He opened his eyes, and the young boy was still there, turned away, wearing yet another set of headphones. He was loved and might even be in love. He might have met his own James, Percy or Michael, and if he hadn’t he would do soon: and then he would be enmeshed. Michael walked on, and found the platform had tilted. He had to work hard, because it was suddenly so steep that he needed all his puff just to get to the bridge.

He felt like crying, of course – so he laughed.

16

He climbed up the footbridge, holding the rail.

Up the stairs, along and down again – and did he want tea in the central café-bar, with its many sets of doors? No, so that meant climbing another set of stairs whether he wanted to go back the way he’d come or onto a platform on the far distant side of this ridiculously wide station, where trains were behaving just like trains, grinding and roaring. The footbridge was heavy old Victorian iron, and had been built long before anyone worried about those who’d lost their legs in the war: it would outlast everyone who dared climb it. The roof was high, and if there were lifts he couldn’t see them, so up he went again, and he thought of the famous picture: the infinite stairs, leading you round and up for ever. This bridge wasn’t like that, for it did its job simply enough: he could see a taxi rank one way, beyond the ticket office. Platform two was suddenly to the right, and he glimpsed people on it, stirring in expectation as a little purple train came in, just like a noisy toy.

‘Never, ever clever enough,’ he said to himself, smiling – and even as he realised he was muttering aloud, the train company told him it was sorry. It was still so sorry, because the purple train was just like all the others: it was running twenty-two whole minutes late. Those in charge knew they might be causing the most terrible inconvenience, and he thought for a moment that he ought to find the station manager and assure her or him that it simply wasn’t so: there was no inconvenience at all, because he no longer had any destination in his mind, and all he wanted was another tangerine. Why hadn’t he eaten one already? He still had two or three left.

‘Don’t apologise,’ he would say to the manager. ‘Lay your burden down.’

‘We are sorry,’ said the announcer.

‘Don’t be,’ replied Michael. ‘I have nowhere to go.’

‘You do, sir – surely. You have a ticket to Scotland in your wallet.’

‘But I have no schedule, and I want you to know that I understand. Trains will be late sometimes – I have the imagination to understand that.’

The manager’s eyes would fill with tears.

‘We do our best,’ he’d say.