Ludo
For all it looked like it had already been passed through the gizzards of one of the larger waterfowl, the Gloria’s fry-up was jolly delicious. I studied the clientele inside through the window. Most were tanned, beefy chaps of the sort who wear high-vis uniforms to work. They displayed a level of comfort with the waitress and the furniture that led me to imagine they probably also ate here regularly during the week.
The waitress came out, and Sunny asked her for the bill. As she disappeared back inside, I noticed an old lady creep up to the table behind us.
“What’s up?” Sunny said, my face clearly betraying my horror.
“Don’t look now, but there’s an extraordinary woman behind you, going through the ashtrays.”
Sunny, who apparently does not take instruction well, immediately turned around.
“Orright, Rosie. How are you, love?” he said.
What in the Mary Poppins was going on?
The woman smiled, revealing a perfect set of stained teeth, which I took to be dentures.
“You orright, Sun?” she said, with a radiant smile.
Sunny jumped up and hugged her. She had wiry grey hair. Her cardigan looked hand-knitted and beautifully done, except it was unravelling slightly at the pocket. She flashed her eyes at me. I realised I’d been staring.
“Is this your fella?” she said. Whomever this woman was to Sunny, they were on very familiar terms. Sunny smiled.
“Rosie, this is Ludo Boche. He’s a journalist, like me. Ludo, this is Rosie. She’s a much-loved neighbour—and what we journalists like to call ‘a colourful local character.’”
Rosie bellowed with laughter and extended a hand. I shook it. Her fingers were as yellow as her teeth and covered in cigarette ash. I cursed my luck at having already used my emergency wet wipe. Honestly, the thing sits in your wallet untouched for months, and then suddenly you need to use it twice in half an hour. Just like a condom.
I was in the middle of saying that I was pleased to meet her when Rosie’s attention was taken by the cigarette butts on the ground. She bent down, picked them up, and popped them in a dirty sandwich bag with dozens of others. What was I witnessing? I looked at Sunny, hoping for an explanation. He frowned and shook his head subtly. He tucked a hand under Rosie’s arm and helped her up into his chair.
“You had breakfast, Rosie?” Sunny asked.
“Today?”
Sunny laughed. “Yes, today.”
She shook her head. “Not got much in just now, Sun.”
“Let’s get you a slap-up breakfast, shall we?”
As Rosie smacked her lips and cooed her appreciation, the waitress emerged with our bill. Sunny asked Rosie what she wanted, added a full English to our tab, and paid for the lot. It was an incredible amount of food for twenty-one pounds. With the bill paid, I thought we’d leave the woman to her meal, but Sunny pulled over a chair for himself from the next table, and we sat with her while she ate. They swapped neighbourhood gossip for a while. Somewhere called Churchill Road was having a street party for the King’s coronation. Rosie was going. Someone called Mrs Patel had been diagnosed with colon cancer. Sunny promised to call in on her. By the time Rosie had finished her meal, Sunny had agreed to pick up some groceries from the local food bank for her, fetch her prescription from the chemist, and repot her aspidistra—which I’m fairly certain wasn’t a euphemism, no matter how sus it sounded.
I looked at Sunny in wonder. Such generosity of spirit isn’t something you see every day. My father slams the door on the children who come carolling at Christmas, then watches the footage back on the home CCTV system to laugh at their shocked little faces.
“Have you lived here a long time, then?” I asked.
“Born and raised in Cricklewood,” she said, pointing up the street. “My father was a driver out of the Willesden Bus Garage.”
“You worked there, too, didn’t you, Rosie?” Sunny said, though he clearly already knew the answer.
“For a little while, yeah.”
“She’s being modest,” Sunny said. “Rosie spent forty years cleaning buses. Scrubbing off graffiti, mopping up vomit, scraping up used johnnies. You kept the buses running, didn’t you, love? It’s people like Rosie that make London work.”
Rosie blushed.
* * *
When Rosie had licked her plate clean, Sunny hugged her warmly, and we said farewell. We strolled along the street aimlessly.
