Confetti landscape

Kate glanced surreptitiously at her reflection in the grimy, train window, noticing the reapplied lipstick (Fuchsia) and the tiny crows feet dancing around her eyes. She saw too the carefully streaked hair, the greying roots meticulously concealed at no little expense. She sighed. James had noticed only the expenditure, not the effect it had bought.
In front of her was a small formica table, its cracked top impregnated with the indelible stains of humanity carelessly deposited along the way. Beyond, stretched seat backs incoherent with colour, a chaotic mess of blacks and reds and blues, as if someone had been playing paintball against them, badly.
The train gathered speed. Blackened terraces gave way to open countryside, graffitied Seven Elevens to the rolling hills. Sheep grazed contentedly, a snagged fleece the only barrier to perfect happiness. Kitty was not by nature deceitful, in fact she regarded her lies, few as they were, as pure pragmatism.
‘I’m visiting a girlfriend,’ she had said keeping her eyes firmly fixed on the pork and ginger stir fry sizzling dangerously in front of her.
‘Mm?’
‘On Thursday. She’s a bit down in the dumps and I promised…You don’t mind do you?’ she added bending further over the worn, plastic chopping board and hacking fiercely at a last onion.
‘Thursday? Think I’ve got a staff meeting.’
‘Really?’
‘Mm.’ James didn’t look up.
‘So, I’ll go then?’
James turned the last page. ‘What time will you be back?’
‘Well, the last train’s at 10pm, so I thought it would probably be easier to stay over. Unless, of course…?’ She left the question hanging in the air like a casually tossed grenade that could explode at any time injuring one or other of them.
‘Fine. I’ve got to get away from those damn onions. Call me when it’s ready.’
It had been as simple as that. He hadn’t once looked at her face, which she had feared would be a dead giveaway. No, Kitty didn’t like to lie, but what, after all, was the alternative?
She threw the remaining vegetables into the wok and slid the chopping board into the sink. The lie bobbed about on the surface, refusing to go away. Oh what tangled web we weave, when first we practise to deceive. She pushed her mother’s mantra away and stirred furiously at the spitting mess in the wok. It was hard to tell if the streaming tears were a direct result of the onions or not.

A woman made to take the seat opposite and Kitty shifted her knees politely- and completely ineffectually- as people do. She wriggled and hooking her left foot around her green overnight bag pulled it marginally closer, kicking her fellow passenger at the same time.
‘God, I’m sorry, terribly sorry,’ said Kitty, with the desperation of someone seeking forgiveness for sins not yet committed. Her companion crossed and uncrossed her legs as if somehow this would erase the deed.
‘No. Really. It’s me who should be apologising. It’s completely my fault. I do hope I haven’t taken all of your room?’ As she spoke the woman curled herself carefully into the corner of her seat and joined her hands loosely in front of her.
Kitty demurred, furiously shaking her head as if trying to cast off her embarrassment. She looked at her companion clearly for the first time noting her woven suit, neatly pressed blouse and gleaming, patent leather shoes. She noticed too a tiny crucifix nestled comfortably in the scored curve of her neck.
The nun smiled beatifically and spoke. ‘Are you going somewhere special?’
The innocuous question lay dangerously on the table between them, the table that separated the human from the divine. A pair of ice blue steely eyes bore into her.
Kitty blushed.
‘It’s just, we, you look so radiant my dear.’
Kitty shook her head, unable to speak. Was it that obvious? She felt the hot flush creep up her chest until it encircled her throat like a choker of guilt. She was glad when Sheffield arrived and she could change trains.
Kitty surveyed the platform with its wonky litter bin and vending machine offering scalding, plastic cups of something which bore little resemblance to anything you would ever drink again. To her left a defaced poster suggested she **** off. If only she could, thought Kate wistfully, then looked round fearful that the nun might be lurking in the shadows.
Pushing her bags under the bench, she paced restlessly up and down the long platform, scanning the departures board every couple of minutes. New information dominoed forth at irregular intervals, noisily clattering its transient presence. After a cursory glance Kitty turned away and marched down the platform. A through train would have been so much better. One quick decision and she would have been there, none of this time for reflection.
‘The next train for Manchester Piccadilly is running approximately twenty-five minutes late.’
Kitty jumped. She gazed at the tannoy as if it were the voice of God. The announcer had a broad Birmingham accent. Maybe it wasn’t God after all. Although, she thought to herself, why shouldn’t God come from the Midlands? She pondered on God’s nationality for as long as she could but eventually even Kitty had to face reality, and with reality, guilt. What on earth was she doing here? The announcement reverberated down the platform. It was a lifeline, another twenty-five minutes to change her mind, to walk away. A bare half hour to save her marriage. Kitty thought of James. She knew what she would do. Indeed, there was only one thing she could do.