purple_pen (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
purple_pen) wrote2009-03-22 01:58 pm
purple_pen) wrote2009-03-22 01:58 pm
Entry tags:
A Rum Do
This is not exactly how she imagined her life turning out. She supposes this is true for a lot of people, but if she’d known this was how hers would be, she’d probably have stayed in Jamaica.
Rosa peers out from behind the crates again, squinting into the dark for the lights of the boat. Five months of this and she could recognise the signal in her sleep –actually seeing it is the problem, when the wages from the laundry hardly pay rent and food, never mind eye glasses.
Something moves nearby, crunching the pebbles, and she ducks back into the shadows. If it’s a policeman, she might as well not bother, because there’s no policeman on God’s green earth who wouldn’t wonder at a pile of broken shipping crates down here. Desperate times call for desperate measure though, and she can’t stand the twice weekly letters from home, asking for money and telling her how Jacob is sick and needs a better lifestyle.
She stopped writing back weeks ago, because she didn’t know how to tell them: it’s not really like that. What they tell you isn’t true, it won’t be better and you won’t be welcomed to a new world and prosperity.
The pebbles crunch again and Rosa risks peeking. There’s no-one there, just a small dark shadow against the rippling darkness of the waves. A cat then, or a stray dog. Two of a kind, she thinks self-pityingly, no home and nowhere else to be but here at midnight on a full moon in May.
This is another thing that’s not like home, she thinks, drawing her shawl more tightly round her shoulders. They don’t tell you how cold it gets once the sun sets, how the sea breezes drag chill air with them, getting into your clothes and your bones till you think you’ll never be warm again. And the room she’s lodging in is no better, up in the attic with a window that rattles with the wind and leaks with the rain, and a blanket that’s more holes than wool.
She peers out to sea again, but there’s nothing there, just the waves breaking on the shore and the looming ghostliness of the White Cliffs. She remembers seeing them for the first time, in the far distance from the ship, Will clutching her hand, pointing. ‘Look, Rosa, the White Cliffs of Dover. England.’
She hasn’t seen him since he helped her off the ship, taking the end of the trunk containing all her worldly goods. She tried to hold onto the other and not trip on the hem of her best skirt, the one her mother made specially for the trip. Will had disappeared, swept off into the crowds with a wave of his hat, and Rosa dragged her trunk by herself, the whole way to her lodgings.
Some days she thinks about that girl, standing in front of a tiny terraced house in a dingy back street, no money to her name beyond the first week’s rent, no idea where she’d find a job, but filled with excitement, and hope. She thinks about that girl and she thinks about herself, now, and she can’t believe they’re the same person. Can’t believe it’s only been five months,
She keeps that skirt folded carefully in the one drawer that doesn’t stick, wears it to church every Sunday, without fail, with a crisp white blouse, black leather shoes that pinch her feet and a neat blue hat. She looks just like the other women, but they look at her as though she has two heads and move away when she goes to sit near them. It took her a couple of weeks to learn, but she soon realised she should sit in the back row, with the other people who don’t belong here.
Rosa forces her mind back to the beach, reprimanding herself for drifting away again. When she looks out to the sea, it’s as quiet as before, not even a flicker of sails or oars. She checks her watch and sighs. They’re late, which is nothing new, but she knows the others will be getting nervous, and she’ll be the one who gets the blunt end of frayed tempers. Still, nothing she can do about it now but wait and hope they haven’t been stopped on the way in.
This is the sort of situation that warrants the phrase ‘better late than never’. And ‘no news is good news’. Clearly the months of listening to the British talk has led to their clichés and sayings soaking into her brain.
Right now, she’d give anything to be back home, on the beach with her family and her friends, where it’s warm. She knew she’d miss them when she left, she just hadn’t realised how long it would go on, how it would just get worse over time, not better.
She saved for a year for the cost of the trip, walking past the billboards every day on her way to work, the ones extolling the virtues of Britain as a place to live, how when she arrived here she’d be able to get a job, a nice house, a better life than she had where she was. She walked past them every day, and she believed them, just like everyone else.
It wasn’t that life at home had been bad, or, at least, it hadn’t got worse, but Britain had seemed like a shining land of opportunity, where even a poor young girl could make it, meet a nice young man and get married, or get a well paid job and live the life of a girl in a magazine. They’d all believed in it, Rosa and the other girls she’d worked with, and they’d compared, every week, who had the most money saved.
She’d made it first, bought her ticket onto the boat, waved goodbye with tears in her eyes and a flutter of excitement, and sailed into the dawn of a new and better life.
A new life, working every hour God sent in a laundry, just to make ends meet, with no friends but the others who came off the boat.
Her mother writes letters about how people are losing their jobs at home, and how Rosa’s had a lucky escape. Some days she wonders if her friends haven’t been luckier, losing their jobs before they saved the money to come over and find out what a disappointment it really is.
Out on the water, something flickers.
Rosa squints, trying to force it into focus. It flickers again, then steadies and flashes, two short, one long, two short. A minute’s pause, and the signal again.
She fumbles with frozen fingers for her torch, echoes the signal, and waits.
Out on the water, a little closer than before, the light flashes, one long, one short, and she hears the creak of oars being lowered into the water.
Rosa pulls herself to her feet, her bones locking for a moment in protest, then she starts up the cliff path, half running, half climbing, the light of the boat low on the sea behind her. She drags herself up over the lip of the cliff but stays down, checking for anything out of place.
For a moment, nothing moves.
Two figures step out of the shadows. Rosa feels the familiar flicker of fear, then the taller one speaks. ‘Took you long enough, girl. You get lost on the way up here?’
She rolls her eyes, knowing the others won’t be able to see it in the dark. ‘Can I help the speed the boat comes in at? You don’t like the job I do, you can always get someone else.’
‘That I can. Any number coming off the next boat in, but you came to me, so I wouldn’t complain.’ He crowds closer to her, his hand tight on her arm. ‘Plus, I pay you twice what you make in a week for one night watching for a signal from a ship. You think I’m your Mama?’
Rosa moves a step back, though it takes her a little too close to the edge of the cliff. ‘No, sir. I’m sorry.’
‘Good girl.’ He releases her arm, smiling. ‘Now you run along home. We’ll be in touch next week.’
‘Yes sir.’ Rosa ducks her head, gathers her shawl closer about her, and makes her way along the cliff-top path, angling towards the dim lights of the town. As she hurries along, she hears the clank of rum bottles as the crates are unloaded from the boats, and the others move down the cliff face to help.
She closes her eyes, listening; feels the warmth of the sunset wash over her, her friends beside her. Just for a second, it feels like home.
Rosa peers out from behind the crates again, squinting into the dark for the lights of the boat. Five months of this and she could recognise the signal in her sleep –actually seeing it is the problem, when the wages from the laundry hardly pay rent and food, never mind eye glasses.
Something moves nearby, crunching the pebbles, and she ducks back into the shadows. If it’s a policeman, she might as well not bother, because there’s no policeman on God’s green earth who wouldn’t wonder at a pile of broken shipping crates down here. Desperate times call for desperate measure though, and she can’t stand the twice weekly letters from home, asking for money and telling her how Jacob is sick and needs a better lifestyle.
She stopped writing back weeks ago, because she didn’t know how to tell them: it’s not really like that. What they tell you isn’t true, it won’t be better and you won’t be welcomed to a new world and prosperity.
The pebbles crunch again and Rosa risks peeking. There’s no-one there, just a small dark shadow against the rippling darkness of the waves. A cat then, or a stray dog. Two of a kind, she thinks self-pityingly, no home and nowhere else to be but here at midnight on a full moon in May.
This is another thing that’s not like home, she thinks, drawing her shawl more tightly round her shoulders. They don’t tell you how cold it gets once the sun sets, how the sea breezes drag chill air with them, getting into your clothes and your bones till you think you’ll never be warm again. And the room she’s lodging in is no better, up in the attic with a window that rattles with the wind and leaks with the rain, and a blanket that’s more holes than wool.
She peers out to sea again, but there’s nothing there, just the waves breaking on the shore and the looming ghostliness of the White Cliffs. She remembers seeing them for the first time, in the far distance from the ship, Will clutching her hand, pointing. ‘Look, Rosa, the White Cliffs of Dover. England.’
She hasn’t seen him since he helped her off the ship, taking the end of the trunk containing all her worldly goods. She tried to hold onto the other and not trip on the hem of her best skirt, the one her mother made specially for the trip. Will had disappeared, swept off into the crowds with a wave of his hat, and Rosa dragged her trunk by herself, the whole way to her lodgings.
Some days she thinks about that girl, standing in front of a tiny terraced house in a dingy back street, no money to her name beyond the first week’s rent, no idea where she’d find a job, but filled with excitement, and hope. She thinks about that girl and she thinks about herself, now, and she can’t believe they’re the same person. Can’t believe it’s only been five months,
She keeps that skirt folded carefully in the one drawer that doesn’t stick, wears it to church every Sunday, without fail, with a crisp white blouse, black leather shoes that pinch her feet and a neat blue hat. She looks just like the other women, but they look at her as though she has two heads and move away when she goes to sit near them. It took her a couple of weeks to learn, but she soon realised she should sit in the back row, with the other people who don’t belong here.
Rosa forces her mind back to the beach, reprimanding herself for drifting away again. When she looks out to the sea, it’s as quiet as before, not even a flicker of sails or oars. She checks her watch and sighs. They’re late, which is nothing new, but she knows the others will be getting nervous, and she’ll be the one who gets the blunt end of frayed tempers. Still, nothing she can do about it now but wait and hope they haven’t been stopped on the way in.
This is the sort of situation that warrants the phrase ‘better late than never’. And ‘no news is good news’. Clearly the months of listening to the British talk has led to their clichés and sayings soaking into her brain.
Right now, she’d give anything to be back home, on the beach with her family and her friends, where it’s warm. She knew she’d miss them when she left, she just hadn’t realised how long it would go on, how it would just get worse over time, not better.
She saved for a year for the cost of the trip, walking past the billboards every day on her way to work, the ones extolling the virtues of Britain as a place to live, how when she arrived here she’d be able to get a job, a nice house, a better life than she had where she was. She walked past them every day, and she believed them, just like everyone else.
It wasn’t that life at home had been bad, or, at least, it hadn’t got worse, but Britain had seemed like a shining land of opportunity, where even a poor young girl could make it, meet a nice young man and get married, or get a well paid job and live the life of a girl in a magazine. They’d all believed in it, Rosa and the other girls she’d worked with, and they’d compared, every week, who had the most money saved.
She’d made it first, bought her ticket onto the boat, waved goodbye with tears in her eyes and a flutter of excitement, and sailed into the dawn of a new and better life.
A new life, working every hour God sent in a laundry, just to make ends meet, with no friends but the others who came off the boat.
Her mother writes letters about how people are losing their jobs at home, and how Rosa’s had a lucky escape. Some days she wonders if her friends haven’t been luckier, losing their jobs before they saved the money to come over and find out what a disappointment it really is.
Out on the water, something flickers.
Rosa squints, trying to force it into focus. It flickers again, then steadies and flashes, two short, one long, two short. A minute’s pause, and the signal again.
She fumbles with frozen fingers for her torch, echoes the signal, and waits.
Out on the water, a little closer than before, the light flashes, one long, one short, and she hears the creak of oars being lowered into the water.
Rosa pulls herself to her feet, her bones locking for a moment in protest, then she starts up the cliff path, half running, half climbing, the light of the boat low on the sea behind her. She drags herself up over the lip of the cliff but stays down, checking for anything out of place.
For a moment, nothing moves.
Two figures step out of the shadows. Rosa feels the familiar flicker of fear, then the taller one speaks. ‘Took you long enough, girl. You get lost on the way up here?’
She rolls her eyes, knowing the others won’t be able to see it in the dark. ‘Can I help the speed the boat comes in at? You don’t like the job I do, you can always get someone else.’
‘That I can. Any number coming off the next boat in, but you came to me, so I wouldn’t complain.’ He crowds closer to her, his hand tight on her arm. ‘Plus, I pay you twice what you make in a week for one night watching for a signal from a ship. You think I’m your Mama?’
Rosa moves a step back, though it takes her a little too close to the edge of the cliff. ‘No, sir. I’m sorry.’
‘Good girl.’ He releases her arm, smiling. ‘Now you run along home. We’ll be in touch next week.’
‘Yes sir.’ Rosa ducks her head, gathers her shawl closer about her, and makes her way along the cliff-top path, angling towards the dim lights of the town. As she hurries along, she hears the clank of rum bottles as the crates are unloaded from the boats, and the others move down the cliff face to help.
She closes her eyes, listening; feels the warmth of the sunset wash over her, her friends beside her. Just for a second, it feels like home.