Flushed

As he unbuckled the harness he took a look around and released a familiar sigh, possibly out of sheer habit. His hand, smothered in a vulgar, bright red plastic glove, weakly extended a thumb in the direction of the orange blur above his head, and received a muffled bellow in return. Most likely the signal that, as usual, he was now in it alone. He flicked on his torch and took a look around at his environment, as if something may have changed since yesterday. It hadn’t.

Everything was the same. He had been coming down here now for nigh on thirty years. Well, this was going to be the last time. He tried hard to feel nostalgic, but somehow he couldn’t bring himself to miss this. Carefully, he placed his right foot forward and felt about for a safe place to rest it. He felt the water trickle against the rubber waders which, intrusively, extended up to his crotch. His left foot followed, only slightly less apprehensively. He switched off the torch, deciding to rely rather on the lamp adorning his helmet, and the tablets of ginger light emanating from his ceiling. He considered where to start, and then considered whether it really mattered at all where he started, or where he finished, or whether he ever even finished at all. Would anybody even care?

People have changed, he pondered, not for the first time. Once upon a time he had mattered; what he did had mattered, how he made people’s lives better. He was part of a team, a strong team, a team that was respected. They called them “flushers” back then. Nowadays, it was some fancy term that some German boardroom had coughed up between pats on the back and plastic cups of coffee. Sanitation officer? Hygiene agent? It didn’t make a difference anyway. He was a flusher, on flushers’ wages, only without the appreciation that, at one time, at least allowed him to look in the mirror and be able to smile at the reflection he saw. Wearily, he reached around to his backpack and took hold of one of the many rod-like instruments hanging from a large pocket and tried to work out why his sense of smell had let him down by remaining so strong, despite his advancing years. It had been one of the pre-requisites for the job, when he had started. “A healthy heart, a strong back, and a good sense of smell.” Today, it wasn’t such an issue. For starters, a good night of rain had cleared the sewer of much of it’s debris, and along with it, the stomach churning odours that the powers that be were so eager for him to be able to smell. And, anyway, he really didn’t care today. Today was going to be the last day he would smell that horrific smell. Today was going to be the last day he would smell any smell.

He had started his final day on this earth with a brisk stroll around Hyde Park, before realizing that he was, subconsciously, following the same route he would be taking fifteen feet lower just a few hours later. So he turned around and returned to the empty shell that had once been home, but nowadays was simply “the house”. Bought and paid for by Thames Water; well, by them, and by his blood, his sweat, his health and, he surmised, his happiness. His life - and hence his perception of life - had changed in the last ten years or so. The ground beneath his feet, and everything below, shifted from a livelihood to an albatross. He often thought of the people of the world who never get to see the other side of the coin, as he put it. They happily turn on the tap and let the efforts of many flow freely back to whence it came. Then he re-assessed his usage of the word “many”. It had been many. When he started, there was a veritable army of flushers, keeping London running smoothly, but there were never any new faces. He would never have been made to work on his own a decade ago, there would have been at least three people on each team. There were hundreds of them. The problem is, the youth of today don’t want to work underground, cleaning out the sewers. Don’t be silly, the very thought is ridiculous. So there were no building blocks put in place for the future. The army dissolved. Men died. Men retired. Men quit. In fact, for God’s sake, there were only about forty of them left now. Forty men, to do the job of four hundred. What would Joseph Bazalgette think? What would these young businessmen and entrepreneurs think when the trunk sewers overflow, when the waste pours freely into the river, onto the streets, wallowing in the muck of their own avarice, victims of their own greed and ambitions? Is this job not good enough for you? Sow your own seeds!

He breathed a short, deep breath and refocused on his surroundings. He was suddenly aware of the chill in the air. The water felt icy cold as it enveloped his plastered feet. He took the rod and unhooked a large cloak of some sort of fabric that had knitted its way into a crevice on one of the mildew encrusted pipes that littered the vast network of corridors below the hustle of existence that he had often yearned for, briefly, before folding his dreams back into his pocket to look at again some other day. The ensuing gush, accompanied by the gruesome aroma he had missed so much, seemed to disturb a rat that had been lurking nearby, examining a potential meal, he supposed. His mind drifted once again, as it was wont to do.

He remembered a time when he was younger, much younger in fact. Certainly young enough to consider a future which didn’t involve shoveling shit out of blocked up drainpipes. He had wanted to, assumed even, that he would join the Navy. His father had been in the forces, as had his uncle, and his grandfather. However, he met Jen, and then she got pregnant, and a life at sea seemed a lot more complicated than it did before. So whenever he would feel like being alone, he would take a long drive to any seaside town which took his fancy, and spend a day sat on the rocks, or perhaps on the pier if they had one, and just gaze across the waters all day. A couple of times a year, he would do that. Of course, the need to be alone isn’t quite such an urgent matter nowadays, and a day spent looking at water would be nothing more than a Busman’s holiday. It was something different then, though. It had possibilities. It was endless, reaching out into the sky, confident and striking. It wasn’t just an ocean, it was a road; a pathway to another world, a different life. Then, of course, he saw the other side of the proverbial coin. Nowadays, it was a slippery slope at the start of a downward spiral. It’s beauty tarnished by a world that just stopped giving a damn. A river of hopelessness, of depravity. His boss would often say that the mess that greeted the team as they lowered themselves into the bowels of London was nothing more than a lack of respect for the lifeblood of our planet.

The discoloured victim of mankind’s ignorance- the so-called “lifeblood”- had begun to rise, and was nearly up to his knees now. He realized that it had started raining again. Any self-respecting flusher knows that when the rain comes, it’s time to get above ground. These trunk sewers can fill to the roof pretty quickly if the storm gets heavy. He trudged his way to a higher platform, from which he could climb his way up out of the abyss. The rain would do most of his job for him now, anyway. And if it didn’t, and we have a repeat of last winter, well whose fault is that anyway? He looked at the sewer for what, he was still insisting, was the very final time. He could not stand another day down there. He could not stand another day of cleaning up the mess of a city with its priorities in the wrong places. But, if he didn’t, then who would? Now maybe he was being selfish. He was the one with the wrong priorities. He emerged into the dying light of his last day as a guest on a planet which had ground him down since the day he arrived. Tonight was his night. Tonight was on his terms. This is it. Finally.

The rain was heavy now, pouring down in thick sheets, like a window too tough to break, and too dark to look into. He caught a glimpse of his reflection in a puddle as his drenched middle-aged body, barely mustering a slight jog, retreated home.

This is it. It won’t be long now.

He thought we might get a bit of thunder tonight, nice heavy rainfall, clean out the old system. But that doesn’t matter anymore.

Tonight. Finally.

The torrent battered his waterproof clothing, as he almost thanked his luck. "Luck"? Hah!

Won’t be long.

He hastily unlocked his front door, shaking off his dripping attire, trying to catch enough breath to assist in the lighting of his cigarette as he walked into the kitchen. And as he turned the tap, and poured himself a glass of water, a slight smile broke out across his face. He couldn’t quite pinpoint the feeling. Was it pride, perhaps? After all these years? Too little, too late.

Tonight is the night.

Wait, maybe it was happiness. Are things really that bad? How many people can say that they make a difference, however small, to something that really matters. Hell, this whole city is able to do the same thing he is doing right at this very moment, and he is partly responsible for that luxury. Perhaps the other side of the coin does have it’s rewards? He decided that was far too big an issue to debate at this time on a Friday evening. He carefully lit up his Victorian coal fire, and spared his customary thought for those responsible for retrieving the coal. Maybe he would take a drive up to Weston-super-Mare tomorrow lunchtime, and think about it there.

He hasn’t done that in years.