Replacement

Eleven o'clock at night, and we stand shivering along with maybe forty other people outside the front of Rochdale station, where large plastic barriers suggest extensive road closures, and are not encouraging for us, waiting as we are for the rail replacement bus service. Just a little way down the road to the right, a darkened minibus is parked. I remark on it to L immediately, but we decide it has nothing to do with this story. The line is flooded at Littleborough, and our train has terminated here. Those of us who know the area are aware that the main road is in that case very likely to be flooded too, and that a 50-seater coach would not be able to negotiate the twisting, steep and narrow alternative route over the tops. The promised bus has not materialised, and railway employees are nowhere to be seen.

Stranded and fed up, we begin to talk to one another. Someone says they have been told that the bus, when it arrives, will not be able to get beyond Littleborough, which for us is about halfway home. Others begin to joke anxiously about opening a local church for us to sleep in. A bearded man with grubby glasses wanders about remarking repeatedly that we are doomed, in the style of that character from Dad's Army, but without the Scots accent. His companion is coming up with an elaborate strategy for getting to Leeds, involving returning to Manchester and getting a train to Huddersfield. As it is already well after 11pm, this seems a little optimistic. A large group of young football fans from Bradford breaks periodically into song 'I wanna go home! Let me go home! This is the worst trip I've ever been on!', and occasionally '1 -nil, 1-nil 1 -nil!' suggesting their team met with success tonight, despite the torrential rain, which must have rendered the pitch one vast sea of mud. A softly spoken young man from Todmorden is discussing the possibility of a lift for one person, with a nervous Asian man and an American woman. His Dad is on the way, and, as there's a child seat in the back, there will only be room for one other passenger. I enter the conversation gently, and begin to explore with the nervous man the possibility of a taxi. He is keen to establish how much L and I would be willing to pay. L's face says she is not willing to pay at all. I am beginning to feel desperate, and think that it would be £8 well spent if it meant not having to share a church hall floor with twenty football fans for the night.

About this time, a shabby looking man, unshaven, with wild grey hair, approaches us in a manner I can only describe as sidling up. Out of the corner of his mouth he asks where we are going, and when L and I, the nervous man and the American woman, tell him our destinations, he mutters that we should go quietly and stand beside the darkened minibus, without drawing attention to ourselves. There we join a large man with a beard and pony tail and bags of bottles, who has been waiting in Manchester since nine o'clock. He is puzzled about the flooded railway line, remarking that it is usually the road and not the track that gets inundated, and says he is wondering if the reservoir has burst its banks. Slowly, others join our waiting party, asking for clarification of the situation, which we cannot give, but we all remain vaguely optimistic that the shabby man will drive us home eventually, and that this will not cost us anything, though he has not at any point made it clear he has anything to do with the train company. In the mean time nervous man is on his mobile phone, still trying to get a price for a cab, still trying to establish whether L and I and the American woman will share it with him. We have just agreed, when the unshaven and tousle-headed driver arrives, opens the minibus and lets us on board without putting any lights on. His mission has been to avoid being overrun with football fans, a goal we all heartily share.

We set off, driver cracking slightly off colour jokes, nervous man asking 'what did he say? Did you get that?', and popping small tablets whilst sitting sideways on his seat. At Littleborough station a poster asks How's Your Train Running? Some lads get off, joking about going to Sainsbury's to rob some food. The driver says the kebab shop will still be open, then tells an even more off colour joke about the Jamie Oliver sausages on sale in Sainsbury's. 'Did you get that?' asks nervous man, eager and anxious. I tell him I don't think I can repeat it. It turns out, despite large puddles, and areas where water is pouring across the road, and some slightly alarming downhill water-planing, as shabby man drives at a fair speed, we are able to get home using main roads, though not by the most obvious route, which is perhaps flooded as we anticipated. At one point we pass a 50-seater coach coming the other way, and the driver pauses, opens his window and calls to the driver that there is a bunch of passengers waiting for him at Rochdale station. 'You'll like them!' he shouts, and laughs as we move off.