Work Text:
It happens on an autumn day. A day at the end of November. Dark clouds are gathering over the London sky. It would be pouring down rain if the cold hadn't already frozen the water into snowflakes that fall silently until they melt. The faded pavement of the alley blends with the gray fog. People in thick coats scurry past in gray. The world appears gray in gray. Outside and inside. Kitty's ghost still haunts the musty walls and the rotten bed of the cheap flophouse where Nancy sought refuge after Kitty threw her out of her life. Her heart still lies in shambles on the ground, reflecting the November sky, and her tears fall like rain. Moths still live in her purse and the coins are getting fewer every day.
But something is different today. For the first time since she has been stranded here, the meager light falls at such an angle on the cracked windowpane that Nancy sees her own face in it as in a mirror: emaciated, pale and bloodless. And she shudders. She shudders at the approaching death that stares back at her. She doesn't know why she stares at herself like this, but there is a strange determination in her gaze.
Nancy shakily puts the threadbare blanket around her shoulders, kicks aside the newspaper with the wedding announcement on the floor, and walks over to the window. The hinges creak as the window opens for the first time, letting in the world beyond. The autumn wind blows icily towards her. But Nancy takes a deep, refreshing breath of air and something inside her, something stronger than Kitty, comes to life...
I'm gonna make a change for once in my life
It's gonna feel real good
Gonna make a difference, gonna make it right
As I turned up the collar on my favorite winter coat
This wind is blowin' my mind
It is the shouting of the kids in the street that pulls Nancy out of her thoughts. It is also the first thing she perceives from the outside world after the wind. The boy and the girl, probably brother and sister, look up at her as if they hoped to see their mother in the window. Nancy takes a step back from the window. Their faces are dirty from street dust, their clothes are tattered. Hunger is in their eyes. Nancy swallows. Something about the children's poverty touches her. In a former life, in her family's oyster restaurant, she often saw that look when guests entered the dining room. But no one ever left with it. Nancy wishes she could help them. But for now, the little ones are like another mirror to her.
Her stomach growls. Probably it growls every day, when she refuses all the food that the maid diligently brings up. But Nancy has never noticed it. Has she forgotten how to recognize her own needs? Hunger, she is hungry. Just hungry. How much has Kitty taken from her? How much has she let herself take.
I see the kids in the street with not enough to eat
Who am I to be blind, pretending not to see their needs?
Confused and introverted, Nancy looks around the room. Maybe she really sees her room for the first time. An empty bottle on the table, the bag with the costumes in the corner, the newspaper with the wedding announcement on the floor. The mistake of a summer, the expression of her devastated mind, the home of a lost soul.
A summer's disregard, a broken bottle top
And a one man's soul
They follow each other on the wind, ya know
'Cause they got nowhere to go
That's why I want you to know
She can't stay! Not forever! Nancy doesn't yet know where the road will lead her. She has no home, no joy, no goal. But her life must go on somewhere. She has to pick up the lost thread at some point. Kitty won't come to rescue her. Nor will her family one day stand on this threshold. The only one who can pull her out of the mess is herself.
For a moment, Nancy gazes at the traveling bag in the corner. Then she goes over to unpack the costumes she once wore on stage with Kitty. Surely London would offer more opportunities for a young man than for a young woman! Nancy proudly looks at herself in her mirror, adjusts her hat and rushes to the door. Out into the open air that she has not seen in months. Hurries towards a new life that lies in her hands. Who knows what it has to offer her?
I'm starting with the man in the mirror
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make a change
~*~
The morning is cold. Icy. Almost like that November day years ago when Nancy first decided to take her life into her own hands. Her feet and limbs ache. They ache from the blows that Diana inflicted on her in the fight before she threw her out on the street with the maid. They ache from the paths they covered drunk until they reached this shelter and settled down for the night on the hard floor, snuggled up close together.
That was hours ago. Now, at dawn, the space next to Nancy is empty. No one to lay their head on her shoulders. The maid has run away, taking all of her belongings with her. The overnight bag with the costumes and suits that Diana had tailored for her has been stolen. Not a coin in her pocket. And no roof over her head. The thin blanket around her shoulders does not really warm Nancy. The wooden floor beneath her is hard and cold. The snoring and yawning of all the other homeless people around her barely crosses her radar. The fact that some of them may share her fate offers her little comfort. Sighing sadly, Nancy rests her head in her hands and tries to hold back the tears.
I've been a victim of a selfish kinda love
It's time that I realize
There are some with no home
Not a nickel to loan
Could it be really me pretending that they're not alone?
Once again, Nancy has been fooled by people. Once again, her heart has been broken into pieces. Once again, all her dreams have been shattered. Once again, she is at rock bottom. She doesn't know where to go. She doesn't know how she will survive the next day. And yet Nancy gets up, shakily and with a growling stomach. She gets up and lets herself be driven to the door by the rough demands and physical violence of the guard, her blanket still around her shoulders. After all, what choice does she have?
But Nancy stops once more at the threshold and looks back. She looks back over the masses of sleeping people, who, like her, are gradually being torn from their slumber, and she meets the grim eyes of the matron. They could take anything from Nancy. Anything. Except one thing: her stubbornness.
A willow deeply scarred, somebody's broken heart
And a washed-out dream
They follow the pattern of the wind, ya see
'Cause they got no place to be
That's why I'm starting with me
The wind blows Nancy in the face as she steps out of the shelter onto the streets of London. She is freezing and shivering. Her limbs ache. But her heart is hardened by the courage of despair. Neither the carriage that almost runs over her nor the man who jostles her and snarls at her for it can stop her from moving on. There must be a light at the end of this tunnel, a new life to start somewhere in London, if she doesn't give up on herself and goes her way, however rocky it may be. Step by step.
I'm starting with the man in the mirror
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make a change
~*~
The washing water is cold and dirty. Nancy flinches a little. At first glance, it reminds her a bit of rainy November mornings and frosty mornings in dirty shelters. And yet Nancy bravely dips the rag into it and wrings it out, for the last time today. Done! The floor in the Banner house shines. Cyril claps his little hands together gleefully and squeals. Nancy beams back at him before washing her hands, fetching the chopping board and knife, and setting about preparing the ingredients for lunch. There is a rumble from the door and the angry shout of a man's voice.
“They have rejected the demand for a law to limit working hours again. Unbelievable! The rich are our downfall. They abuse the working class to their grave! We have to become even louder, hold even more rallies and start the revolution!”
Calmly, Nancy expects Ralph to storm into the room any second, followed by his sister, only to be told a second later that she should have waited to prepare dinner until Florence could give her a hand, because he doesn't tolerate a servant in a socialist house like this, and they're a family. As if Nancy hadn't grown up as her father's daughter and as a servant in her father's oyster restaurant. But of course she doesn't turn down a helping hand with her chores around the house.
Socialism. Nancy isn't even sure if her other family, her father's family, even knows this word. Or Kitty or Diana's servant girl. Diana certainly does. Socialists are the enemies of the rich like her, who abuse people like Nancy once was. Probably Nancy would never have been interested in the political vision of her old neighbor and her brother, who saved her from the gutter, if Nancy hadn't been treated so harshly by life. But the time on the streets; the time when she was alone and tried to survive in London; the hell she went through changed her, starting with the hungry children below her window and the unknown bedfellows in the shelter. Today she writes Ralph's speeches in the hope of a better world for all.
I'm starting with the man in the mirror
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make that change
I'm starting with the man in the mirror
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
“Nancy, you were supposed to wait!” Ralph's voice can be heard, still angry about the failed request. But Nancy pays no attention to him. She looks for Florence. Florence, whose eyes once again elude hers, turns to her adopted son with slightly red cheeks and a throat clearing, and lifts the baby out of his playpen into her arms. Nancy's heart sinks a bit and the silent prayer, of which Ralph is unaware and Florence acts as if it does not apply to her, rushes once again through her mind.
If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make the change
You gotta get it right while you got the time
'Cause when you close your heart
Then you close your mind
But Nancy tries not to let it trouble her. Whatever dark sorrow is keeping Florence from opening her heart to Nancy, Nancy can wait. Without her persistence and stamina, she might never have survived London's streets.
“I told you, it's not work. I enjoy doing it,” Nancy replies to Ralph's words, as she does every evening, and puts on the boiling water for the oysters. The fire flickers brightly and warms the room. For a moment, Nancy lets her eyes drift over the people around her. The two siblings, who welcomed her into their home as if she were a sister, and little Cyril, who she has grown to love as if he were her own child. Her friends, her family. And a feeling arises in Nancy's chest: pride. Pride in never having given up on herself, since that day when she looked in the mirror in her window.
I'm starting with the man in the mirror
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you want to make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make that change!