We notice only after we sit down. Looks as though we’ve sat in the wrong spots, but ours are also taken. .. appears to be a free for all. One hour and two stops later, a couple boards.. gingerly. They do that thing.... where people walk up and down an aisle looking at seat numbers in a confused manner and then looking down at their ticket. We are apparently sitting in their assigned seats.
It takes them a while to approach. Lots of hemming and hawing and internal gut wrenching, undoubtedly. The husband presents his ticket, politely announces we are in his seats to which we respond," yes, yes, right you are, etc. Some one was in ours as well. Its been a bit of a free for all.” The seats directly across the aisle are open. ...as are many seats around us which are of equal desirability. However, they'd like to sit their porridge hinds on the pre-warmed seats they were assigned. They settle into their assigned seats, with a large brown bag in between them. It holds a beautiful floral arrangement. We move across the aisle, which provides me a delightfully painful vantage point from York to Edinburgh.
They are short, compact people. He has a gut. Not an american gut, but a solid contender nonetheless. No hind quarters to speak of…. a middling Humpty Dumpty, wearing muted tweed slacks fastened below his stomach.
She is wearing brown: A flaxen sweater with gold flecks. It picks up the copper/brown in her hair. Tan/grey patent flats with a short silk bow at the toe. Her ankles are large and covered with nude stockings. Nylon with a slight shimmer. Conservative jewelry. Both are wearing glasses from 1987. He has two pair. One for reading, one for regular seeing I suppose. The readers are of coke-bottle thickness.
She’s received 2 calls, and though it’s never mentioned directly, I can tell that someone has passed and they are on their way to a funeral or to a hospital situation. I am almost sympathetic to them despite the fact that they booted me from my seat.
The near-sympathy is fleeting. She ruined it by whining about the lack of cottage pie. “We were told there would be cottage pie…” She is no doubt penning a long winded complaint letter to the head of the railway as I write this. After living through the trauma of the pulled pork sandwich, that was served in place of the cottage pie, they both have tea and cake for dessert. This provides an opportunity to look at their hands.
His fingers sport long black hair, covering his knuckles in what must be the strongest living testimony to monkey evolution I’ve witnessed in awhile. He’s working… reading emails, reviewing a document, writing notes, and picking his nose intermittently. The same monkey paw that picks the nose also handles the cake.
Her hands are large, but not mannish. I fixate on the size of her hands and feet relative to the rest of her body. She is adequately moisturized… no dry skin to speak of… and maybe even a touch oily. She handles her cake aggressively just like her husband.
Ten minutes from the station, the porter walks through the cabin to gather dishes. Her nose in a book, he snatches her tea cup and moves down the aisle. This invokes dramatic faux-protests after the porter is out of earshot… not sure to what end, although I sense strongly that her life is full of faux-protesting when no one is in earshot.
Her wi-fi does not work on her kindle…. she is perplexed, and the vagaries of spotty wireless when traveling elude her. Cue the faux-complaining and whining. She unplugs it from it’s charger. Re-plugs it into its charger. Pounds on the keys like one does to an elevator call button when it’s moving slow. She asks Humpty Dumpty if he’s got safari on his laptop. He says no and returns to his work, cake eating, and nose picking.
There is a brown bag on the table between them. It holds a beautiful flower arrangement. It is likely for the funeral or hospital situation to which they travel. I can’t decide if she will complain about this train ride during her entire visit or if it she will get it out of her system as she transports from the station to her destination.
Then I recall the faux-protesting and see Humpty Dumpty change his from his coke-bottle specs to his regular seeing ones. I determine that she’ll likely complain during transport and during the event and during their entire visit… but she’ll do so under her breath, just after the casual offender leaves her earshot.
I decide to look one final time at the flowers, and I hope they bring peace to whomever they are intended. … go toward the light… y’all.