So. It's lunchtime and I'm hungry, which is the main reason I'm at the back of Holland and Barrett, rifling aimlessly through the packets of vegan protein slices. Do I want Pretend Ham or Pretend Chicken? The endpoint of late-stage capitalism: pseudo-choice over worthless commodities. I had noticed the Indian lady when I came in, because non-white faces are still relatively uncommon in Harlow Town Centre, albeit noticeably less so than when I first came here, ten years ago. Elegant, grey-haired, peering at the special offers. Also present: a bored, overweight shopgirl, behind the counter, and a stout, well-dressed grey-haired gentleman, in front of the counter, next to the Indian woman. He's speaking to the shopgirl in a low-pitched, rumbling cockney-esque near-monologue, and I half listen as I continue the search for lunch.
- I passed my truck licence in Cambridge, you know.
- Oh yes that must have been very useful.
- Yes, oh yes, you could get jobs anywhere then, not like now, not with all these immigrants around. We want rid of Brown, we do, and then we'll have less of these bloody immigrants.
- Is that right? [nervous giggle]
- That lady didn't like that, did she, see how she left? Hurr-Hurr-Hurr.
There is never enough gap between thought and reaction. I'm moving towards the front of the shop, or, at least, I'm no longer peering into the fridge at the back, but am at the front, somehow, next to this man. The Indian lady is indeed leaving. I say to him, Look, you know, that's a horrible way to speak, and he meets my eye but then doesn't, and laughs, then says Harlow's changed so much, so many blacks now, you want to see it where I live, it's full of them, and I say, You upset that woman, you should be ashamed of yourself, but I can hear the high-pitched waver in my voice and I can feel the shopgirl thinking Stupid middle-class poof and I think, irrelevantly, She wasn't black, she was Indian, and also Couldn't you see the years of sensitivity etched in her brow and her fragile grip on the ledge of a civilised life and for fuck's sake you stupid man, I am so angry with you for making me angry with you, because of course I can understand why change has made you anxious, I know you wish it was like it used to be, but it isn't, it won't ever be, and there's enough unavoidable shit around for us all to deal with without you manufacturing unnecessary shit for us all to wade through too.
Less than a second. I look at his face, I slide my gaze over his crestfallen face but of course now I feel shamed too, what am I doing upbraiding this old geezer, he may easily have done such things for this land in his life that he should be proud, and I'm wondering, like a Moral Query column in the paper, Is it maybe like a bank, an ethics bank, you get to make a withdrawal and be viciously unkind to a stranger if you've contributed first? but no, courtesy and dignity cost nothing to offer and I can't shake the image I glanced of the woman's face as I entered, delicate and forebearing, only now I see why the smile was brittle and frozen. I need to find her, I should have offered her friendship, rather than offer this man my anger, and I leave the shop, but Harlow Town Centre on a cold October day will not bring her back.
Don't look at passers-by our parents tell us when we're young, and we think they're telling us not to do so because it's rude to stare. Maybe it is, but it's less kind not to look, and not to notice, and not to feel what's happening behind her eyes, behind his eyes, behind your eyes. Could you see your face in someone else's smile? We've got to try, I think, even - especially - when the smile is brittle and frozen.
