She does not
mention her departure to anyone as they unload the train, setting their bags
and suitcases and trunks in a large tent where it will be distributed to the
back stage areas deemed theirs. She does not plan to be long. They are only
right outside London, and no one notices when she purchases a return ticket at
the station, nor when she takes boards the next train.
The train is
early, though it is already getting dark and a light rain is beginning to fall.
She steps off in a station surrounded by residential streets, though one road
does have a string of cafes and a bookstore.
The address if
for a flat across the city. By the time she steps off the train and only to
darkened rain-wet streets the sky is black, barely scattered stars shining
through the smog. She squints at each flat number in the dark, pausing and
double checking the address on the faded card from the ticket booth now in her
gloved hand, when she comes to the one she has been searching for.
The flat looks
identical to the tall buildings surrounding it, but the windows are boarded up,
covered with planks of rotting wood, the arch over the door hung with cobwebs,
the doorknob is blanketed with dust. Nobody has occupied the flat for a long
time.
She stands in a
pool of lamplight for some time, regarding the house and clutching the polished
wooden handle of her umbrella long enough for the cold rain to wane to a fine
drizzle.
When she tucks
the card into her pocket once more, among a handful of dried scarlet petals
stained with something dark and brown, she emerges onto the busy street,
drifting back in the direction she came, a black shadow in the thinning crowd.
Text by Lucie MacAulay
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