‘Who’s been let loose on this?’ she asked, touching my hair with her long red fingernails. ‘Who’s the butcher? Your girlfriend?’

‘I haven’t got a girlfriend.’

‘Tell you what,’ she said, after a pause. ‘I’ll do you for free.’

The next Wednesday I sat in the salon, helpless under her fingers. She tilted my head, ruthlessly, this way and that; she smelt of a perfume I’d smelt on other girls. In the mirror our faces were strangely private; when she turned away she became other people’s but then she turned back and our eyes flashed, we were intimate.

She tapped her foot to the music; she looked restless and professional. She wore plum-dark lipstick today; snip-snip went her scissors as she hummed along to The Supremes. Her hair was reddish, and piled up. Only two meetings, and already we had seen each other at work; this made us familiar. She told me how trapped she felt, living with her sister. She wanted to get out, out, out, she mouthed to the beat. Out.

When she had finished we both sat back and looked. Then I grabbed her handbag, took out her lipstick and, on the mirror, scrawled a big, dark tick. It was true; she had given me a wonderful haircut.

She grabbed back the lipstick. I thought she was angry at me for blunting it—years later she would have been. But this time, this early, when we were new to each other, she leaned across to the mirror and scrawled three big XXXs. We smiled at our reflections through the graffiti, and I was lost.

Now my hair tickled my neck. For six years she had looked after it. Now I’d have to find a barber’s shop. How much does it cost, nowadays, for a haircut?

I had pulled off the road. This frightened me—I didn’t remember stopping, or turning off the engine. I was parked beside a dual carriageway; beside me, a car crept past in the fog.

I noticed with surprise that my ashtray was full. In the cubbyhole was a carrier bag; I had put the comics into it but where had I bought them? Which shop, in which town?

I didn’t know how far I’d driven; the fuel gauge was three-quarters full. In my headlights I could see a hedge beside the road; somebody appeared to have tipped a rubbish bin over it. My watch said 6.30; I didn’t trust myself to drive. I knew I wasn’t alone. I paused, holding my breath, but I couldn’t hear anything so I switched on the lights just to make sure the coach was empty. The seats had a theatrical, expectant look; at each of the windows a little curtain was drawn back and hooked to the side, as if we were all waiting for something to begin. An empty coach isn’t just empty; it changes, according to your mood.

Two more cars crawled by. I felt exposed, with my vehicle lit like a liner, and I switched the light off. The seats were swallowed up in the gloom. When my eyes got used to the dark I turned round again and looked at the rows of them, two each side. I thought of them occupied by my unborn children. I heard the rustle of whispers; was that a giggle? I couldn’t see their faces, I didn’t know their ages, but they were all a part of me and each one of them made a future. Despite Eleni’s complaints we must have made love hundreds of times; there might even be a woman to come, though it was hard to imagine at this moment. All the possibilities made my brain ache. Blokes don’t usually think like this, do they? It wasn’t what you discuss down at the pub. I was probably off my rocker.