On the Tube home I listen to Leonard Cohen. Listening to Leonard Cohen makes me feel as though as long as I can be wry and observant about the world then everything will be okay.

An email arrives, from Mia.

Yo! Are you not coming back after lunch? What about your leaving drinks tonight?? We have a hashtag #JENNYSDEFOOFING

MIA

I don’t reply. It takes a lot for a person like me not to reply, but I don’t. Instead I text Nicolette.

Fancy a drink later? Lots to tell you. X

Yes

I have news too

X.

Good Christ, could everyone stop with the news? I’m all news’d out.

Then I think:

Is she pregnant?

WHY DOES MY BRAIN INSTANTLY THINK THAT? FUCKING BRAIN. Why is this the automatic news-related question – the, Say it brain, say it, you’ve said everything else – the worst news-related question. The question that makes my heart feel full of soot.

What? X

Tell you later! X

I text Nicolette a time and a pub and then I put on ‘Don’t Get Me Wrong’ by The Pretenders and slide into a fantasy where I walk into a sunny café where the song is playing and my mother and Art and Kelly and Suzy are all there and I’m all, Oh hi, I just got back from this brilliant trip where I won the equivalent of an Oscar for journalism, and they all stand up and hug me and clap and we end up having a celebratory brunch together and it is ASTONISHING and inspiring how cool I am with everyone about everything.

A man comes through the carriage with a worried look on his face. I pull off my headphones and sit up.

‘Has anyone lost a black rucksack?’ he says.

We all sit up.

‘Black rucksack? Anyone?’

I look back down the carriage. Now, I want eye contact. I want reassurance. We all do. How far away is this rucksack? Has anyone looked inside it? Will we throw it off at the next station? Could we not just throw it off now?

Two more people come through the carriage, the same look on their faces. Plain-clothes traffic police? Plain-clothes Tube workers?

There is an announcement over the tannoy: ‘Can the cleaner report to receive a message. I repeat, can the cleaner report to receive a message.’

It’s obviously code.

‘It’s code!’ I say. People nod at me, thanking me for my insight. They are glad to be on a train with me, hurtling towards death.

Then nothing happens. The black rucksack isn’t followed up.

When I get to my stop, part of me wonders whether I died an hour or so ago; whether the train exploded. And everything since has been some kind of dead-brain dream. I have thought this periodically throughout my life – mostly when I’ve been on public transport.

I should probably stick to cabs.