Day 4: Gah

Having bored myself rigid with the scene in the railway station and feeling like I was pulling teeth - even with the return to the cliche part where our main character gets dressed and I revel in the boy/girl clash (the original story of my own that I'm ripping off is named oh-so-originally Boy to Girl in case it wasn't obvious) - I decided I would skip ahead. I've been watching some video essays and Harry Potter kept being referenced and so, with that in mind and with my main character on a train, I thought I might use the journey to try and get some other characters in the narrative. Still no real plot here but at least I have a conversation. It's clearly first draft territory though - you'll see that for yourself - but at least I have a name for my main character now. The other character is the only name I remember from the original (not the surname, not sure she had a surname back then), as is her character design but description of her here is deliberately sparse because my MC isn't analysing her looks as they analysed their own back in their room and I wanted that to be a Thing. Mind you, maybe being sparse is a bad choice.

First draft. Just keep repeating that mantra and maybe I won't hate it as much! Here's the noodling from tonight:

       “Are you going to Leeds too?”

       I was a bit startled, having been enjoying the view across the rugged landscape and chalking up yet another cliché by making the observation deliberately in my head just to do so. “Huh?”

       “Leeds. Is that where you’re going?” repeated the girl sat opposite me. She looked unnervingly similar to the girls at my school in the face, which just added the feeling that things were off when I took in her clothes. “I’m going to Leeds. Union camp, you know, learning about the value of friendship or something annoying like that. They’ll probably say something about what jobs to do. I want to do Maths.”

       “Maths?” She spoke quickly, too quickly for me to really take everything in all at once. “I mean, yeah, yeah, I’m going to Leeds.” Also, there was a bit of a culture shock to be spoken to by a girl without opening conversation. Not to boast but people tended not to open conversation with me for any reason. If this were a film would it pass Bechdel’s test?

       She looked harder at me, cocking her head like a small dog. “Are you a Colonial?”

       “Pardon?” I don’t usually use that word but the situation seemed to demand the kind of archaic confusion my grandparents were fond of, I just removed the undercurrent of irritation that usually accompanied their pronunciation.

       “You said ‘yeah’ rather than ‘yes’. Makes you sound like a cowboy.”

       “Cowgirl.” I corrected impulsively, feeling stupid before the last syllable left my mouth. “On account-”

       She was laughing anyway, the kind of light polite laughter that came from genuine amusement and not being threatened by the situation. I’d heard it often enough, but never evoked it. “Well, then, what’s your name?”

       For the briefest moment I consider telling her my actual name, the one I grew up with, but luckily the confusion of seeing her laugh gave me pause for just long enough to realise that this was not the time nor the place. At least, not yet. “Suzanne. Suzanne Charlton. You?”

       “You talk funny. Are you sure you’re not a Colonial?” she caught my look of utter incomprehension. “Well, I’m Harriet. Most people call me Hattie though and Harriet sounds a bit posh if you ask me.”

       “Hattie,” I repeat, anxious to catch hold of one thread of the conversation at least. She seems nice enough.

       Smiling at my repetition. “Hattie Watson. You’re not from Carlisle are you?” Perceptive too.

       Without thinking I started talking: “Lived there seven years,” it came out almost as a defensive boast, which was not what I was intending. “Moved from Lancashire.” I was flustered, recognising that this was a chance at gaining a friendly ear in whatever the heck was happening, and grabbing it with both hands. “I live in Stanwix.” Luckily this was true for Suzanne as well as me, so I could bring things back on track. If I’d learned nothing else by watching Quantum Leap it was that Sam had to leave those he leaped into the way he found them so they could carry on living. I had no intention of leaving Suzanne with a web of confusion when I left. And I felt like I could leave at any time. Unless this was like Quantum Leap and I had to put right what once went wrong. Hattie was talking again.

       “…that’s why I ended up going to Trinity School rather than working down in Denton Holme. My Dad reckons it’s better for me anyway so…” she tailed off. “School or Co-op?”

       For a moment I thought I’d misheard. Also, I had no idea what she was talking about. Nor did I know. What on Earth was a Co-op anyway? Oh well, in case of emergency: be honest. “School.”

       “How fabulous! So you’re an academic as well?”

       “I mean, I guess.”

       “Don’t you know?” she looked moderately confused.

       This wasn’t an easy conversation. But then, I reflected, most conversations were filled with landmines and mistakes to make so this was unfamiliar but no different to normal. “Oh, yeah, I do. Just… it’s a figure of speech.”

       “Lancastrian?”

       In for a penny… “Yeah. I mean, yes.” Also I had no idea what a Union camp was and that was, apparently, where I was going. And Hattie had been nice enough to strike up a conversation. I decided to take a risk and ask some questions of my own. “You been to one of these before?”

       “No, first one. I suppose it’s the same for you.”

       “Absolutely.”

       “Oh, good. So, what’s your favourite subject? Mine’s Maths, and the sciences obviously.”

       “Oh, History. I like the First World War. Well, like is probably the wrong word, but it’s my favourite thing to learn about.”

       “What’s that?”

       “What’s what?”

       “First World War? Is that like a Roman or Saxon thing? Most of my History is all about modern stuff and nonsense.”

       I was taken aback. Well, I did think this was all a bit close to Victorian times. Either that or she was very into Maths and not a fan of History, which would make sense, most of the History I’d done in class was medieval and industrial era anyway so we hadn’t actually studied the First World War, it was just what my Dad was into. “No, 1914-1918, I guess it’s a bit-”

       “Oh, the Great War you mean? I’ve never heard it called the First World War before, you make it sound like there was another one! Or more! Gosh! Can you imagine? Oh! I bet you like reading those science fiction books! I’m not a fan, my Mum made me read H. G. Wells once, she really liked it, and it wasn’t as good as Anderson or the Brontës. Have you read Wells?”

       Something told me to drop the subject and take the opportunity to talk books instead. “Read the Landships once, prefer short stories.” I’m not completely dense, but I ignored the ‘something’. “You’ve never heard of the Second World War? Hitler and the Germans, that sort of thing.” In the moment, despite my huge confidence in my own abilities, I found myself floundering and relying on half-baked memories of Commando comics and bad TV shows. “Like Dad’s Army or ‘Allo ‘Allo?”

       Hattie looked utterly confused, but clearly decided that I wasn’t a raving lunatic and, instead, jumped to what must have been the only logical conclusion for her to draw. “I’ve not heard of those books, who wrote them? I’ve heard of Hitler though,” she looked thoughtful for a moment, “Angry gadgey with a silly moustache, did something in Germany or something?”

       I didn’t think Hattie was this ill-informed, nothing about her so far suggested it, apart from the fact that she had blonde hair and films had long since told me that blonde girls in films were a bit- no, that seemed unlikely. Basically, I got the distinct impression that she really didn’t know about Hitler and that, therefore, this strange place in which I found myself didn’t find him as noteworthy as perhaps I thought he ought to be. “Leader of Germany, of the Nazis?”

       “Yes, he went on a bit of a radge from what I know, then he was done in. Capitalist and all that.”

       I wasn’t expecting that. I’d heard that term once or twice but honestly had no idea what it meant. “A what?”

       “Oh, you know, a radge – bit angry… a radge.”

       “No, no, I know that,” I did, heard it before: Carlisle slang. “Capitalist?”

       “Well, that’s what the Soviets say about Germany. It’s a capitalist country. Like the Colonies. My Dad reads all the news, says I need to as well, he quizzes me on it. Says Maths is a pointless subject with no real applications in the real world.” Her voice took on a posher tone when she said that, I guessed she was quoting her father. “Sorry, I’m going on a bit.”

       “No, it’s cool.”

       Again that look of confusion flashed over Hattie’s face. “What?”

       “It’s cool, I don’t mind.”

       “Is it? I thought it was pretty decent, actually.”

       “Huh?” This was far harder work than normal conversations. I decided that the best course of action was to play this more carefully, say less and pay more attention. It was beginning to dawn on me that being in the body of a girl might be the least disorienting thing happening and, arguably, the least confusing. “Why Maths?” I grasped at anything to keep the conversation moving. I had at least found out that it wasn’t Victorian times: Hattie knew about the First World War, or the Great War, which meant that had happened. Didn’t people between the wars call the First World War the Great War?

       “It’s easy. You line the numbers up, apply the stuff and they do what they’re supposed to do. Then, if you’re not certain, you can work backwards. Everything has a correct answer, no opinions or guessing. You know, like in Literature Appreciation where you’ve got to say why the author used that word or this phrase. Or Computers, where the programming can have mistakes and you don’t realise until the end and even then you don’t know where it is.”

       I spotted the ‘Literature Appreciation’ rather than English, the use of ‘Computers’ rather than ‘Information Technology’. However, more importantly, I totally got what she was saying about Maths. “Yeah!” My enthusiasm wasn’t put on. “Same with languages. Like, in Latin, when you know the verb endings it’s easier to translate and, if there’s a problem, you can work backwards.”

       “Latin?”

       “Oh, yeah, I got to take it in…” I paused, I took it in Year 8 because my school offered it but this place might not have that. I took another stab: “Language of the Romans. I learned a bit because I want to learn French and Spanish and Portuguese but, well, haven’t got the time. Not yet. Latin’ll make it easier ‘cos they’re Romance languages, based on Latin, and Portuguese is practically Latin anyway.”

       “I’m not as much of a fan of languages. Had to learn a bit of Russian, obviously, and my Dad wants me to learn some Zulu and Xhosa.” Hattie had that look again. “Trinity doesn’t have African languages, Dad was talking about going to Union House. God, I hope the camp doesn’t make us do languages.”

       Zulu I knew, I’ve seen the film, but the other one I wasn’t even going to try and pronounce even having heard her say it. “I know a bit of German,” I said, a little lamely. I’d always considered myself a bit of a linguist but I had never even wrapped my head around the fact that Russian had a different alphabet, let alone learned any words.