I arrive. There is a familiarity in this landscape. I recognise it but it doesn’t belong to anywhere in particular. I should know this place. I have it written down, I have been here before, certainly this place stirs a half echo. There is someone waiting for me, perhaps on the street outside where the travellers are funnelled in or sprayed out, released onto the pavement and perhaps into what passes for their own volition—arriving. As do I. Arriving. Arrived.

Grimaced pursuit by one young lady, ducks under red and white tape, hurries towards toilets. Renault adverts, no smoking signs and a line of empty black cans. A pile of luggage. Voices and engines. Steel struts and long whistles. A phalanx of neckties points to the left. Katie and Peter decide on the name of their baby. A round-headed man with round glasses, tries to hide his painful waiting stance, seeks solace in his mobile. Services cancelled due to inaudible problems. No apologies. That kid is shaking a can of Coke. White hands painted red make the shape of a tulip. [dog pants] a woman in a wheel chair. ‘Girl to be called Bunny’ say reports. No apologies. His face is dancing, twitching. The one over there is the paint on an outside wall, banister, barrier—he blends but doesn’t care. Bag connects with shoulder. Deliberately cool with tight arse and cigarette. No apologies to Stratford, Seven Kings, Maryland, Forest Gate, Chadwell Heath, Manor Park, Ramford, Ilford, Gidea Park, Harold Wood, Brentwood, Shenfield. Ramford has a reason. Ramford is a dog track. Pastry smells seek out bruised shoulders.


This much I know: If I can’t get to Shenfield I can’t go to sleep. I will lie on the marble-dashed floor beside an old lady’s orthopaedic shoes and sink into the shapes of cold and brown.

The old lady speaks, ‘Do you want one?’ A shake of tic tacs in my direction. ‘No thanks’, I say. A tic tac is not nearly enough.

My eyes close as the clouds draw overhead. The kid at my back opens the can of Coke and the sweet geyser erupts. The train to Shenfield is cancelled.


These words are being transcribed for processing, made legible, so that there are no distractions from the shaking hand that is writing them. These sounds are being recorded and will be made available for download onto personal audio players, such as those worn by commuters, reporters, office workers, soldiers, distributors of flyers, taxi drivers, children and customer service officers. This space has been prepared for her. That’s her, in the middle of the screen. Large screen parameters hold her; she is transitory. In a moment she will move on. But right now, she is being held here. It is for her own safety—and convenience.

And when she is gone, all traces of her passage will be swept up. In a little while the screen will be blank, and then replaced. In a little while these words will stop. It is what is expected.

For now, though, we observe her: She’s standing too close. If I could tell her one thing—I mean really tell her—it would be that she is standing too close. And her breath smells. Is that nicotine gum? These things are more important than the way to Kings Cross. Perhaps she shouldn’t go to Kings Cross till she’s sorted these things out. Anyway, if she can’t read a map then she shouldn’t be here in the first place. I want to say to her, ‘You have no right, you know. Did you know that you have no right? What are you anyway? With your big bag and your dumb eyes and your polite expression and your “it’s all about me” attitude. Well I’ll tell you something. If I could tell you something—I mean really tell you something. Then it would be that it’s not all about you. It’s not about you, or that policeman, or the pigeons with their broken feet, or the MacDonald’s wrappers they peck at, or the new ‘No Smoking’ sign that everyone ignores on the way to Kings Cross, or the way home, or the way across the road to catch the number 26 (which won’t take you to Kings Cross, by the way. I don’t know what you were thinking). It’s about someone else. Someone else here who is waiting for you. Look over there. Outside the station, first column on the left, on the outer edge. Away from the stairs and escalator, at the entrance.’

I am anxious. I have been anxious for as long as I can remember. Now is all there is. Check my phone. I already know the time.

Surely it’s obvious to any of these people passing by. It’s big enough, it’s so obvious, a big envelope, bigger than A3. Why hasn’t someone noticed it and asked? Now is all there is—this waiting, this watching. Each second that departs empty only increases the likelihood that the next will bring her arrival. And this spiralling statistical probability in turn increases the gnawing presence of potential personal failure. My personal failure. I don’t even know what she looks like. I am scared that I will look back on this moment and see clearly that a different course of action should have been taken.

I can wait here, in this one spot, outside the station, first column on the left and not move until she arrives. Or I can circle the entire station continually, in the hope that in this way I will cover the most time/space possible.

I switch the envelope to the other arm, face the seal inward toward my body. I should have worn different shoes. But I am wearing black. The envelope stands out against me, like a beacon. How long should I give her? I can’t ditch the envelope. I’ll have to stay until she comes.

Adapted for performance by Barbara Campbell from stories by Robin Bale, Mark Greenwood, Helen Idle, Claudia Jefferies, Mary Paterson, Simon Porter, Derville Quigley and Theron Schmidt.