Cultural Exchanges Pt. 01

CW: Racism

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I can only claim jet lag as an excuse for not acting sooner.

I had flown in on a flight from Dallas to London that morning. Well, morning London time; my body thought it was already well into the afternoon. I knew the way to deal with jetlag was to just stay up through it and let my internal clock get adjusted. But I hadn't slept well the night before the trip due to excitement, so I was doubly tired.

Once at my hotel, I learned that my room wouldn't be ready until two, so any chance of a quick nap was down the drain. Probably for the best. I left my bags with the concierge and, lacking anything else to do, figured I'd go see the sights. I had done a little research before the trip, so I headed down into the Underground with my first destination in mind: Tower Hill station, the closest to the Tower of London.

The state of mass transit in the States, outside of a few major cities, is pretty abysmal. Part of that is politics, part is money, part is the car-centric culture, and part is the realities of scale in a nation with so much empty space. But what I found under the streets of London was really impressive for a guy who had really only seen Dallas's DART and San Francisco's BART: a well oiled-machine of crisscrossing underground tunnels, massive stations, and well-kept schedules. I boarded the first train, then switched to another a few minutes later.

I was sitting on the tube, mind drifting due to tiredness and excitement. This was London, once the center of the western world, filled with sights to see, places to go, and things to do. I had a few days before I needed to get started with my work, and I was going to take full advantage of them. Lost in my reverie, I missed the sudden tension in the air when a new rider came aboard at one of the stops. Missed the voice until it became a shout.

"Fucking Paki, why the fuck you in my country, eh? Get the fuck out!"

I looked down the aisle and saw a teenager in the stereotypical skinhead uniform: shaved head, Harrington jacket, tight jeans and steeltoed boots with white laces. He was sitting next to an older brown skinned woman, leaning into her, hurling slurs and veiled threats. Enough that the cops might do something if they saw, but not enough to make most random strangers just trying to get from point A to point B intervene.

I started to sit up, unrolling myself from the usual hunched position I sit in; bad for my back, I know, but good for not being noticed when you're a young nerd trying to not be a target for bullies. Old habits die hard. I was about to open my mouth to say something when the skin saw me and smiled, then tilted his head at the woman, as if to say, 'You want to have a go at her?'

I have buzzed, very light blonde hair; not for fashion reasons, but because every man on my mom's side of the family is prematurely bald, and that particular hereditary curse is starting to come for me as well. I decided to just lose gracefully on that one. Combined with my typical casual wear of a black t-shirt, jeans, and Docs, I could see why someone as thoroughly stupid as this guy might think I was a compatriot. I would need to disabuse him of that notion.

I fully uncurled from the hunched position that had been concealing the muscle I'd spent so much time building in the college gym, time I had in abundance as I had no social calendar to speak of. Then, standing at my full upright height of just over six-two, I cracked my knuckles while glaring at the racist shitstain. In my father's East Texas drawl, I growled, "Boy, if you say another got-damned word, you're going home in a body bag."

Skinheads are cowards. I'd had to deal with them enough in my clubbing days. Unless they have the weight of numbers or an easy target to pick on, they're cruel and stupid, but mostly harmless. Cowards trying to convince themselves of their nonexistent superiority. Confronted with a real threat, or at least what they perceive as one, they'll slink away like jackals looking for easier meat. This one's jaw hung open for a moment, then he made his way to stand near the entrance to the car, well away from both me and the woman he had been harassing. When we reached the next stop, he disembarked rapidly, glaring back in my direction, finally brave when there were no consequences to be had.

I let myself relax. That could have been bad. I'm big, but I hadn't been in a fight since grade school. And I'd lost those.

"Ma'am, are you okay?" The older woman nodded, grateful, but still scared. Maybe even a little of me; I'd just threatened a guy with a pummeling, after all. She gave a small, shy smile, then returned to the pastime of every other person on the tube: minding her own business. I decided to do the same.

Tower Hill was the next stop. Once there, I got off and started to head for the stairs, when I suddenly heard a woman's voice. It had a "Received English" accent, the kind the presenters on the BBC have, tinged slightly with something else I couldn't place. "Hey, cowboy. Hold up."

I turned and saw a beautiful, petite Black woman. She was probably in her mid-20s like me, and dressed in a floral sundress, white lace choker, and Mary Janes. Her hair was done in a short set of dreads, and they hung just slightly off kilter as she tilted her head to the side. The broad smile on her pretty face was one of the best sights I'd see in London.

"Thanks for what you did back there. Not a lot of folks would've."

I shook my head. "I wish I'd done something sooner. I was jetlagged. Not paying attention."

Her tone was teasing then, just a touch. "Ah, a tourist in our fair city. Off to see the Tower?"

I chuckled. "Yeah. Yeah, just got here. Figured I'd take in the sights before I get to work next week."

She looked up at the ceiling for a moment, pensive, then came to a decision. That lovely smile was back as her eyes focused on me again. "Well, I'll tell you what. I'm at loose ends right now. Was supposed to have brunch with friends and hang out, but they flaked on me. I am aaabsolutely famished; why don't you join me for that brunch, and then I'll be your tour guide for today. Sound good?"

Yes. Yes, it definitely, totally, 100% sounded good.

She could see that I was going to say yes, because I'd be completely stupid not to. She stuck out her hand. "Emma."

I took her delicate, manicured hand in mine. "Jay."

We stood there for a long moment, looking into each other's eyes. Then she said, "I'm going to need that back, cowboy."

I hadn't even realized I'd still been holding her hand. I let it go suddenly and laughed. "Sorry. Sorry."

She just raised an eyebrow and said, "Come on. I want to get a mimosa."

We didn't talk much on the way there. Too much noise on the street, and I was frankly nervous. Emma moved almost like a dancer as she wove between the foot traffic, while I lumbered behind her like a bull, pushing my way through. She held my hand for a time as we made our way there, trying to make sure we weren't separated as we waded into the morning throng. I tried not to read too much into it, but deep down I wanted to find a whole novel within the gesture.

Once at the restaurant, we were seated outside in the warm summer sunshine. We ordered, then chatted as we waited, sipping on the mimosas she'd asked for.

"Aren't you hot? You're wearing jeans and boots, and it's almost 30 degrees out."

I just laughed. That was about 85 in Fahrenheit. "In Texas, this only barely qualifies as shorts weather."

She shook her head. "So, what brings you to London? Work, you said?"

"Yeah. I'm in IT. The company I work for is opening a new office here. I'm supposed to help with the initial setup, get things running, and monitor everything for the first month to make sure that it runs smoothly."

She looked a little surprised. "So you're here for, what, a couple months?"

"About that. This is the third one of these I've done this year, but the first one outside of the US." Venture capital money had flowed like water, as it often did at this point with startups.

She tilted her head. "Your first time abroad?"

"Eh, sort of. Been to Mexico for like ten minutes."

"Ah, then we'll have to make sure this is an adventure for you." She winked. "What did you want to do besides the Tower today?"

"Honestly? I hadn't really thought that far ahead. Figured I'd see what I wanted there, see how much time I had left over, and then try to squeeze something else in. I'm trying to stay up, get my internal clock on London time, you know?"

She nodded thoughtfully. "Well, the Tower won't take that long. There's really not that much to see in there." She grinned and shook her head. "I'll figure out something for us to do. Something fun."

I laughed. "Well, then. I leave myself in your capable hands, madam."

Emma's face showed a sudden mild confusion. "Hey, what happened to your accent?"

"Oh." I grinned with a little embarrassment. "It's not mine. I mean, it used to be. My dad's from East Texas. It's his accent. Hank Hill from King of the Hill." I slipped into the accent again. "'I sell propane and propane accessories.'" She giggled.

She made the 'keep going' gesture. "So..."

"So I grew up near Dallas. The accent's different there, a lot subtler than my dad's drawl. It's one for bankers and lawyers trying to talk to people in the more 'civilized' states. On top of that, you've got the American broadcaster accent that we all pick up and..." I gestured at myself. "My accent." I sighed. "Then as I grew up and started to understand all of the connotations of any kind of Southern accent in the US, I modified it again. Trying to get it as subtle as possible is just the cost of doing business in the tech industry." I shrugged.

"Ah." A look of recognition and maybe a little sadness on her face, as if we suddenly shared something we didn't know we had before. When she spoke again, her accent was markedly different and very recognizable. "Third generation British Jamaican. Raised on BBC TV and American movies. Working on my doctorate, genetics, so best to have the..." It shifted back for one word. "'Proper' accent."

I nodded, understanding. "It's a shame you have to hide something so beautiful."

An awkward silence then, the silence of two strangers that might like to be more but had moved too fast. That shared something too intimate too soon.

I cast about, trying to throw us a lifeline. "So, genetics? That's interesting. What's your dissertation on?"

That brilliant smile came back as she grabbed the out that was offered, her 'proper' accent back in place. "Right? So it's in..." I have no idea what she said. I was listening, really, but I was done with biology when I took AP Bio in senior year. The genetics terminology was all Greek to me. Literally. She saw my confusion and had mercy. "It means..." She shook her head and took another sip. "No. I'm not going to waste a beautiful day, yummy mimosas, and good company trying to explain something this esoteric."

We shifted into easy conversation then, chatter between two people trying to build the rapport necessary to share what we'd already unintentionally shared. A foundation laid after the building was partly constructed, but still with enough time to get it anchored to solid ground. When the food arrived, we lapsed into another silence, but this one was comfortable and friendly. Our foundation was stable enough, for now.

When we made our way to the Tower, we did so hand in hand. It wasn't quite romantic yet, but I knew I wasn't reading anything into it that wasn't there. It wanted to be romantic. We wanted it to be romantic. But right now, she was a new friend leading me through the city she'd grown up in, taking me to the tourist spots she only visited on field trips as a kid.

The Tower was fun. The armory, the crown jewels, the ravens, the whole shebang. As she'd expected, it didn't take very long to hit the highlights, so she suggested we head to the Victoria and Albert Museum next. It was one of those places we could spend a couple hours or a whole day in, depending on what struck our fancy.

We toured the various exhibits, treasures from other lands plundered by the crown back before everyone stopped doing that. Or at least before they started apologizing publicly, and then bribing officials to move them out of their home countries anyways. Never giving them back, though. That just wouldn't do.

We ended up in a "life in 19th century London" exhibit that included all sorts of things: clothing, tools, carriages, and all the other everyday parts of life in London from 200 years ago. We found a section that had children's toys and books, and one in particular had us in stitches. It was written in an older style of writing, one that used a font that made the lowercase "s" look far too much like an "f." We were rolling with laughter as we read about "whale fifherief" and "crab graffef" and "pretty dreffef." "Whale fifherief" became an ongoing joke for us, something one of us could say to make the other erupt into peals of laughter.

We were laughing together a lot by then, laughing like old friends. And then we looked in each other's eyes, and we realized it wasn't like old friends. It was like new lovers. She threw the lifeline this time, making a silly face and dragging me along to the next exhibition.

It was starting to get a little late by this point, so we hopped the tube to another station and went to a little hole in the wall she knew. "It's your first day here. You're legally required by the touristry board to have fish and chips," she joked. I paid for them, and we ate while walking, watching the people as they moved around us. We were walking closer to each other than we had this morning, closer even than at the museum. We had the plausible deniability that we were in a crowd; we didn't want to lose sight of each other, after all, or rudely take up too much space.

We talked about her life, her family, and what she wanted to do after school. She lived with two roommates, an engaged couple, in a two bedroom flat that the three of them could only barely afford. It wasn't exactly in the heart of London, because none of them were millionaires, but it was convenient to the tube. She planned to work at a biotech company when she finished her doctorate, even had a job lined up.

Her parents were on her to get married, to the point where they had set her up with the last guy she dated even semi-seriously, Duncan. He was a disaster with some very Old Testament views on a woman's place. Between Duncan, some other real gems of humanity she'd gone out with before him, and her studies, it had been almost a year since she'd seen anyone. She'd put that part of her life on hold.

Emma asked about my life. My job, friends, all of it. There wasn't much there, honestly. Not a lot of friends, no pets, nothing that really kept me from going wherever my job required whenever they needed me to.

I told her how my last girlfriend and I had broken up during COVID. She was a nurse that lived with a couple of other healthcare workers, so there was no way for us to be together during the initial stages, before the vaccine rollout. The stress and loneliness got to her, so she found comfort in the arms of one of her roommates. I understood the reasons now, even if I felt horribly betrayed at the time. People were dying around her every day in awful ways, and she was worried she'd be next. She was in a bad place, and she made a bad choice. Doesn't mean it didn't hurt. I was past it now, but I had thrown myself into my work at the time and never really got back out of it.

We walked through a park as we finished our food, then tossed the trash in a bin. She took my hand and squeezed it. Plausible deniability was out the window. "Ain't we a pair, raggedy man?"

Thunderdome. Nice. "Are you going to take all of my shit and dump me in the desert?"

She laughed. "Ah, I think you can handle yourself, cowboy." She stopped and turned to look at me, face tilted up towards mine. I'm not always the smartest man, or the bravest, but there was no way I could turn down such an incredible opportunity. I leaned down to the beautiful woman in front of me and kissed her, a soft, sweet, not-quite-chaste kiss. A first kiss between two people that both hoped there would be more soon.

It was enchanting. I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt something like that with a woman. I wanted more, but I resisted the urge, pulling back after a few seconds. I wanted to be a gentleman. She looked up at me, starry-eyed, and just breathed, "Wow." Then she stood on tiptoes and pulled me down into another, far less chaste one.

We were in the middle of a park at this point, in a city I didn't know. I had no idea exactly where I was. I didn't care, either, as long as it was with her. I was thousands of miles away from my apartment, my family, the few friends I had. And I wanted to be nowhere else than here.

She broke away after giving me one last tiny peck and smiled shyly. We started to walk again in a comfortable silence, thinking about what we wanted this all to mean. Then she asked something that surprised me. "So, this morning, when you were standing up to that arsehole, why did you have that accent?"

I laughed quietly. "My dad was really into westerns. Clint Eastwood was his favorite, but I liked John Wayne."

Emma smiled. "I used to love watching those with my Dad, too. Marathons on the weekend." She leaned her head onto my arm as we walked.

I kissed the top of her head and she made a little happy sigh. "I was a scrawny kid. Picked on a lot. And those guys, they were tough. They sounded like my dad. So when I got into trouble, I leaned into that. Tried to sound like them." I chuckled. "Still got my ass kicked, though."

She laughed loudly, and I continued. "But it still was... better, I guess. Made me feel braver. I started to do it when I'd help people out that needed it, too, if they were getting picked on, or even if they just needed help with something small. You know, the cowboy riding into town and righting the wrongs." I shrugged. "I guess I just wanted to be that guy. It doesn't come up that much anymore, but it's the only place I can't hide my accent. When I'm angry, or scared, or trying to help someone else that can't help themself."

She made a little "Hmm" noise. Not judgmental, not good or bad, just thinking. Then we walked in silence for a while, just enjoying each others' presence.

The streetlights started to come on. I didn't want to part from Emma, but I I didn't like the idea of her being out by herself after dark. Silly, I know; this was her city, not mine. But still. "I've had a really great time today. Thank you for taking me around."

She chuckled. "I assure you, cowboy, the pleasure has been all mine." We stopped again and kissed. "I-- I want to... would you mind walking me back to my place? Not to-- not for anything else, just to walk me back?"

I kissed her once more and said, "I'd love to."

Her place wasn't far. What I'd taken as aimless wandering was actually directed to get us to this point. It only took us about 10 minutes to reach the door of her flat. She looked shy. "I..." She looked down, then back up at me. "There's part of me that really wants to invite you in right now. But I don't... I don't do that, and-- "

I kissed her. "You don't have to apologize. We have two months. Plenty of time to get to know each other, if that's what you want. I'd love to spend more time with you. Hell, I'd love to see you tomorrow. I know the 'dating rules' say you're never supposed to admit that, but-- "

Emma just laughed and kissed me again. "You an outlaw now, cowboy?"

"No. Just smart enough to know that you're really someone special, and I don't want to waste more time with silly games than we have to. But I want you to feel comfortable, so if-- "