It started as a fairly pleasant train journey. A woman with a half-shaved head and multiple tattoos got on pulling a French bulldog on a lead. We got to talking about dogs, and breeds, and whether Staffordshire Bull Terriers had an unearned bad reputation, and about her cats too, and was she a dog or a cat person? She said she was both, and I agreed it was hard to choose, and soon we were swapping pictures of our cats and discussing different Norfolk villages, and was Swaffham a nice place did she think or not? Both of us, I suspect, enjoyed connecting on the topic of animals with someone so unlike ourselves. In fact, we were chattering away so cordially that we didn’t notice that 15 minutes had gone by and our train – usually punctual – was seriously late leaving the station.
Presumably, he had sudden nightmare visions of a tribunal, a re-education course or disastrous PR for his rail network
It was soon clear why. A couple of uniformed railway workers were striding down the gangway, assuring us the train would be leaving soon and homing in on a pair of boys sitting further down the carriage who, as they were sitting in silence, had been barely noticeable up to now.
Unnoticeable to us at any rate, but clearly not to the railway staff. ‘I’m going to ask you to leave the train now,’ railway worker one, a middle-aged man in a cap who did all the talking, said to one of the boys. ‘You pushed through the barrier and then threatened station workers. And do you actually have a valid ticket?’ The boy refused to get off – ‘I’m not going anywhere, I have a ticket,’ – while the railway worker went on, with mounting insistence, that he had to. ‘There are cameras showing what you’ve done,’ he said. ‘You swore at our staff. And we’ve got a trainload of people here who don’t want their train delayed any more. I am asking you to leave.’ There then began one of those circular conversations so familiar to people trying to get home or to work these days who find their path blocked by the intransigent. ‘I don’t have the authority or I’d push you off myself,’ said the railway worker, or words to that effect. ‘Now I am asking you to leave now before we cancel this train.’
‘But I’ve got Tourette’s,’ we heard the young boy say. ‘Tourette’s and schizophrenia. Those are medical conditions. Don’t you care about that?’
The railway worker stopped in his tracks. There was almost a sound of gears shifting into reverse. Perhaps the boy did indeed have Tourette’s and schizophrenia, though he provided no evidence, and there was nothing in his sober and rather articulate manner to suggest in the smallest way he had either. But those words had their effect nonetheless. Presumably, the worker had sudden nightmare visions of a tribunal, a re-education course or disastrous PR for his rail network. ‘I most certainly do care,’ he said. ‘So let’s get that straight now. If you have those conditions, I care. I want to make that clear. Now I don’t want to intimidate you, so I’m going to sit down beside you.’
He did, literally shrunken now, and the circular conversation continued, the railway worker staggering on like a wounded wildebeest. I was on the point of standing up and saying to the boy: ‘Please mate, get off the train. Please. Just do it for us and the other passengers. We want to get home,’ assuming my tattooed, dog-loving and similarly inconvenienced fellow passenger would back me up.
Good thing I didn’t – it was clear as soon as the railway workers had sloped off to confer with their colleagues that, despite the delay, she was vehemently on the side of the two boys. She rolled her eyes and commiserated with them. Hadn’t the railway company got anything better to do than hound innocent passengers? Tourette’s – that was a serious condition, she’d had something like it herself once. Yeah, yeah, poor kids, these people were clearly on a power trip in their uniforms. It was now late enough that the next train was in sight and, making my excuses, I got off and made for the vending machine. Battle lines had clearly been drawn, I was pretty sure an awkward conversation was coming with my fellow traveller, and that a shared love of animals wasn’t going to cut much more mustard on the common ground front. It was a sunny Sunday afternoon. Better to retreat and catch the next.
But still, I couldn’t get it out of my mind. Had the boy really had Tourette’s and schizophrenia, as my fellow passenger assumed, or had he simply been savvy enough to come up with the words that would checkmate his opponent and reduce him to blancmange? If he hadn’t provided any proof, why was it taken on trust? Out of kindness? Or because it was too risky not to and, however much he cared about the smooth runnings of his network, the railway worker wanted to cover himself against the possible shitstorm of consequences to follow?
The train left. I have no idea who won the bout. But a few minutes later, I saw the other railway worker – the quiet one – discussing the event with his colleagues. We caught each other’s eye and, as I passed, I addressed a mere eight words to him, in the mildest of voices. ‘Do you think that boy really had Tourette’s?’ I asked.
‘I don’t think so, no. Couldn’t see any sign. Nothing in his behaviour suggested it.’
We nodded agreement at each other. But then a strange thing happened. The railway worker seemed to square up to me slightly and gave me an unmistakable look. ‘But if he does have that condition, I have every sympathy for it. I’m on the autistic spectrum myself.’ He stared at me, daring me to say another word.
For hours afterwards, I wandered around thinking: ‘Did that really happen?’ We’d had our train delayed at least 20 minutes by a boy who’d simply said three magic words – I’ve got Tourette’s – to dispel authority, and seen it collapse before him. And now, having asked the natural question to one of those humiliated functionaries, I was being put in the wrong myself.
Maybe I am heartless for having doubted the boy. Unreasonable for having expected my train to leave on time and mean for minding the inconvenience – an authoritarian fuddy-duddy, a compassion-free zone or, as I fear my animal-loving fellow passenger might have put it had we crossed verbal swords, a fascist dinosaur. But when the mere mention of mental health conditions has such a power to end debate, to make authority slam on the brakes, and when even those poleaxed and stymied by it want to join in the game, it seems more, much more, than train timetables is at stake.
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