The Cosmopolitan

Joanna has been waiting, hunched at her table with half a mug of cooling tea clenched in both hands before her, waiting for the inevitable ring of the doorbell. She hears the scrape of the gate and a footstep up to her green front door, a pause, then the bell rings. Joanna remains unmoved, paralysed.

How foolish, she tells herself, imagining she can hear the breathing at her door, just to sit, yet I cannot open the door. She looks up to the small square, birch-framed mirror up on the kitchen wall in front of her that shows the length of the hallway behind her. She can see the dark silhouette through the frosted glass panel of the front door, but can they see her through the glass, in the mirror? Surely not, but she cannot move, she might make a sound. Already her breathing is shallow and she senses the air in her nostils as she breathes in and out and tastes the feintly rank milkiness of the tea on her tongue.

She knew it was coming and had even smiled at them, three days before on returning from work, walking up the road from the bus - not late, but not too early in the evening. They were her neighbours, of about half a year, childless, husband and wife - well, so she assumed. They were knocking on doors, each had taken one side of the street: he odds, she evens. Each had a loose grimey neon orange holdall used by paper boys which seemed to hold bundles of leaflets. The wife was just about to knock on a door when Joanna passed. They both smiled awkwardly, in the way neighbours who haven't spoken do, and Joanna pushed on, thinking little of it. Oh had they had visited that night!

It wasn't their ethnicity that bothered Joanna - far from it. Joanna prided herself on living in this vast 'cosmopolitan' city. That was her - 'cosmopolitan'. She had chosen a 'cosmopolitan' area to live in because it was 'more real' than her upbringing in a small Midlands market town. She was a 'real' Cosmo girl, she would tell friends and boast of how cool it was to have such a variety of neighbours. She had black and Asian friends too - like Shira from univeristy and what's his name from accounts. She loved White Teeth, voted Labour at the last election (for a black MP, she notes) and only reads The Guardian. So why then is she sitting, waiting for the step away from the door, for the scrape of the gate being closed?

It is not religion either. She is agnostic, but refuses to force her agnosticism down people's throats. Joanna tells relatives one of the things she loves about the capital is its 'tolerance'. Of course that means leaving people to think what they think, not interrupting or being pushy. You can do what you like within your own walls, she believes.

The next day the couple had advanced halfway up the street. The bags were lighter? Perhaps that was just her imagination. The couple had swapped sides and by the time Joanna passed them, both were standing at people's doors chatting to the inhabitants, showing them some literature. Missionary activity was not her thing. She had hurried on, telling herself that she would tell them that she didn't mind people practicing what they want to practice, but she would rather not talk about it. Your spirituality is a private thing, isn't it?

And she had half expected their call the night before but it never came and Joanna sunk into her armchair to watch Eastenders and forgot all about them.

So, to tonight.

Joanna had half-consciously accepted the offer of a coffee from a girlfriend after work hoping that her neighbours would have finished for the evening by the time she returned home. On getting off the bus she had forgotten them once again, but on turning into her road saw them in the far distance, their orange bags at their waists. She stopped, waited a few seconds and then almost without thinking began walking to the parallel street, up that street and round to where her house was on the corner. With guilt rising steadly, though for reasons Joanna couldn't put her finger on, she waited by the wall like an amateur spy, waiting for both to be at a door, engrossed and unaware of her fleeting dash to her door.

Time seemed to stop as one talked but another walked then another walked while another talked - each getting progressively closer to where Joanna trembled. When Joanna was starting to feel mildly sick, her opportunity presented itself and she ran quietly to her front door while quietly thanking the God whose presence she doubted for the slience of the trainers she wore to and from work. Fumbling with the keys seemed to take another age but eventually the door succumbed and, just remembering at the last moment not to slam it, Joanna went inside to wait.

And still she waits. Are they still there? Maybe both of them are there. She didn't leave the living room light on did she? Why are they waiting? Why does this matter? It's not that she's racist or that she doesn't tolerate other people's views. Why then does it matter? It's just that she's tired and doesn't want to see anyone. It would be the same with the old woman on the other side of the house. It is nothing to do with them.

Looking up to the mirror again, Joanna cannot make out whether the silhouette has gone. The evening is drawing in and she is struck by how dark the kitchen is all of a sudden. Maybe five minutes have passed. Surely they won't still be waiting? Perhaps they did see her. Maybe they heard her door.

The sound of a leaflet being pushed through the door, breaks into her questioning and then the sound of the gate closing. Joanna gets up from her chair slowly, trying not to drag the chair over the floor. On tiptoe she makes herway in the gloom to the door before bending down to pick up the leaflet. Her heart still beating hard, a more relieved Joanna takes the leaflet back to her kitchen, throws it in the bin without nlooking at it and makes herself another cup of tea.