Northern Line, December 16th 2017

A pair of friends in their late teens, a boy and girl, sit opposite each other and communicate only through smirks. She has a speaker in her hands through which she blares bursts of music.

The pair catch eyes falling on them with hard disapproval and smile to each other.

This continues for six stops or so. The boy and girl smiling, the tension rising with each burst of music. She ducks her head and giggles into her chest.

Fantasies of vigilante counter-attack throb through the carriage but instead of complaint, people clench jaws and give their paper a firm rustle. And then...

She stands up and begins using sign language . He doesn’t see her and so she taps his leg for attention. It’s their stop. He signs back and silently mouths words. Oh.

They step off the train with music blaring. A wave of curious bewilderment flicks across brief glances through the carriage.No one is sure how or why but somehow feel we’ve been had.