The more we fixate on what we feel we can’t do, the less able we are to do it. A ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’ the book on self-confidence he had once read called it. The book didn’t help. He understood all of that but knowing and acting are not the same thing. So Tom settled for Denise. ‘Settled’ is his word. It’s not meant to sound demeaning or to put down Denise. Even though it is, even if it does. She settled for Tom, too. He has loved her, she has loved him. They have become a pair, a couple, a family unit of two people plus cat (her cat). Two people who, after five years together, can order dinner for each other without harbouring the slightest fear of it ever going wrong.

Tom knew it wasn’t his thing. He never mastered the ability to talk to the opposite sex. Tongue tied and too shy, the sort of thing his mother said about him when he was growing up and when she didn’t think he was listening. She was right. He knew he had many talents but being the life and soul of the party or the guy with that perfectly timed, well judged chat-up line, no. That was not Tom. He’d done alright despite this obvious weakness. Get to know him, he’d reason, and he was a nice guy, he could hold his own around people he knew. It was people he didn’t know that worried him. Why would she talk to me? She’s out of my league and what’s the point, really, if I’m honest?

Tom is good at what he does, he’s a systems architect for a bank. He spends his days trying to understand how people want to use their new applications and internet tools. Or rather, he is in charge of the people that do this. Because Tom is good at his job he has risen at a good pace. A couple of promotions, one, two, three, then jump across to another company. He’s been with this bank for three years and his new job for six months. Another year, he thinks, and it will be time to move on.

Juliette is not like Tom. She is fresh, confident. Her mother instilled in her an elegance and sense of self so typical of young French women of a certain social standing. Now living in London, Juliette heads up the client marketing team of a life insurance company. It’s a name you would know and the images and slogans her team sign-off are what you’ve seen on the television and staring backing at you across the gap on the Victoria Line. She is married to Philippe, a good match their families all agreed. He is an international tax lawyer and this is why they live in London. Juliette knows that she does not love him but he is yet to notice.

Juliette could not be more different to Tom. Yet when we put two objects, two people, together there are sparks at the points of (inter)connection. Much to our surprise we start to recognise that the real strength can lie in the difference. Two smooth surfaces rarely adhere strongly, they need a roughness, an edge and some friction in their movement. We start to sense that possibility exists in the smallest of spaces.

“Are you OK?”, Tom asks the woman he is next to on the DLR. “Yes, thank you… Well, no, actually, it won’t let me go to Bank”. Tom had noticed that she was engaged in a deep and increasingly intense battle of wills with her iPhone or, more precisely, the Transport for London website. He smiled, “I can check on mine”, he offers. And reaches for his own mobile. “It looks like a problem at Poplar, sorry”. She looks annoyed, she thanks him, she’s not sure where to go next. “You can go via Stratford, on the Central Line”, offers Tom, doing that automatic recalibration of routes and journeys and options familiar to any Londoner. “I can show you if you’re not sure.” He has noticed her accent, maybe it’s French and they both got on at City Airport. “Are you visiting?”. She smiles, “Thank you, I’m not used to going that way. And no, no, I live here, I’ve been in Edinburgh but now I have to go back to my office.” “At this time? That’s a bit rough”, Tom said and he meant it. He too was returning from a week in Edinburgh but to home, not back to work. It was already after seven on a Friday evening. She shrugged, “tell me about it but what can I do?”

They talked about their trips. She hadn’t seem him on the flight? Turns out there were two, arriving minutes apart. Different airlines. Tom had noticed her on the platform waiting for the train. She was beautiful. He would have described her in that moment as being ‘very European’. She wore a soft white dress that hung perfectly, an elegant blue cardigan wrapped around her shoulders. Her bag, like her, was elegant and understated. Her hair was long and dark, it curled just the right amount in all the right places to frame a face that reminded Tom of someone he had never met but had always wished he could.

They talked more about their week. About how they were both regularly in Edinburgh with their work. About how neither ever saw much beyond the office and wherever it was they stayed. She said she wanted to see the hills beyond, to climb to the top of Arthur’s Seat. He said he did too. They laughed. As the train pulled in to Stratford the two strangers were deep in conversation. To those around them they must have looked like old friends, two people who knew each other well enough to lose sight of everything and everyone in the world beyond. Tom pointed her towards the Central Line and, as he did, a wave of sadness and loss, a sudden feeling of deflation, washed across him.

Tom met her eyes, she met Tom’s, “thanks, it was nice to talk to someone.” Words that carried in them much more meaning than the short journey could ever permit. Tom smiled and, before he knew what he was saying, had replied, “We could do it again sometime, maybe take that walk up Arthur’s Seat? And I’m Tom, by the way.” Her smile hit him with the force of bolt fired from a longbow, piercing through his armour in one movement and sending him off balance. Impaled in the moment. “I’d like that, I’m Juliette.” She reached into her bag and handed him her card, “Message me, Tom, it would be nice. I have to go.” She leaned forward, kissed him on the cheek and evaporated, subsumed into a still-crowded station. Vanishing but her touch lingering in his mind.

Tom lies in bed, unable to sleep. His mind is filling with conflicting thoughts and ideas and emotions. Denise had been pleased to see him home, had made them a nice dinner and opened a bottle. Normally he would have appreciated the gesture but tonight he explained his distance as tiredness and a long week away. He was sure she knew it wasn’t that. And now it is late and an inner turmoil, a storm, has settled over him. A hurricane. Destructive chaos reigns everywhere but at the centre. At the centre there is a beautiful, terrifying and perfect calm. At the centre there is Juliette. Who lies in bed, unable to sleep.

Philippe has yet to return from wherever he has gone. She does not know or care. So long as he doesn’t wake her (even though she isn’t asleep). Juliette lies in the stillness of the night and thinks of the man she met on the train from the airport after the flight. She is wondering where he is, what he is doing. She is wondering if he has lost her mobile number or the courage to use it. She wills him to call her, she wants to hear his voice. At least to read his text. Be patient. She relives that moment over and over. How the train shuddered. How it threw her forward, catching her off balance. How he reacted, his strong body protecting her. A hand on her arm for a second, the gentlest touch averting danger. How did he know she needed saving? “Tom”, she whispers to herself, “call me”.

[2017]