An old woman walks up the westbound platform of Bethnal Green Underground station, moving painfully slowly on account of her arthritis.
‘Mum, can we go?’ asks her eldest daughter Miranda, trying to hide her irritation. She has an Ocado delivery due later and she’s dying for a coffee. ‘We shouldn’t be on public transport, not in the middle of a pandemic.’
‘Tsk.’ Her mother waves her walking stick dismissively. ‘You go if you like, but I’m not leaving.’
Miranda glances over at her younger sister Rosemary and rolls her eyes. God their mother could be tricky. ‘All piss and vinegar,’ as her ex-husband once memorably described her.
‘At the very least Mum, pull your mask up over your nose,’ Rosemary orders. But the older lady ignores them both, moving with
a tortoise like determination.
They reach the end of the platform and all pause, staring into the gaping black mouth of the tunnel.
‘We clean our transport network regularly with antiviral disinfectant,’ mutters the old lady, reading out loud from a poster pasted to the tunnel wall. ‘That’s nothing new. They did this nightly during the war.’
‘You came here in the war?’ asks Miranda, thoughts of her latte fast fading.
‘We lived down here.’ Their mother smiles, her face slightly crooked since the stroke. ‘Your auntie Marie even took tap-dancing
classes down here.’ Miranda presses her lips together, worried.
‘You’re getting confused, Mum. People only slept down here during the Blitz.’
‘I might have snow on the roof, but I’ve still got all my marbles!’ the old lady barks, her voice stiletto sharp. She loves her daughters desperately, but she wishes they didn’t keep on doing this, fussing over her, checking her constantly for signs of senility.
She closes her eyes. Intrusive thoughts march through her brain like a brass band. Heat. Blood. Smoke…
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