James pulled the phone out of his pocket and tossed it onto the counter, where it landed with another clatter, its screen lighting for a moment as if in reproach. He didn’t want the effing thing in his pocket. If he hadn’t handed it to the conductor, if he hadn’t seen it. That was what had started all these futile thoughts. And now they were crawling over him like little lice under his skin. There was sweat up his back and he was too hot, even though a mean little draught kept whispering through the thin shield that separated him from the night outside.

How could a life go from that to this, he asked himself again: from the gallery of lights it had once been to this miserable little compartment, shaking and hobbling its way up the country like a sidecar on a cobbled road? How could you trace a straight line from a happy, functioning James to this finished one? Could even one domino have fallen differently and left him in that safe, perfect life he’d once had? If Dad hadn’t been diagnosed. If James hadn’t promised to go and ‘meet him’ regularly after he passed; if Michaela hadn’t made them so late they missed the wedding and he missed getting to the bridge; if they hadn’t had that huge row at the station. If she hadn’t gone off and met Phillip, if he hadn’t had to go back to Karl for a job; if Karl had trusted him enough not to fire him over something that wasn’t his fault.

He remembered walking through King’s Cross station, a few years ago – unaware that not so far into the future, when he had run out of options, this would be his workplace. There was some building work going on, and a temporary display of art had been erected to put an attractive face on the mess. One of the pieces was a huge canvas with nothing on it except some words stencilled, black on white, in the bottom right corner.

IF YOU DON’T LIKE YOUR LIFE

YOU CAN CHANGE IT!