The train arrived a minute late, Rachel noted with some disdain. Americans couldn't do anything right. She lifted her bags, containing the spoils for a day on the town, and stepped up into the cabin.
It was half-empty, stuck between the morning rush to work and the evening crush home. She settled down on an empty seat near the door and across from a glamorous-looking Japanese woman.
"Good afternoon. Pleasant weather, isn't it?"
The Japanese woman looked up from gazing out the window. "I suppose so."
"I just love this time of year. I'm Rachel, by the way." She held out her hand.
"Yukari." The Japanese woman tentatively took Rachel's proffered hand, curtly shook it once, and then let go.
"Oh, that's a Japanese name, isn't it?" Rachel said brightly.
"Yes. It is." She had turned back to the window and was not looking at Rachel as she spoke. Curious, Rachel turned to glance at the what was out there that was so interesting and found they were passing through one of the line's underground passages.
"What part of Japan are you from, then?" She asked, trying to be polite.
"I'm from China."
"China? But you have a Japanese name."
"Yes, and I'm from China."
"But you have a Japanese name."
"And I'm from China. Why?"
"Why are you making such a big deal about this?" Rachel asked, her frustration with the strange woman's reticence rising. She thought Asians were supposed to be polite. "Aren't China and Japan basically the same?"
"No, they're not."
"They're close enough," Rachel insisted, waving her hand. "So, why is your name Japanese but you're from China?"
Instead of respond, the Japanese woman stood up and walked down the train to another open seat.
"What? What did I say?" Rachel asked the lone man sitting across the aisle. He shrugged. "That was rude. How rude of her." She shook her head at the nerve of some people, then turned to the man again. "So, where are you from?" She asked him.
"Sorry, this is my stop." He rose and got off the train.
"Where are you from, then?" the woman sitting behind Rachel asked.
"I'm British," she said proudly, turning to face her new conversation partner.
"Britain? I never would have guessed that; you don't have any accent at all."
"Well, i've never been there, honestly. But both mum and dad are British, and dad lives in London." She said London with two long o sounds, dragging out the word in her mouth: "L-on-d-on."
"I see. So you're not really British, then."
"I am too! I am most definitely British."
"British, but born and raised in America?" the woman was fighting a smirk.
"Yes!" Rachel pursed her lips and gave the woman her best evil eye. Was this pick-on-Rachel day or something?
"Whatever." The woman turned around and went back to her reading, leaving Rachel to fume in silence.
A stop or two later, a couple got on the train. Rachel perked up as she listened to their conversation; they were both speaking with thick British accents!
She waited for a lull, then lept in. "Hi, I'm Rachel. What part of England are you two from?"
The couple turned to look at her, and suddenly Rachel had a terrible feeling. "Britain? Well, I guess if you think Darwin, Australia is Britain, sure, whatever."
The woman sitting behind Rachel made a funny little noise, like she was trying not to explode laughing.
"I, uh, I..." Mortified and blushing deeper than a pomegranate, Rachel grabbed her bag and rushed off the train as the door was closing, leaving the Australians and the rude Japanese woman and the mean American woman to ride off down the rails.