Day 6: Ghosts

A day of hauntings.  On the walk to the station, unbidden, a childhood memory of betrayal so visceral that tears run down my face and I think I may be sick.  Thanks, subconscious.  I know this has a purpose, even if it's a little embarrassing amidst the Hertfordshire commuters.  Hooray for the woman on the platform with whom I have a courtesy-off.  Not once (both of' us standing back to allow each other on the train), but twice (both offering up the last available seat).  Another hooray for the woman behind me at the ticket barrier.  When my faulty ticket was providing no joy, she simply bundled up with me, and we just managed to get through in her allocated gap.  She got nipped slightly, but was smiley and unbothered.  Buoyed, I went to my job at Eurostar, and decided to bring love to them.  Which I did.  And I got it back, tenfold. 

Saw my first ghost bike today.  Right in the middle of the tangle of junctions outside Kings Cross.  It's painted white, and piled high with beautiful flowers, just starting to wilt.  Peonies, lilies, roses - the good stuff (no garage carnations here).  There's a shop in St Albans that sells candles, flim-flam and furniture (white-washed, deliberately distressed).  At first sight, the ghost bike looks like one of their window displays.  It is pretty and feminine amidst the grubby urban flotsam and fumes.  I cannot help but think of the contrasting ugliness of the incident behind it.  I get closer, and see a picture of a young, smiling girl hugging a bunch of flowers.  She was twenty-four and fragile.  I feel sad, but with a renewed sense of gratitude and responsibility for being here now.

I have a whole afternoon to spare, so I walk down through Soho to one of my favourite cinemas (The Apollo on Haymarket).  I worked for five years in the West End, and I bowl down alleys and cut through back streets with the verve of a London cabby.  The Christmas lights have been switched on and I am taken down a time tunnel to the early nineties, when these streets were my daily beat.  China Town and its unmistakeable bouquet of smoke, piss, wind-dried duck and jasmine.  The intrigue of bookshops on Charing Cross Road.  The question in my head - could I be here again?  Could I?

Afternoon cinema, especially flying solo, is one of my absolute favourite things.  One of a handful of people, dotted around the dark womb, reality muffled by velvety seats.  Sucked into the screen for a couple of hours, and then deposited gently back.  Out on the street, owlish and blinking and a visitor in my real world.

And then to the Pheonix Artists bar to meet Abi.  I haven't been there for years.  Raffish, tawdry, exciting.  We sit in a cubby hole under the stairs, below a black and white photo of a dancer from the 1920s.  The glass in the frame is broken and hangs in shards, suspended dangerously.  We drink Red Stripe, the rattan table unravels and I help it. 

Finally to the 12-Bar Club, another haunt of my past.  Battered, covered in grafitti, sticky with beer and dreams.  There I see people I haven't seen for years.  And there are inspiring updates.  Rachel left her job, followed her heart (but made a business plan!) and has just finished her play.  It's with agents now.  Tom has also just finished his play.  Abi's screenplay has had two nos - but from Hollywood, no less, so let those nos be seen in perspective.  Her scripts are being read by Brad Pitt's production company!  Jamie has his first role in a proper big film.  Piefinger play and Jana's beautiful, familiar voice soothes me with truth and heart.

I sneak off, because I have to get a train back to the suburbs.  I walk back through the deserted moonlit streets of St Albans, proud to know such talented, brave seekers. They're all around me.  I just didn't see them for a while.  Breathe.