space. I felt bare space on my back and wished there was a wall against it. The only movement beside us was the twisting and turning of our shadow, like a mad sundial’s point, as we passed underneath and towards each ceiling lamp.
The lift returned again, letting out a little blast of music, heavier this time, lyrics wondering what the story was and why no one else seemed to have got it, whatever it was.
The doors closed again. The music stopped.
I walked on.
I could hear footsteps behind me, a sharp snap-snap-snap on the concrete, louder than the gentle step of my soft soles. I told myself it was nothing. Feeling like an idiot, I stopped. The footsteps stopped a few moments later. I started. They started. I stopped. They stopped. The lift returned, the doors opened. The singing voice drifting down the corridor was running out of battery, dull and distorted against the hard tiles.
I turned and looked behind me. No one there.
I looked to the left, I looked to the right.
No one there.
I risked walking a few more steps.
No sound of footsteps other than my own.
I said, “This isn’t funny, universe.”
My voice bounced down the tunnel around me, fading at last to a high whisper on the air.
I started walking faster towards the exit, not quite running, not exactly lounging along either. Silence in the tunnel. Just my breathing and my footsteps, nothing else. I could see the lift at the end of the road, see the stairs spiralling upwards towards the other bank. Nothing behind me. Not a sound, not a breath, not …
Not music.
I slowed.
I stopped.
The air around me thickened with cold river magic, as I raised my defences. I turned and looked back the way I’d come.
For a moment, I saw someone, or rather, owing to the trick of perspective played by the dip of the tunnel, I thought I saw someone’s feet and knees, standing by the other lift, some few hundred yards behind me. They were caught in the light coming out of the open lift door. Then that light went out. Then the light in front of that. Then the light in front of that, a sharp snap-hiss and a brief ultraviolet flash as they burnt to darkness. Then the light in front of that, a moving darkness coming down the tunnel, heading for me.
I turned and, this time, I ran.
*
I stopped running at the top of the spiral staircase that led out onto the north bank of the Thames. I stopped running because my knees were aching, my heart was pounding, and because out here, the lights still burnt and the air was clear. Here was as good as anywhere to stand and fight.
I stood and waited, facing the exit from the tunnel.
Behind, yellow sodium lamps burnt steadily above the neat park benches and between the growing plane trees. The river sounded like thick yogurt being slurped up through a straw. A few cool drops of drizzle fell, promising more rain. No one came.
I stayed there for a good five minutes, waiting as the rain began to thicken from a tickle to a patter, from a patter to a splatter, from a splatter to a downpour, and still, no one came. So at last, feeling every part a fool, and turning as I walked to keep the tunnel exit in my sight until the last possible moment, I let the magic between my fingers go, and scurried away.
The night bus from the Isle of Dogs to Mile End took twenty minutes to come. I now began to miss my coat, huddling under the bus shelter, arms wrapped around me and chin tucked into my chest as though this could somehow protect me from the gathering downpour. Water churned in the gutter, tumbling down into the grates too fast for the drainage system to cope, and forming great pools of water which flew up in sheets whenever the few scant cars drove by. When my bus came, it was a low single-decker, inhabited by a group of three young women dressed for a party, silent, their eyes low, their faces grey, reflected water distorting the make-up on their pale, pasty faces. We swished north without bothering to slow for the empty bus stops, the corners
The lift returned again, letting out a little blast of music, heavier this time, lyrics wondering what the story was and why no one else seemed to have got it, whatever it was.
The doors closed again. The music stopped.
I walked on.
I could hear footsteps behind me, a sharp snap-snap-snap on the concrete, louder than the gentle step of my soft soles. I told myself it was nothing. Feeling like an idiot, I stopped. The footsteps stopped a few moments later. I started. They started. I stopped. They stopped. The lift returned, the doors opened. The singing voice drifting down the corridor was running out of battery, dull and distorted against the hard tiles.
I turned and looked behind me. No one there.
I looked to the left, I looked to the right.
No one there.
I risked walking a few more steps.
No sound of footsteps other than my own.
I said, “This isn’t funny, universe.”
My voice bounced down the tunnel around me, fading at last to a high whisper on the air.
I started walking faster towards the exit, not quite running, not exactly lounging along either. Silence in the tunnel. Just my breathing and my footsteps, nothing else. I could see the lift at the end of the road, see the stairs spiralling upwards towards the other bank. Nothing behind me. Not a sound, not a breath, not …
Not music.
I slowed.
I stopped.
The air around me thickened with cold river magic, as I raised my defences. I turned and looked back the way I’d come.
For a moment, I saw someone, or rather, owing to the trick of perspective played by the dip of the tunnel, I thought I saw someone’s feet and knees, standing by the other lift, some few hundred yards behind me. They were caught in the light coming out of the open lift door. Then that light went out. Then the light in front of that. Then the light in front of that, a sharp snap-hiss and a brief ultraviolet flash as they burnt to darkness. Then the light in front of that, a moving darkness coming down the tunnel, heading for me.
I turned and, this time, I ran.
*
I stopped running at the top of the spiral staircase that led out onto the north bank of the Thames. I stopped running because my knees were aching, my heart was pounding, and because out here, the lights still burnt and the air was clear. Here was as good as anywhere to stand and fight.
I stood and waited, facing the exit from the tunnel.
Behind, yellow sodium lamps burnt steadily above the neat park benches and between the growing plane trees. The river sounded like thick yogurt being slurped up through a straw. A few cool drops of drizzle fell, promising more rain. No one came.
I stayed there for a good five minutes, waiting as the rain began to thicken from a tickle to a patter, from a patter to a splatter, from a splatter to a downpour, and still, no one came. So at last, feeling every part a fool, and turning as I walked to keep the tunnel exit in my sight until the last possible moment, I let the magic between my fingers go, and scurried away.
The night bus from the Isle of Dogs to Mile End took twenty minutes to come. I now began to miss my coat, huddling under the bus shelter, arms wrapped around me and chin tucked into my chest as though this could somehow protect me from the gathering downpour. Water churned in the gutter, tumbling down into the grates too fast for the drainage system to cope, and forming great pools of water which flew up in sheets whenever the few scant cars drove by. When my bus came, it was a low single-decker, inhabited by a group of three young women dressed for a party, silent, their eyes low, their faces grey, reflected water distorting the make-up on their pale, pasty faces. We swished north without bothering to slow for the empty bus stops, the corners
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