Naked On The London Underground

This short story is one of my submissions for Literotica's 750 Word Project 2024 - this is always a really difficult but fun challenge, so I'd recommend giving it a go! Enjoy.

*****

"I'm about to leave," Maria texted, nervously glancing over her shoulder to check that she was still alone at her computer. "Are you there?"

"I'll be in position in five minutes," her friend Lucy replied. "Are you still going through with it? Haven't chickened out yet?"

Maria nervously tapped her phone against her chin, wondering for the thousandth time if she was brave enough to commit to her plan. "Yes, I'm going to do it," she texted back, as her own words sent a shiver down her spine. "See you soon!"

Maria got up from her desk and headed to the office bathroom. She worked in Canary Wharf, the heart of the British Financial District, in a towering skyscraper on the 40th floor. Despite her incredibly well-paying role she had grown to hate the London rat race, and had recently quit her job to move to Australia, and start her life afresh.

In the bathroom she looked at her reflection in the mirror, then quickly began to disrobe. Now that she'd completed her final day at work she had no intention of wearing her dreary business suit again, so she casually let her clothes drop to the floor as she stepped out of them. She admired her naked reflection for a moment, then put her trench coat back on and buttoned it up.

She got the lift downstairs, said goodbye to the kind receptionist Paul, who was the only person in the building she'd miss, and then headed to Canary Wharf Tube Station. She'd spent more of her life than she cared to think about stuck on the London Underground, commuting back and forth between her flat and the office, and on one of those soul-destroying trips on the Jubilee Line she'd developed something of an exhibitionist fantasy. A fantasy that, with the help of her friend Lucy, she was about to live out.

As Maria descended the escalators and stepped onto the platform a tube train immediately pulled into the station, and she shivered in anticipation as the rush of warm air from the tunnel shot straight up her coat. The doors slid open and a stream of people filed out, then the other office workers around Maria piled onboard.

Maria pulled her phone and house keys out from her pockets, then nervously unbuttoned all but one of her coat buttons. As the doors began to beep Maria waited until the last possible second before pulling off her coat and entering the tube completely naked but for her high heels, leaving her only item of clothing lying outside on the platform.

The train pulled away from the station, and a young man around Maria's age cleared his throat.

"Sorry," he said, "why did you just do that? Why are you naked?"

"I'm leaving the country soon," Maria explained, "and I've always had this fantasy of riding the underground naked - you don't mind, do you?"

"No," the man smiled, shamelessly looking Maria's naked body up and down. "No I do not..."

*****

Twenty minutes later Maria disembarked at London Bridge and nervously looked around for Lucy. Her friend had agreed to meet her there with a set of clothes for her to wear, but to Maria's alarm Lucy wasn't anywhere to be seen.

Maria's phone had no signal, so she decided that her best option was to weave through the shocked crowd of coummuters and tourists before bounding up the escalator and running into the main railway station. She burst out into the bustling concourse, and passers-by frowned at the naked woman as she crouched down in the corner to call Lucy.

"Hey, where the hell are you?" she hissed. "I'm at London Bridge but you weren't on the platform!"

"Wait, London Bridge?" Lucy gasped, genuinely taken aback. "Hold on, I thought we were planning to meet at Victoria?"

Maria's heart dropped. Her friend, and more importantly her spare clothes, were at a different station halfway across London. As she realised the gravity of Lucy's mistake Maria noticed a couple of policeman jogging over towards her, so she stood up and ran out of the station and onto the busy main road.

"Ok look, I'm going to try and run to Waterloo before the police grab me," she shouted into her phone, already starting to pant as she glanced behind to see her pursuers now sprinting after her. "Get on a tube and try to meet me there, or you're going to have to bail me out of jail!"