1995

Day-dreaming in my car. What else is there to do? Moving up towards the lights, crawling two car lengths. Stopping. Looking about. Whistling. Not really listening to Radio Four but aware that it’s on. Squinting through the dirty windows into the oncoming sunlight. Wondering why I’m doing all this. Then not wondering. Then wondering again. Day-dreaming. The days ahead. The days to come. Days imagined. Days past. Old friends. New friends. People I saw every day. People I’ll never seen again. People I have yet to meet. Parties been to. Parties missed. Old girlfriends. Forgotten phone numbers. Half-remembered addresses. Sitting on the stairs. Drinking Applesnap. Listening to ‘Freebird’.

Who was that girl at Colin’s party that dim and distant evening? What was I? Nineteen? Twenty? Maybe. Can’t be far off. Did I ever keep in touch with her? Yes? No? Why not? Did I have someone else on the go as well? Surely not.

Empty bottles. Blue light. Dim hallways. An electrical snap to my right and the crackle of recognition from the unfamiliar face. We turn. We bend. We make do. We get along. We get by. Rain patters on the pane as we lie together. Not her. Someone else. But who?

Snap. A pretty girl is trying to cross the road to my right. I pause and wave her across. Dark haired. iPod in her ears. Spring in her step. Me in her sights. She fixes me with a smile and then bounces between the cars and off into the blue covered walkway in front of the building site. She seems happy with herself. I’ll be she is in love. If I can jump a place at the next lights I might catch sight of her again before she disappears into the crowds in the adjacent streets.

This is the hammer that drives the nail.