There was this day, right. And the traffic was all snarled up. As slow as clouds on a still day until we reached the bridge and then everything stopped. I was antsy at first cos there was places I was s’pposed to be and I didn’t want to be behind the clock for starting work. I got out my car and stood looking straight ahead, as if there might be something to say why we was stuck standing still.
It was an ordinary looking day and the air so hot and dry and breathless. There was horns sounding and men kicking the tyres of their cars and spitting on the road and looking at their watches like they could stop time. Behind us as far as you could see the picture was the same as in front.
I got back in the car and turned the radio on. Sometimes there’s stuff on the radio and they give you an indication of what’s going on and how long the hold up should be. There was music playing, a song I knew from years back. I sucked in air and forced it slow out from my cheeks. I swore, too, loud as punches, and I sounded my own horn.
Once it was late and it was past the time for clocking in and all hope of ever being there just left me, well, then it was different. Suddenly the day wasn’t so bad. Sure, there was better places to be if you was not at your work, but still it was like a holiday. It was the same for almost everyone, I reckon.
I wound the window down and I wasn’t the only one and music leaked out and it was like a party or like carnival. And there on the bridge people unfastened their ties and unbuttoned their shirt sleeves and they was all smiling and shrugging their shoulders and making sorry faces or no-nevermind faces.
And there was this one girl dancing and we was all just watching her and thinking how good life could be. She was maybe in her early twenties and she was laughing and her arms making shapes in the air and her feet moving to the music and her whole body moving, too. There wasn’t anything else to do so one by one we joined that girl till there was about fifty of us out of our cars and dancing.
And some guy popped his trunk and he was giving out bottled water, like he’d planned for this eventuality, and people was talking and sharing stories of who they was. And I shook hand with this guy and it turned out he lived in the same street as me and we knew people in common. And horns was still sounding someplace, and sounding far off, but not sounding sharp or shout.
And the sky – Jesus, it was so fucking blue, you know. I’d forgotten how blue it could be, and there was this bird, a gull of some sort, and it was just drifting on the air, its wings spread wide, and I watched it for a while, and I could see others watching the same, and it was just so perfect with its breast so white, and flying in misshaped circles without any obvious movement of its wings.
And the girl that had started the dancing, her name was Chloe, and she came over to say hi and to ask after my name. She was doing that with everyone, and she was writing stuff down, and she said it was so she wouldn’t forget. Ord’narily I’d have said she was weird, but saying that about not wanting to forget, well, I sort of understood.
The traffic started moving again about the middle of the day, when the sun was at its hottest and the road was beginning to melt and most of us had got back into our cars so we wouldn’t get burned. It turned out there was a truck hammered into three cars about a mile the other side of the bridge and when we passed the mess of those cars and policemen standing with their hats pushed up on their heads and looking serious and directing us to keep moving, well, I felt kinda guilty then, about the dancing and the taking the day easy and watching that seagull hanging in the beautiful blue, guilty like when you’re eating steak and fries and your plate’s piled high, and on the tv there’s suddenly pictures of some famine on the other side of the world and kids with their ribs showing and mothers with shrunken breasts and arms and legs like sticks. And I wondered if the dancing girl from the bridge, Chloe, I wonder if she wrote any of that down.
There was this day, right. And the traffic was all snarled up. As slow as clouds on a still day until we reached the bridge and then everything stopped. I was antsy at first cos there was places I was s’pposed to be and I didn’t want to be behind the clock for starting work. I got out my car and stood looking straight ahead, as if there might be something to say why we was stuck standing still.
It was an ordinary looking day and the air so hot and dry and breathless. There was horns sounding and men kicking the tyres of their cars and spitting on the road and looking at their watches like they could stop time. Behind us as far as you could see the picture was the same as in front.
I got back in the car and turned the radio on. Sometimes there’s stuff on the radio and they give you an indication of what’s going on and how long the hold up should be. There was music playing, a song I knew from years back. I sucked in air and forced it slow out from my cheeks. I swore, too, loud as punches, and I sounded my own horn.
Once it was late and it was past the time for clocking in and all hope of ever being there just left me, well, then it was different. Suddenly the day wasn’t so bad. Sure, there was better places to be if you was not at your work, but still it was like a holiday. It was the same for almost everyone, I reckon.
I wound the window down and I wasn’t the only one and music leaked out and it was like a party or like carnival. And there on the bridge people unfastened their ties and unbuttoned their shirt sleeves and they was all smiling and shrugging their shoulders and making sorry faces or no-nevermind faces.
And there was this one girl dancing and we was all just watching her and thinking how good life could be. She was maybe in her early twenties and she was laughing and her arms making shapes in the air and her feet moving to the music and her whole body moving, too. There wasn’t anything else to do so one by one we joined that girl till there was about fifty of us out of our cars and dancing.
And some guy popped his trunk and he was giving out bottled water, like he’d planned for this eventuality, and people was talking and sharing stories of who they was. And I shook hand with this guy and it turned out he lived in the same street as me and we knew people in common. And horns was still sounding someplace, and sounding far off, but not sounding sharp or shout.
And the sky – Jesus, it was so fucking blue, you know. I’d forgotten how blue it could be, and there was this bird, a gull of some sort, and it was just drifting on the air, its wings spread wide, and I watched it for a while, and I could see others watching the same, and it was just so perfect with its breast so white, and flying in misshaped circles without any obvious movement of its wings.
And the girl that had started the dancing, her name was Chloe, and she came over to say hi and to ask after my name. She was doing that with everyone, and she was writing stuff down, and she said it was so she wouldn’t forget. Ord’narily I’d have said she was weird, but saying that about not wanting to forget, well, I sort of understood.
The traffic started moving again about the middle of the day, when the sun was at its hottest and the road was beginning to melt and most of us had got back into our cars so we wouldn’t get burned. It turned out there was a truck hammered into three cars about a mile the other side of the bridge and when we passed the mess of those cars and policemen standing with their hats pushed up on their heads and looking serious and directing us to keep moving, well, I felt kinda guilty then, about the dancing and the taking the day easy and watching that seagull hanging in the beautiful blue, guilty like when you’re eating steak and fries and your plate’s piled high, and on the tv there’s suddenly pictures of some famine on the other side of the world and kids with their ribs showing and mothers with shrunken breasts and arms and legs like sticks. And I wondered if the dancing girl from the bridge, Chloe, I wonder if she wrote any of that down.