Few things are as satisfying as seeing the train, your train, poke it’s head out around the corner of the platform like a tortoise emerging from it’s shell. The noise of the engine approaching, an ever so slight change in the air as wind is pushed in your direction. It is the match that lights many a drunken fire and brings the people on the platform to life.
The last train home is a social phenomenon. It is the paradigm for human behaviour, in all its diversity and wonder. The roars of delight start to echo around the old platform as groups of men; at this point closer to walking, talking cocktails of alcohol, blood and tissue than human beings, see their route home arrive. Their female counterparts join in the excitement, awkwardly limping towards the incoming train, hindered by high heels and their own haziness, making it look to any unfortunate bastards already on the train that a sort of zombie army is descending upon them. Or perhaps its a war-zone, as loyal friends battle to pull fallen comrades off benches, steps or the ground, before slinging their limp arms over their shoulders and marching them to the doors. As men jockey and hustle for the best position, in order to be closest to their vulnerable female targets. As scared and sober recruits huddle in the comfort of their units, ready to fight their way to a seat.
The crowd disperses, forming smaller mounds around each of the carriage doors, the anticipation rises, slurred monologues about the beauty of life and stories about fights with “six-foot fuckers” and “posh twats” come to a momentary halt as the unmistakable click of the doors opening is heard and the neon orange lights signal that it is time for the bedlam to move to closer quarters.
I am amongst the group gathering by Coach F, my eyes moist as a mixture of the cold and my own weary state of mind leave me with a slightly smeared view of what lies in front of me. I am alone, my only accomplices being the beat and rhythm of the music that flows from my headphones and reverberates around my head. The music has the effect of somewhat numbing the action going on around me, everything seems ever so slightly more distant, the cackled laughs of a hen party nearby pierce my ears a fraction less.
Bad choice of carriage, I think to myself. The music has an isolating effect though, meaning that when I look around and see some kind of absurd and distorted community being born, I feel at no point a part of it. Someone knocks into my back, jolting me forwards, I turn and am greeted with an apologetic hand from an intoxicated stranger, though that is where the communication ends as whatever he was trying to say I can’t hear through the music. We can’t even share a knowing glance as he fails to hold my gaze, his pupils constantly slipping downwards in his eyelids, like an oyster being gulped from its shell. I turn back to find more movement; my group are beginning to enter the train. I shyly place myself in a line, politely allowing a couple of women to go in front of me before following them onto the carriage.
A train never feels narrower than at eleven o’clock at night, as you leave the cold air behind and become engulfed in the sweaty, boozy atmosphere, crammed into the tight space between the adjoining carriages, unable to move without brushing a stranger. History flashes before me as I imagine myself embarking on a voyage, escaping my home country and its lack of resources and joining my compatriots on a journey into the unknown in the hope of a better life. The pilgrims didn’t have to deal with football chants, is my second and less poignant thought. Gradually, the conveyor belt of partygoers clicks back into life and I find myself walking into the minefield that Coach F has become.
The mines in question are the ‘avoidables’- the groups of people appearing too rowdy and troublesome, as well as any unfortunate souls who look at all as if projectile vomiting is in their near future. I settle for a seat next to a businessman with headphones in, like me, staring out the window, on the basis that if he does not look at the carnage, it is in fact not there. I am not so evasive; on the contrary, this is my sport.
You see, the thing with chaos is that it’s addictive. When there is a terrible accident reported on the news, yes our first thought goes out to those who suffered, but it is swiftly followed by the extremely natural reaction of “I wonder what I’d have done?” We hear tales of unprecedented disaster and a part of us longs to be there. Now, I do not live near areas of war or unrest, so I settle for my own personal, bitesize fix: the intoxicated insanity of the last train home.
George F Brown 