I ‘ave me place and it’s nobody’s place but mine, see. ‘Sbeen mine for years. Since me luck changed and her in doors upped and left me. Really fucked me up that did and no mistake, pardon me French. Looked for answers in the bottom of every beer and whisky bottle, and I couldn’t fink straight for weeks and monfs, and maybe for years. Can’t fink straight now if I’m tellin truth. Then I found me this place.
It’s a small corner of the station where I used to work and it’s like ‘ome. They know me ‘ere. Know me name and everyfin about me. They nods their ‘eads and make no fuss at me bein there. Some as was friends before still do friendly fings and a cup of tea with three sugars pressed into me hand and a few coins dropped in me cup and a sandwich or a hot meat pie brought from the caff. That’s somefin when they remember it’s three sugars and they says G’mornin Tommy.
And I sits there and make no trouble, see. You’d ‘ardly know I was there. Not like some of ‘em and they ‘ave a drink on ‘em and they starts up with singin at first, and then too loud, and singin slips easy into cursin and before long the coppers are carrying ‘em off for a warm night in a small room wif bars on the window and a ‘eavy metal door locked behind ‘em. But not me. I’m quiet and only the sound of me hand lifted and the small bell-ring of coins spilled into my open palm.
Been like that for years and I don’t see nothin changin. She won’t never come back not, not if she sees what I’ve fallen to. Shit, she won’t ‘ardly know me even if’n she did look me way, which she does now and then. I see her some days. She steps down from the 8.43 train, Mondays to Fridays. Pretty as a picture still and she’s laughin and it shouldn’t make no nevermind to me, but it ‘urts to see her laughin. She sees me but she don’t never notice me, not really. Even when she drops a silver penny or two into me cup, she does it wifout really seein who I am. That ‘urts too, but I don’t blame her none for it.
It ‘urts to see her, but it ‘urts more to not see her. That’s what I fink. That’s why I stay ‘ere, day after day, in the hope of catchin sight of her. And the pennies she does give me, they is special pennies, and I fink I can smell her perfume or soap on them pennies, and so I keeps ‘em in my pockets and don’t never look to spend ‘em or give ‘em away. Not even when times are ‘ard and ‘ardest and there’s an ache in me that might be dulled by a plate of fish and chips or a shot of rough whisky or a bottle of cheap wine. And though those pennies don’t ‘mount to much when you add ‘em up, I’m richer than God wif what she gives me. And that’s somefin.
Patricia Ann McNair 
I ‘ave me place and it’s nobody’s place but mine, see. ‘Sbeen mine for years. Since me luck changed and her in doors upped and left me. Really fucked me up that did and no mistake, pardon me French. Looked for answers in the bottom of every beer and whisky bottle, and I couldn’t fink straight for weeks and monfs, and maybe for years. Can’t fink straight now if I’m tellin truth. Then I found me this place.
It’s a small corner of the station where I used to work and it’s like ‘ome. They know me ‘ere. Know me name and everyfin about me. They nods their ‘eads and make no fuss at me bein there. Some as was friends before still do friendly fings and a cup of tea with three sugars pressed into me hand and a few coins dropped in me cup and a sandwich or a hot meat pie brought from the caff. That’s somefin when they remember it’s three sugars and they says G’mornin Tommy.
And I sits there and make no trouble, see. You’d ‘ardly know I was there. Not like some of ‘em and they ‘ave a drink on ‘em and they starts up with singin at first, and then too loud, and singin slips easy into cursin and before long the coppers are carrying ‘em off for a warm night in a small room wif bars on the window and a ‘eavy metal door locked behind ‘em. But not me. I’m quiet and only the sound of me hand lifted and the small bell-ring of coins spilled into my open palm.
Been like that for years and I don’t see nothin changin. She won’t never come back not, not if she sees what I’ve fallen to. Shit, she won’t ‘ardly know me even if’n she did look me way, which she does now and then. I see her some days. She steps down from the 8.43 train, Mondays to Fridays. Pretty as a picture still and she’s laughin and it shouldn’t make no nevermind to me, but it ‘urts to see her laughin. She sees me but she don’t never notice me, not really. Even when she drops a silver penny or two into me cup, she does it wifout really seein who I am. That ‘urts too, but I don’t blame her none for it.
It ‘urts to see her, but it ‘urts more to not see her. That’s what I fink. That’s why I stay ‘ere, day after day, in the hope of catchin sight of her. And the pennies she does give me, they is special pennies, and I fink I can smell her perfume or soap on them pennies, and so I keeps ‘em in my pockets and don’t never look to spend ‘em or give ‘em away. Not even when times are ‘ard and ‘ardest and there’s an ache in me that might be dulled by a plate of fish and chips or a shot of rough whisky or a bottle of cheap wine. And though those pennies don’t ‘mount to much when you add ‘em up, I’m richer than God wif what she gives me. And that’s somefin.