One particular Tuesday he had got embroiled in an argument about Rawlplugs. It was his third month, and things had been going reasonably well, though he was spending less time at Amy’s place. His benefit had ended, replaced by his earnings from the store. A minor glitch had delayed the first payment but it didn’t matter. He wasn’t starving: he knew the bank transfer was imminent. Of course, the weather had got worse, and it was colder than ever cycling to work, but he told himself it was all part of a fitness regime and he was cutting down on the wine, or trying to. The girl he’d called silly was away, learning how to mix paint, and her friends were studiously ignoring him: all he wanted was to do his job.

Was that a fiction in itself? Michael looked at the houses, and then at a swathe of allotments so carefully tended they made him want his own. The train was slowing down, and the station seemed for a moment to slide towards them like stage scenery, and there were the actors in their places. A couple sat on a bench, as if they weren’t on a platform at all – they could have been relaxing on a pier, gazing out to sea. Someone was hurrying down the steps of a footbridge and a neatly dressed woman stood ready to board, tapping something into her phone.

Did anyone simply want to do their job? That was absurd: everyone seeks validation, and wants to be useful. He wanted to be liked, so how had he got into an argument about Rawlplugs? In fact, he hadn’t argued, but it hadn’t mattered – it had felt like a fight.

Perhaps everyone is on a high wire, he thought as he sipped his drink. Everyone is inching along step by step, trying not to look down.

‘Mate,’ said the man. ‘Where’s Instafix?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Michael. ‘I don’t recognise the name. What is it exactly?’

‘Oh, fuck,’ said the man quietly.

He looked at Michael as if he were an idiot.

‘Instafix,’ he said again. ‘Like plasiplugs, but better.’

‘Are they…?’

Michael faltered.

‘What are they for, exactly?’

‘Cavity walls,’ said the man, as if everyone should know. ‘Plasterboard?’

He had a wire basket in his hand, and his wife – or lover – or sister – or transgender brother – was carrying something from the garden centre. It was an orchid, and she, they or he held it in both hands so the wand of the stem swayed in front of their face, which looked as if it had been crying.

‘I think we’ve got our own brand,’ said Michael. ‘For cavity walls, I mean.’

‘You don’t do Instafix?’

‘I don’t recognise the name, but—’

‘I thought everyone did it.’

‘Let’s have a look. If we do, it’ll be with the fixings.’