Ferry (a Shem story)

Some days, Shem liked to sit on the Woolwich ferry, watching the
city drift from side to side. This particular day was a late autumn one
- all clinging greyness, making it difficult to wake up. Shem rarely
felt entirely awake.

After a few journeys, he noticed a soul standing on the North bank,
lurking around by the ferry, but not boarding. He had vaguely noticed a
figure there since he got there earlier, but only now did it strike him
that this was a soul. The soul was a man's, middle aged, wearing jeans
and a battered and unfashionable brown leather jacket. It looked
faintly worried.

None of the people around could see the soul but, being an angel, Shem
did. The first time he noticed it, or rather its status, the ferry was
drawing away from the North side of the river, so he had no time to
talk to it. He just hoped it would be there when he came back. In the
meantime, he watched the smokestacks, the rubbish barges, heard the
cries of feral kids scraping across the river (despite it being a
school day) and sympathetically eyed the disinterested seagulls.

As the ferry docked once more on the North side, Shem called out to the
soul. 'Excuse me! Do you need any help?' The soul looked up,
surprised.
'Wouldn't say no, mate - I seem to be stuck here'.
'Stuck?'
'Yeah, need to get over to my place, but just can't get on the blooming
ferry, what's that all about, eh?'
'Ah!' nodded Shem, he went over and took the soul by its hand and led
it onto the boat.
'Cheers mate,' said the soul, 'I was beginning to worry.'
Shem looked the soul up and down - did it have a body to go to or not?
At any rate it was unusual to find one wandering about, around the
Woolwich ferry or otherwise. He'd never met one that had a body and was
concerned that, seeing as it was trying to get somewhere in the city,
it was at least under the impression that it had one. There had been at
least two occasions when he'd had to break the unfortunate news to
errant souls and it was no fun at all to have to do so, although at
least he could point them in the right direction.
The soul put its hand out to Shem.
'Dave Aintree.' he smiled.
'Uh&;#8230; Shem.'
'Not a, how shall we say it&;#8230; Regular, are you, Shem?'
It had been a long time since he'd heard that expression 'Not a
Regular' being Jicker slang for residents of the city such as himself.
Not since he'd last come across a Jicker, old London Majickers,
historically a mixture of alchemists, quacks, kabbalists and those
gifted with the skills of the 'Not Regular.'
'No,' he replied softly, 'Not a Regular.'
'There I was' proclaimed the soul of Dave Aintree, 'minding me own
business when, flash! Out the body and plunked right over the other
side of the bloody river, innit!'
'Well, that must have been inconvenient for you.'
'Mum warned me, she said, we Aintree's ain't made for tripping our
souls north of the river!'
'So I see - lucky I was around to take you across.'
'Aw, not luck, sure as sure there's a reason I zipped over while you
were here.'
Perhaps, Shem reflected, it was simply to let him know that the Jickers
were still there; that was how things worked - soul-wanderers like Dave
were most vulnerable to whimsical breezes of the city.

They exchanged pleasantries for a while until the ferry docked at
Woolwich. Before leaving, the soul removed a small object from the
inside pocket of its leather jacket and gave it to Shem as thanks for
his passage. As the soul of Dave Aintree set off to rejoin its
corporeal shell, Shem unwrapped the object, which emitted a faint azure
glow and a gentle murmuring sound. He smiled. He'd wanted one of those
for some time.