Beth
Beth
The evening before opening night, Beth makes her way out of the theatre. It’s been a while since she took the tube but tonight she feels like it. She feels stupid wearing sunglasses underground and yet without them she’s more recognisable, prone to the odd stare and worst of all, whispers. Her least favourite form of attention.
As she passes by the billboards outside, emblazoned with her own face, her ego kicks in and she finds herself feeling just a little bit excited about the opening night tomorrow.
That’s the nature of the job. It’s a bad boyfriend, an addiction, and the highs and lows are constantly in flux.
She pulls her baseball cap down over her forehead and climbs into the tube carriage at Bond Street. The Jubilee Line will take her to Waterloo, where she’ll catch the overground train to her cottage in Barnes.
She takes out her book – a biography of Carrie Fisher – and settles down. It’s nearly 8 p.m., rush hour is ending, and the carriage is relatively empty.
But she can’t focus on her book. Instead, she’s haunted by the thought of Rosa, and her flowers. Why would she have sent them? Why would she have wanted to get in touch again, after all these years?
Is it something to do with her argument with Nick?
Nick. She can’t think about him right now. It’s too painful. She needs to focus on the play, on opening night, doing her best. People are relying on her. This isn’t the time to get sentimental or regretful. She made a commitment and she needs to be professional, to honour it.
Her work, as always, will be her saviour.
At Westminster, the tube idles in the platform. People run at full speed to get on, then stand inside panting while the train remains stationary.
A few moments pass. She looks at her watch. The tube doors are still open. She’s waiting for the familiar warning beeps that sound right before they close. But they don’t come.
More time passes. Someone leans out of the carriage doors, looking up and down the platform. People start shifting in their seats. The middle-aged man opposite her, briefcase by his feet, tuts.
And then she hears the sound. An alarm that’s designed not to be alarming.
It’s followed by a message, repeating. Slightly crackly; the voice of a newsreader from the 1960s.
Would Inspector Sands please go to the operations room immediately?
Her eyes widen. She wracks her brains, trying to work out why this strange message feels familiar.
Would Inspector Sands please go to the operations room immediately?
Inspector Sands? It sounds like a prank.
She glances around at her fellow passengers, but they are all frowning too, puzzled and irritated by the delay.
And still, the voice persists.
Would Inspector Sands please go to the operations room immediately?
What is it about Inspector Sands that’s making her hackles rise?
She remembers. The same message, but different.
Mr Sands.
That’s what they call it in a theatre.
Sand , because that’s what they used, back in the old days, to put it out.
Mr Sands.
The codename for fire.
*
Her reaction is instant. She grabs her bag and stands, yanking off her sunglasses. It doesn’t matter anymore if people recognise her.
‘We have to get out,’ she says, to the carriage. ‘We have to leave. It means there’s a fire. That message. It means there’s a fire somewhere in the station.’
But the passengers all look at her as though she’s crazy.
‘I’m serious!’
She wants to stay, to try to convince them, but how can she risk it? She can’t. She has to get out. Now.
And so she races down the platform, looking for the Way Out sign. But she takes a wrong turn and ends up following signs for the District & Circle lines instead.
Would Inspector Sands please go to the operations room immediately?
The other passengers in the station are oblivious, plugged into their iPhones, heads down, blocking out the outside world. She wants to grab every one of them and tell them to get out, but she can’t because she’s lost, spinning on her heel, trying to make sense of the signs pointing in different directions.
Why is it so fucking confusing?
Then, there’s a pause in the alarm. She stops spinning, gulps to catch her breath. Strains her ears to listen for it again.
Another crackle over the tannoy system.
Another message.
Due to a reported emergency, all passengers must leave the station immediately. Please obey instructions of the station staff.
Finally, the zombies around her wake up. She watches as their faces turn from confusion to fear, just like hers did a few moments ago. And then, they are all running, as fast as they can, a herd of stampeding elephants and she’s swept up in it, following the crowd, hoping it knows where it’s going.
Everyone remembers the London bombings.
Everyone knows that to live in London means every day, in some minuscule way, you take your life in your hands. Because things do happen here. Ordinary people do die. Bombs go off, terrorists run people off the streets in lorries, young boys are stabbed by other young boys and women are murdered walking home from nights out.
She feels as though she can’t breathe as she’s pushed through the station and up towards the escalators. They are rammed with people – still sticking to the rules – standing on the right, walking on the left. She’s on the left but she’s out of breath and sweating as she finally emerges into the ticket hall at Westminster.
And still, the message repeats. Is it her imagination, or is it getting louder?
Due to a reported emergency, all passengers must leave the station immediately. Please obey instructions of the station staff.
The staff usher everyone out, telling them to keep calm, but the street outside is flooded with people. She looks up, completely disorientated, and sees that she’s right opposite the Houses of Parliament.
Probably the most secure place in the whole of London. And yet, and yet…
There are ambulances and fire engines outside, and she’s corralled, round the corner and away from the tube station. She tries to look back, to see if there’s any sign of what might have happened, but she’s pushed forward by the crowd.
She can’t smell smoke in the air, at least.
She stares up at the deep black sky, and she tries to regulate her breathing. This is not like that night. This is nothing like that night. People are getting out. The fire service are already here.
She will be OK. The further away from the tube, the safer she will be.
The crowd thins out, and soon she finds she’s walking down an unremarkable street, with no idea what direction she’s going in. There are still sirens wailing but they sound far away now, as though they exist in a different life.
Someone stops her, pulling on her arm.
A young woman, gold hoop earrings swinging from both ears.
‘Hey,’ the woman says, and Beth squints at her.
‘Are you OK?’ Beth asks, because surely this woman has stopped her to tell her what’s happened, or to ask her for help?
‘It is you!’ the woman shrieks, and Beth frowns, confused. ‘I knew it! Beth Millen! Can I get a selfie? Oh my God, I can’t believe it’s really you… I like literally love you, I’m such a massive fan.’
Beth stares at her.
‘No,’ she says. ‘No. You must have me confused with someone else.’
She stumbles on, away from the woman, but she’s disorientated by a flash of blinding light.
No , she thinks. No, please! I thought I was safe.
Then she’s overcome with an excruciating pain in her chest. A pain more intense than any pain she has ever felt before. So intense it feels almost impossible. As though someone has their fingers around her heart and is squeezing it tightly.
She reaches up towards it, reflexively, but she can no longer feel her fingers, no longer has any sense of where her hands are. She’s drenched in sweat. Seconds later, she has the realisation that she’s bending down, her head against her knees, and then she feels the urge to vomit, the pain in her heart getting ever more intense, even though how can that be possible when she must be dead?
She must be dead because someone has just stabbed her. Someone has just plunged a knife into her chest.
She thinks of that woman. The last woman she will ever speak to. She’s heard before about crazed fans, stalkers, the danger they pose to those in the public eye.
She’s been lucky until now. Her fans – the few she has got to know – have all been lovely. No one has ever threatened her. But clearly, her time has come. After all, she climbed success’s greasy pole, enjoyed its spoils. Now she must pay the price.
Two thoughts rush in, each distinct. Arrows piercing her soul.
I should have given that woman a selfie .
If I had given that woman a selfie, then I wouldn’t now be dead .
A pause. Her brain speaks to her again.
I should have let Nick go back into the building.
If I had, he might have saved her.
If I had, he wouldn’t have left. He wouldn’t have blamed me and everything would be different.
She thinks of the ash and smoke in the air that night.
This is only what she deserves.
And then, she thinks something else. Her profound truth. The one she has always known, the one she has always carried with her.
I should have told Nick that I wasn’t OK without him .
I should have told him I still love him. And now, it’s too late.