1627794565 by J. S. Law

Author:J. S. Law [Law, J. S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Headline
Published: 2015-07-29T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 18

Sunday Lunchtime – 28th September 2014

The scent of lunch seemed to have permeated through the ventilation system and as Dan finished up another interview, she imagined that her senses must have been operating at an enhanced level through sheer physical need; her hunger was beginning to make her feel queasy.

Above her, along two-deck, she could hear the chatter of sailors as they queued, waiting for a seat in their tiny mess-decks to become free as they cycled through the constant, monotonous routine of sleep-wake-eat-work-eat-sleep. She climbed out of the bomb-shop and made her way down two-deck towards the wardroom.

The queuing sailors, a mixture of junior and senior rates, were all waiting for access to their own separate messes.

As Dan passed them, some that she had spoken to already nodded a greeting to her while others didn’t. Some of them smiled and many others didn’t, but they all looked. Conversation seemed to stop ahead of her and start again in muted whispers and unheard comments as she passed, as though she were the epicentre of a verbal Mexican wave.

The two-deck passageway was narrow, and it was impossible to pass down it without touching and brushing against everyone she met.

By the time Dan reached the pantry she was no longer sure if it was only hunger that was making her feel queasy. The silence as she passed, the blank stares, the closeness that prevented her from having any personal space, the way the submarine forced her near to people, their arm or elbow touching here, their back pressed against her there, all of these things drove a numbness through her body.

She almost bumped head-first into Steward Roach as he hustled around preparing for lunch and carrying the officers’ food from the galley, across two-deck and into the pantry, where he would carry out final preparations before it was served.

Stepping into the pantry to get out of his way, and away from all the queuing sailors, she immediately heard chatter from inside the wardroom. Some officers were already there, waiting for their lunch.

McCrae’s voice was recognisable as the loudest as he talked over all others around him. He was talking about the foreign ports that the Old Man wanted them to go to. How good they would be, how the Old Man was hoping for a quick stop in another UK port before they went back to Devonport after the patrol, how cheap the whoring was in some of the cities under consideration.

Dan’s head physically slumped forward; she had hoped to be in and out first, to be gone before anyone else arrived to eat, even if it meant just taking whatever was there.

‘You OK, Steward Roach?’ she asked quickly, hoping he would reply and not blank her today.

The young man pursed his lips but didn’t look at her. His eyes looked sunken and dark.

‘Sure, I’m fine, I am, ma’am,’ he replied and made to skirt around her in the tiny pantry. ‘You can’t really be in here, ma’am. I need to get all the lunches done.

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