The Access 2 Art fair at Alexandra Palace in London was the first one I’d ever been to. I didn’t know such things existed until Aidan told me. One of the artists he frames for was going to have a stall there, and sent Aidan two free tickets. Aidan tore open the envelope at work one day—it must have been October or November last year. It’s strange, that’s the one detail I don’t remember. Everything else about the art fair is fixed in my mind as clearly as if someone had filmed what happened from start to finish and implanted the footage in my brain.

I saw Aidan grinning down at something. ‘What?’ I asked.

He passed me the envelope. I opened it, pulled out two stiff rectangular cards and a folded leaflet.

‘Access 2 Art? What’s that?’

He waited for me to read the leaflet, knowing all the relevant information was there. He and I have never been good at answering questions.

‘It says here hundreds of artists will be exhibiting,’ I said.

‘Have you ever been in a maze?’

‘You mean like the one at Hampton Court?’

‘That’ll do,’ said Aidan. ‘Picture Hampton Court maze, except bigger. Instead of hedges, picture endless rows of stalls selling paintings, prints, sculptures, so many that you start to worry about finding your way out once you’ve gone in. You start to walk a little bit faster, unsure if you’ve walked down that aisle ten times already or never before. You look at so many pictures that you lose the ability to see them. You start to feel as if you’ve eaten a bucket-load of sweets, or the visual equivalent. It gets to the point where you don’t think you could stand to see another painting as long as you live . . .’

‘I’d never feel like that,’ I told him.

‘. . . but you’ve got no choice. Every corner you turn, there’s more of the same: hundreds of artists and galleries flogging their wares.’

‘Stop it!’ He was teasing me deliberately. ‘You’d better be telling the truth.’ There was a light, fluttery feeling in my stomach. What Aidan had described was my idea of heaven. I was already fantasising about finding something special. I hadn’t felt strongly about anything I’d seen for several months—not since Abberton, which I tried very hard not to think about—but I was used to seeing only nine or ten paintings at a time, twenty at most; no more than a small gallery’s walls could accommodate.

‘I’ve got to go to this,’ I said, clutching the tickets as if someone might take them away from me.

‘It starts on Thursday the thirteenth of December,’ said Aidan. ‘All you have to do is square it with your boss for you to have the day off. Oh, that’s me.’ He pretended to think about it. ‘You can have the day off.’