My insides twisted and turned endlessly like a game of snake, the only potential end in sight being that if they eventually ate themselves. I’d heard of people’s stomachs being tied up in knots, but never before had mine felt like eating itself. Butterflies? Those I’d felt before, but these butterflies were eating me alive.
I tried to go about my daily business as my internal organs each sang together: a brass band, rumbling away, void of all harmony. The stares of the others on the tube carriage burned through my ego as though it were a bug under a magnifying glass. I never saw the people staring, as such, but I could feel it in every inch of my body. It pinned me down with all the weight of everyone on this rush hour service, with their baggage thrown in for good measure. Just two more stops I had to survive through. That was all. Two stops and the doors would open and I would be able to crawl out of this hell hole and breathe what ought to be fresh air. I closed my eyes and tried to let my thoughts be swallowed by the darkness to gift myself a rare moment of peace.
The pistons gasped loudly and shocked my eyes open just in time to witness the doors of the carriage do the same. The first thing my eyes saw was the name of the station beckoning me in. I stumbled to my feet as I battled my way against the flow of the current, the never-ending flow of pinstriped suits and briefcase-wielding sociopaths desperately chasing the never-ending dream of a satisfyingly plump bank balance. And they thought I was the odd one.
The doors closed behind me, and the vessel disappeared into the distance leaving only the slight gust of wind behind for those of us who had departed the service. Though a chance to catch my breath this was not, the journey had to continue if I was to get to my destination on time. What time it was exactly, I couldn’t tell you. Hell, if it was even rush hour I could only guess from the piercing smell of armpit and Lynx Africa that I’d just had to endure in the heat of the tube. Whether it was actually hot or not, I also couldn’t tell you, but one thing was for certain - that out of every pore of my body, I was leaking whatever liquid I had left in me. Sweat, booze, blood. It didn’t matter. All that mattered to my body in its current state was that anything that was within it and was removable did just that and evacuated my system. It was as this realisation dawned over me that for the first time the void of heat that had been created within me was taken back over by genuine emotion. Unfortunately, that emotion was fear. Fear for my life? Perhaps. But in moments that I knew were to follow, it was predominantly a fear that I wouldn’t be able to get outside in time.
If I could have run up that escalator I would have done, but alas my feet would not let me. Every iota of power drained through those pores, swimming along in any bodily fluid it could find its way into. Suffice to say the level of pride that I felt when I finally felt the relief of being in the outside world was hardly warranted. Just as I went to gasp for air, my mouth opened for another reason.
What exactly happened at that moment I wouldn’t be able to tell you for certain. This is one of those fine moments where the reliability of your lovely narrator can be called into question, for I recall a far different series of events to the others who were around me on that day.
As far as I can remember it, it was the final notes of the orchestral rumblings coming from inside of me. Just as the composition reached its crescendo, the band decided to switch art-form entirely from the musical to the dramatic. Not content with having serenaded the commuters I had the displeasure of sharing a space with, the band decided they wanted to pay a visit to those out here on the street - the motivation for which I can assume was to claim some sort of remuneration for the provision of ongoing entertainment.
So, with one final rhythmic blast, the band formed from my organs (now, for some reason, joined on the percussion by my spinal cord) blasted their way through me. They rode not just on the waves of the deep notes they produced with their instruments, but on the rainbow-like beams that they produced out of my mouth. My spine acted like a train, each vertebrae providing a different carriage for the members of the orchestra. Brass on one. Woodwind on the next. Hell, there was even room for the choir around my coccyx. By the time they had all escaped, the crows had certainly gathered to pay their respects to the musical talent that was on display. Phones in hands, as you may expect, but this time with their cameras pointed in the direction of the band. For the first time in what had felt like a lifetime, the people around me were all paying attention to the same thing. Every person, living in harmony at last.
If you were to ask the onlookers, whose faces were washed white as they bore witness to what was happening atop the steps rising out of Liverpool Street station, they would much more likely tell you something along the lines of a drug-fuelled maniac barging his way through a series of equally drug-fuelled city types, then puking his guts out before falling face first into his own vomit.
Regardless of which story you choose to believe, there is one thing that is for certain: I doubt I’m going to get a second date.
Caitlin Hazell is a lover of pickles and aliens, who also happens to be a talented metal worker and reluctant artist. Purchase some metal goodness.