When he had covered some distance in the dark, his final words came drifting back to me through the night. “Maybe he let go, mate, not you. Fathers sometimes have to let go of their kids to save them.”

I fastened my watch strap to my wrist. My fingers were shaking. I glanced at the dial. Shortly after three in the morning. My legs were wobbly, but I managed to make it to the pool of light under a streetlamp. There, I vomited and was suddenly so dizzy that I had to crouch there until a young couple from Sussex stumbled across me and called an ambulance.

THE DOCTOR who’s treating me at the hospital now, a few hours later, has recommended that I draw up a living will for the future.

“For the future? Just in case I get mugged again and the guy stabs me? Do you really think it’s worthwhile?”

“Of course. Just in case you don’t get off so lightly next time or are so badly injured that—”

“Or in case someone shoots me on the tube.”

She doesn’t pick up my sarcasm. “Possibly, yes. If you’re so badly injured you need to be connected to a life-support machine or fall into a deep coma and can no longer express whether you want to die or be kept alive. Everyone is entitled to be left in peace if he or she has no wish to continue. You shouldn’t leave that decision to overworked trainee doctors, especially if you’re an organ donor.”

And so that very night I put Eddie’s name on the living will to cover just such an eventuality. I can’t think of anyone I trust more than her to know what ought to happen to me.

She only needs to sign it. Only.

I’m flirting with the idea of sending her the living will to ask her . . . Ask her what? Will you be my medical carer and decide if I’m to live or die? How romantic. How morbidly romantic.

Instead, I leave London and run away. I never send Eddie the living will, even though I always carry it with me. Her “no” erected a barrier between us.

I only go to London once every few months and when I’m there, I drift from one person to the next.

But then I receive an email that changes everything.

Dear Dad,

We don’t know each other, and I think we should do something about that. If you agree, come to Fathers’ and Sons’ Day on 18 May at Colet Court. That’s part of St. Paul’s School for boys in Barnes. It’s on the banks of the Thames. I’ll be waiting for you outside.

Samuel Noam Valentiner

My son wants to see me.