Waiting

My fingers have turned white, I suddenly think.

And then I think of those new white chocolate fingers they’re advertising at the moment. Another chocolate coated biscuit with a twist. Fancy that? Another way the CEOs can prise the money from my very fist. Social mobility my bum. Equal opportunities my foot. With all this corporate pressure the only mobility I’m partaking in, social or otherwise, is running between my house and the corner shop to stock up on those stupid fucking delicious ready-in-two-minutes noodle sachets. Pathetic. Crippling. But I digress.

My fingers have turned white. Bone white. I run them along the peeling veneered edge of this chair and clench my fists again. Consciously this time. That must be it. My nails burrow into the folds of my palm and leave marks, which I look at. Then they disappear.
The walls aren’t white at all, they’re orange. But the kind of orange that makes you think of soluble vitamin C tablets. Watered down orange. The disappointing taste of too-weak Robinsons. “One coat of paint should do it.” I think about scratching my nails against the squeaky paint layer and cringe.

The man sitting two seats to the left of me is eating a sandwich. I feel a pang of pity for him, as he eats it. But I’m not sure why. Is it because he has mayonnaise in his beard? Is it because he’s got nobody to tell him he has mayonnaise in his beard? Or maybe it’s because he might not even care that he has mayonnaise in his beard. He stares silently into the distance and chews slowly, taking mechanical bites. His shirt is from the Hard Rock Café in Copenhagen. I try to imagine who he went to Copenhagen with, but I can’t.

The rug on the floor is orange too, but the floor isn’t. Nice touch.
The window blind has mercilessly severed the late evening sunlight. The fading remnants flicker across the orange rug, catching specks of dust in their wake.
I stand and walk towards the vending machine as the sun bounces in and out of my eyes. I watch my arm lift to insert a silver 50 pence piece. Sucker. My fingers stab at the keys. The machine thinks. I think. I stop thinking.

A man has come into the room. Not the man who was eating the sandwich. A new man. He looks different to the two of us in here. His eyes are not so staring. His lips are not so dry. His fingers are not white from fist-clenching. I’m pretty sure he had a hand in choosing the wall colours. “It has a kind of warm feel about it, don’t you think?”
He starts to speak. I turn my head.
But I can’t hear him. Not really.

Thud. The vending machine has released its prize. The man’s lips stop moving. “Sorry.”
He sweeps out of the door in a blur of white.

I should have gone for a twix.