One cannot get away from the street markets in the East End. Holly’s flat was on the second floor of an old Victorian factory, now converted to bijou residences, at far from bijou prices. It overlooked one of the traditional East End street markets. The stall holders, the costermongers of the past, had already been to London’s trade Market at Nine Elms and now their elderly diesel trucks groaning and spluttering with the weight of the cases of fruit and vegetables arrived to set up by 5:30am. They used to bring stock for a largely European diet. Now they brought all sorts of exotic fruits and vegetables for a multiplicity of ethnicities.

The local primary school on the next street had children who spoke dozens of different languages at home, and yet the children thrived there even when it was cold and wet.

The residents decorated the trees with brightly coloured dummy parcels at Christmas, and with appropriate symbols for a dozen other Faith groups throughout the year. When there wasn’t a festival of some sort local yarn bombers filled the void with colour.

People living there knew that the tight-knit community that formed in the nexus of streets surrounding the market were mutually dependent and they accommodated to its presence.

At least it was May and the sun was shining.

Holly yawned. She enjoyed the cat-like moment of stretching and uncoiling that seemed to be part of her morning routine before she pulled back the duvet to face the day.

One of her few luxuries was the pod coffee maker that held pride of place in her kitchenette. She bought the pods from the Indian store only a few doors down. It was crammed with products that were written in a variety of Asian languages. Unintelligible to most residents except for the price.

Holly loved the rich spicy smell of the shop redolent of the East. She could have bought her coffee pods from the branded Mini-market just a couple of hundred yards further away, but going into the Singh’s shop was an olfactory tour de force and the elevated prices were worth every extra penny.

The street traders were allowed to call from 6:30am. The calls were in the local vernacular. A blend of rhyming slang and local dialect. A melange of phrases that was a lingua franca of the local population, and exclusive to them.

By 7am Holly had had her first cup of coffee and had attended to her needs in the bathroom. The scars that arrived with the breast enhancement were healed and after a long winter’s skin pallor, they were more or less the same colour as her skin now.

“Must get a bit of sun she thought. I think a trip to the Lido is in order.”

Daywear on a working day was a freshly laundered shirt, over a matching bra. All the old A cup bras were gone, and she massaged her new C cups into their enclosure with a broad grin. She through that she would never tire of that sensation.

Next she sat in front of the small dressing table, and applied makeup sparingly. Just enough to enhance her feminine features and just enough to conceal the other features that came with her origins.

The saffron coloured shirt matched a tan skirt she enjoyed wearing. There was a lot of leg showing when she wore it, but she enjoyed the freedom of wearing skirts. The skirt also had two pockets that had just enough room for her phone and house keys.

Gold coloured costume jewellery added a narrow belt and a chain necklace that hung in her cleavage. She also had a matching bracelet that went on her left wrist. Cheap baubles, to be sure, but money was tight and precious metals would have to wait.
Satisfied with her appearance, she slipped on the sandals that were her standard footwear for the summer months. Just enough of a heel to show off her legs to best effect!

Time for some breakfast.

She looked round the small flat before leaving. One bedroom with just enough room for a double bed and a vanity unit. A sitting room with two overstuffed armchairs bought from a second hand dealer a few streets away. The stirring room came with a small kitchenette attached, then to one side a minute bathroom with a shower, wash basin and WC. All she needed at a horrendous price. At least it was a Freehold flat and not the pernicious Leasehold that plagued much of inner city living. She had a frisson of worry each time she thought of the day when she had agreed to buy it for £285,000, but she was over the anxiety it had brought her, now it was almost two years ago.

She almost skipped down the flight of steps to the outside door she shared with three other flats in the building and out into the sunshine.

She noticed Bill and Sheila his wife serving customers from their greengrocer’s stall opposite her front door. They were very good friends and kept an eye on her flat if she was away. Bill nodded in her direction and Sheila waved. “You look good in that outfit.”

Holly smiled and gave her hair a well practised flick and accepted the compliment.

The hardware stall was next. Ana always had a small Polish flag flying from her stall, displaying her origins. It was a cornucopia of bits and bobs for the home. Trays of small tools, adhesives and screws, bolts, nails and the like. Her van was a hi-top so she could push the wheeled display units back in at the end of the day’s trading. She was not a slight woman and needed to be tough. She would be a different markets from 5:30am to 3:30pm, six days a week. It was hard life, but Holly had never seen her unhappy.

Seeing Holly, Ana came round to the front of the stall and enveloped Holly in a huge hug, and nuzzled her hair.

“You smell good.” she said. Holly knew to take such a comment at face value. There was no subliminal message in what she said.

She held a key for Holly’s flat. If any of the women Market Traders were caught short, she would let them into Holly’s flat to use the bathroom.

Two stalls down, Doris held sway with her fish stall. The ice glistened in the trays and the fish lay in serried ranks with the shine of their scales getting dimmer as the day went on. Two pint mugs doled out Cockles and Mussels, Whelks and Jellied Eels into cardboard containers. The smell was potent, and no other food stalls were allowed either side of the fish stall.

Across the road a new stall selling accessories for mobile phones and an unlocking service had been erected. The stall holder, a young dapper Asian man nodded to Holly. They had never spoken, but were on nodding terms.

Holly wandered on. Bright colours of the sari stall attracted her, colours that clashed abysmally hung together. Holly could never get over the Hindu love of garish hues in juxtaposition.

Then there was the stall that sold cheap underwear for the larger woman. A huge bra in fluorescent pink, hanging at eye level elicited a smile, but she could now smell the coffee stand where she could get a croissant, with jam and cream, and a flat white and that was an obvious distraction.

“The usual, Holly?” was the comment as she sat down in one of the white plastic chairs close to the three plastic tables permitted close to the stand.

Jane knew Holly from the time she moved to the street in her previous guise, and had embraced her as a sister subsequently.

“So how goes it?”

“Fine. I am enjoying the summery weather. I do enjoy having my legs free when it is warm enough.”

“I enjoy a skirt when I am away from work. Trousers or shorts are practical but there is nothing like a skirt or dress to feel a bit girly. Exciting and vulnerable at the same time. Just one thin layer of cloth between your most intimate areas and the World outside.”

“You not at work today?”

“I have appointments from 2pm until 10pm tonight.”

“How does this upmarket Estate Agency you work for do its business?”

“Our introductions team finds potential clients and interviews them, often they have to travel to other parts of the World, or meet up in a port somewhere for a meeting on a large yacht.”

“Once the client has agreed to visit properties and has explained their needs, a portfolio of suitable properties is drawn up and submitted to the potential purchaser by email or post, whatever.”

“Next, I come in. I pick them up from their hotel or other accommodation in a chauffeur driven car, and take them to the property. I am given clients where my Mandarin and Arabic are particularly useful.”

“If I am showing a property that they eventually choose, then I hand over to a closing team that does all the work with contracts, payment and alterations the new owner expects. That is often done with a team of lawyers brought in by the client. We often need the agreement of a freeholder, or the owners of neighbouring properties before the exchange of contracts.”

“Clients who are buying in the £10-20 million bracket can be very fussy and we have to pander to their whims a lot. Such people expect a level of service that ordinary people would find extraordinary and often oppressive.”

“The whole thing sounds amazing to me, but I have never met a multimillionaire, even less a billionaire. I don’t know how such people tick with their need for personal guards and exotic levels of comfort.”

“You would be surprised. Millionaires are often very ordinary people. They mix with other millionaires and their money is just assumed. It isn’t even a topic of conversation. When I sell a property I never mention the price or negotiating a price. They have received the portfolio and know the prices. If it is too expensive then they will not be shown the property. When we enter into discussions with a client, we do a bank check to confirm that they actually have say, £M15 in available funds.”

“What is the most expensive property you have sold?”

“That was huge penthouse in Mayfair. We sold it for £85,000,000. It was a night for champagne after the sale was signed, sealed and delivered!”

“My Agency got 1.25% of the sale as commission and I got 20% of that after costs, and those were considerable.”

“That sale paid the deposit on my flat.”

“How many properties do you sell in a year, then?”

“Probably only one every couple of months, but I do get a small regular salary because the Agency does sell many smaller properties as well. I started off selling properties in the £500,000 price bracket, and I could sell one of those a week in the Spring and Autumn peak sale periods.”

“You must be very good at selling. Has it made a difference now you have become Holly?”

“It is easier to deal with the Chinese and Europeans, but more difficult to deal with Moslem clients who seem to want to talk to a male agent all the time. In the office we had a meeting and decided that it was in our interest to send a male agent if there was a clear reluctance amongst some Arab men to deal with a woman. We don’t approve, but after all, we want to sell properties so have to be flexible. Pandering to rich, or very rich Arabs is part of the job.”

“I must get on.” Jane said as she got up from chatting with Holly.

Holly stood to give Jane another hug, before sitting and finishing her croissant, and coffee.

Just as she was about to stand a very pampered Chihuahua leapt towards her with a joyous yap landed in her lap. She proceeded to give Holly’s face a lick.

The dog was wearing a pink collar studied with plastic sparkles.

“Holly, dear, lovely to see you.” … the owner of the dog effused whilst blowing air kisses.

I have been dying to see you in case you have a nice property for me.

“Also good to see you Clarissa. You know I never talk business on my time off, but once you become serious about a new home, then give the office a ring. We will be happy to give you all the time you need.”

“I know that, but I really want you to handle my sale and any new purchase.”

“You can always ask for me to help you. I am sure the office would allocate me to you if that is your wish.”

Clarissa was overdressed as usual. The phrase ‘mutton dressed as lamb’ came to mind. Her makeup was applied to cover blemishes that were beyond concealment. She was thin as a rake, and the dog, Bambi probably ate better than she did. Many hair grips maintained a semblance of order in her off-white hair that was much too long and unkempt for a woman of her age, or indeed for a woman of any age.

Holly knew it would never happen. Clarissa was as poor as a church mouse. She owned a flat in a decaying mansion which she had inherited it from her late husband. When she and a few other residents had moved on, the property would be demolished and modern apartments built on the site. Her best hope was for a potential developer to offer her an inducement to vacate.

As Holly continued to walk through the market she passed one of the original pie and liquor shops. The smell was enticing. Minced beef pie with two sorts of pastry, Short crust top and suet underneath but served upside down with a smooth potato mash as a halo, and liquor made of the water that had been used to cook eels, then lots of parsley was added before the sauce was thickened.

Pie and liquor was a food that kept generations of young Eastenders healthy. It fed hardworking men like stevedores and longshoremen who toiled for long hours in the Port of London. It really wasn’t to Holly’s taste, too laden with Carbs, but it was part of her heritage and she treasured the shop for that reason.

As she walked on she thought of the desperate poverty of the East End in centuries gone by. Children on the verge of starvation mudlarking to get by. The London she knew with its gentrification of the East End was a far cry from the abject poverty of families forced to live in squalid tenements with landlords who extorted the last farthing of inflated rents.

Near the end of the street the market tapered off, then the neighbourhood pub, the Black Horse with its small beer garden where the smokers were still allowed to gather. The landlords had put up an awning to protect them from the rain, but even in the dry, they could be seen huddling together sharing their habit guiltily. Like many pubs close to Markets, they were allowed to open much earlier than other ones. Two hundred years ago the Black Horse had been a Palace of sorts. It still retained its dark smoky interior with gilded mirrors that reflected back the images of the drinkers with a distinctive antique golden light. The bar had had so much wax on it over the years that it glowed dully in the dim lighting that came from sconces only recently provided with electric fittings. The old town gas mantles that gave London light fifty years ago were still in the cellar after twenty years.

Holly had been to that pub with friends on occasion, but it never really appealed. The Licensees fulfilled their function as licensed victualers. They gave a social life of sorts to a scattering of lonely men, and provided a wholesome diet for those who couldn’t or wouldn’t cook for themselves. Men would nurse a pint for more than an hour, but would be driven out by a flock of young things who arrived bedecked as Hen Party revellers in minimal clothing and sashes saying ‘Bride to Be’ or ‘Bridesmaid to be’ in gold lettering on virginal white.

June, the landlady was a capacious woman had an inexhaustible ability to offer help wherever it was needed to families who were torn apart for one reason or another and to physically throw out drunk or otherwise objectionable clients. Not only capacious, but capricious. Anyone caught snorting a line on the washbasins in the loos was ejected without ceremony.

June’s husband, Bob was a scrawny little man with thinning hair and a scruffy beard. He had teeth that seemed to have grown randomly in his mouth and had a laugh that seems to start somewhere near his legs and grew inevitably as it rose through his body to burst out in a roar that brought tears to his eyes. He could play a mean game of darts when there was an inter pub darts match, but devoted most of his time to breeding greyhounds which he raced at the Walthamstow Stadium.

As Holly was about to turn round and retrace her steps her mobile rang. Her clients who were due to be seen at 2pm wanted to bring the meeting forward to 12 noon. Could she do it?

Yes, was the answer if the company would pay for a taxi across town rather than he using the DLR and Tube.

(Note - DLR is the Docklands Light Railway, and the Tube is the London Underground.)

She was already pacing back the way she had come, and soon ran up the stairs to get changed into her business suit, then grabbed the first vacant black cab from her part of the capital to Mayfair where she was to meet her clients. Luckily the apartment block had a concierge system so she did not need to get a key from her Agency office.

Her home was in an area replete with history and charm. It’s character was enhanced by the rich vista of riparian folk who lived there, so the contrast with Mayfair couldn’t have been greater. The apartment she was to show was all stainless steel and acres of glass with three floors of communal parking under an eight story building.

The carpet seemed extra thick as she walked in. The reception team were dressed immaculately in uniforms with the company logo emblazoned over each left breast. They were as uniform as the clothes they wore. Immensely polite but entirely characterless, always with a gentle smile that acknowledged their subservience. In effect, simulacra of her friends in Wapping.

They knew Holly and acknowledged her with a nod, before pressing the button hidden below the desk This activated the oversized electric doors that allowed residents and guests to enter the vestibule with its huge display of cut flowers. She and her clients were entering the World of the protected and the hugely rich. She met her clients here when they arrived less than five minutes after her.

One of three lifts carried Holly and her clients to the sixth floor. There were only two apartments on each floor, and a key card opened the very secure main entrance door.

The Chinese couple and their two teenage children were very apologetic for bringing Holly into work so soon, but the meeting went well. The children liked the communal gym, and infinity pool on the top floor and the fact that the apartment had six bedrooms so friends could visit.

The girl seemed to spend a little too long looking at Holly. She said in Cantonese to her mother that Holly looked attractive in her suit and would like to see her in a bikini, or less! Holly smiled to herself as she knew exactly what had been said, but did not choose to embarrass the girl in front of her parents and brother.

After some negotiation for planned alterations, the family bought the apartment for an eye-watering sum.

Some days later when the ink was dry on the contract, Holly was able to celebrate with the team.

Patrick, the owner of the Agency was fulsome in his praise of the team, but singled Holly out for her skill in closing the deal.

“I would never have believed that the quiet boy with a double First Class Honours in Chinese and Arabic could become the dynamic young woman you see here today.”

“I have an envelope here from our clients. It is written in Cantonese, but I am informed that it contains a thankyou note and a cheque for £500 for Holly … in appreciation of her diplomacy in not embarrassing their daughter.”

Holly blushed as she accepted the envelope proffered by Patrick. It was nice to be appreciated, but the world of glass and steel was not for her. She slipped away before the drinking became too obvious, and was relieved to get back to the East End with its colourful characters who made it home.