Doctor Who_ Warchild - Andrew Cartmel [126]
Ricky had no idea what it would be like in Galveston, Texas. But he knew it would be a different place and no one would know him there.
The train was already waiting at its platform, sitting patiently for the journey which wouldn’t begin for hours.
Clutching his ticket, Ricky felt a flutter of anxiety. Should he have gone for maximum speed instead of maximum distance? Perhaps he should have simply jumped on the first train that was leaving.
Too late now. He was committed. He put the ticket carefully into his pocket and climbed up into the shining silver bulk of the waiting train. Inside it was dim and plush, and luxurious. A smoked-glass dome spanned the roof of the train carriage, letting daylight in. Looking at the expensive chromed fittings and the long bar draped with white linen, Ricky realized that he’d wandered into first class.
With a tug of regret, he left the dimly glowing luxury of the carriage and walked further down the train.
He found an unreserved seat in standard class, made a calculation about which way the train would be travelling when it pulled out, and sat down facing in that direction.
The entire coach was empty and Ricky could sprawl comfortably. He’d stopped worrying about what Mr Pangbourne would think of him if he could see him now.
Ricky knew he’d done the right thing.
It was as if a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. For the first time in months he felt he could truly relax. The clean empty space of this second class coach seemed like paradise in the autumn sunlight.
And then the train began to fill up. People began to trickle into the coach and to take up seats near Ricky.
Ricky had thought he’d be the only one to board the train so early, but all the other passengers seemed to have had the same idea. The carriage was filling rapidly and Ricky began to tense up again at the thought of being in a crowd.
Even now he could feel himself beginning to have an effect on his fellow passengers. He could detect a certain awareness of him, a subliminal reaction which he himself was only peripherally aware of. Out of the corner of his eye he would see someone tense up and know that they were aware of his presence.
His very anxiety must have been a signal because almost immediately a fat woman came sweeping along, sweating from her struggle to board the train, through the narrow corridor. She had a heavy bag in each hand, and ignored row after row of empty seats to plunk herself directly down opposite Ricky.
Ricky’s alarm at her sudden presence so close to him didn’t escape the fat lady. She jammed herself into the seat across from him and as much as they both tried to avoid eye contact he couldn’t help being aware of her growing hostility to him. And that made him even more aware and her hostility just grew, her resentful eyes peering out from the doughy folds of her face, daring the world to look at her. Daring it to find her ugly. Then her eyes returned to take a quick angry look at Ricky, as if she was sucking at something bitter.
Ricky realized that the fat woman was searching for a hostile reaction in him. She wanted him to find her unattractive, to fuel the familiar resentment she lived by.
But Ricky decided that there was another approach. He couldn’t have this woman travelling for thousands of miles sitting opposite him like this. She was reacting to him so strongly that she was like a beacon, attracting attention to herself and, inevitably in turn, to Ricky. The other passengers were sensing the fat angry woman and beginning to register the kid sitting opposite her.
Ricky had to halt the process. So he made his peace with the woman. On some deep behavioural level he simply forgave her for being fat, for being ugly.
He had soon relaxed and forgotten about the fat woman, and sat in calmness and tranquillity. But this didn’t last long.
Two more passengers sat down near him. One was a business-woman with a computer. She immediately switched it on and began working as soon as she sat down.
The other