Somehow Andrew ended up at the station. At times of need his body had a remarkable aptitude for self-preservation. In the back of his mind this must have provided some reassurance. However there had been few times when his body had taken such emotional and physical punishment. How Andrew got onto a train was irrelevant. He wasn’t certain where he was headed. He wasn’t even certain where the train was going. It was all irrelevant. His auto-piloted body would take him somewhere.

If today was a day like any other, Andrew would be lying in bed throwing up bile into a bin. He deserved to have a crippling hangover. He hadn’t slept properly for two days. He hadn’t eaten for 36 hours. He had drunk..... Oh God, it was all so irrelevant. These trivialities were just pleasant, everyday-life-snippets to intersperse and blot out his life. Acquired Immuno Deficiency Syndrome. AIDS. That was it. Pink neon letters blurred against the fuzzy backdrop of his mind. Interweaving, wavelike through his thoughts, battling against that other picture for ‘mental air-time’. That picture of Heather and Paul. Fucking. How could life be so cruel. His skin felt intolerably grubby.

‘Whoy Yeh, man. You look SHIT’. What? What was that? At some point a pony-tailed Geordie had seated himself opposite.

‘Thanks’, replied Andrew inadequately, adding almost as an afterthought, ‘Where’s this train going?’

‘Man, you REALLY are in a bad way. Frankfurt.’

Euro-Fucking-Star. Five years ago he wouldn’t have been able to accidentally get on a train to another country. Why couldn’t Britain be left on its own. Why couldn’t we have stuck with poxy British Rail trains which would guarantee you could never accidentally go more than twenty miles before the train broke down or there was a signal failure.

‘But it stops in London first’, said the Geordie in a manner which Andrew could only interpret as patronising. Andrew attempted a sarcastic smile back which must have come out wrong because the Geordie took it as an invitation to butt into the remains of Andrew’s life.

‘A woman. I BET it was a woman’, said the Geordie, emphasising the words in a way which made the sentence sound argumentative. Of course this was just a feature of North-East accents.

Andrew didn’t know why his mouth was even bothering to answer. ‘My girlfriend’s dumped me and starting seeing one of my friends’, Andrew’s voice was rising, ‘I have just discovered I’m HIV positive. I have a hangover.’ Andrew’s voice was now becoming a growl, ‘I haven’t slept or eaten for two days. And I’m on a train to Germany without a ticket.’ By this point several other passengers were looking from behind newspapers; a small child was pointing - his mother was looking distressed. Andrew was now shouting. ‘So please, don’t think you can solve my problems, don’t give me useless cliched advice, don’t offer to buy me a drink. Kindly just FUCK OFF and LEAVE ME ALONE’. Andrew then stood up, and walked along the aisle trying to catch eye contact with the people who had been staring at him. They all looked to their newspapers, books, children, or feet. When he reached the end of the carriage he went into the toilet. Locked the door, and sat on the toilet. He hated everything. He was getting very close to his ‘Goodbye Cruel World’ scenario. He dragged his fingernails along his arm, drawing blood. He kicked his feet into the walls. He punched himself on the nose. He then cried, feeling more wretched and despairing than he could ever recall. ‘What did I do?’ he thought. ‘Why me?’.

Blood pounded in Andrew’s ears. kervroom. Kervroom. KrVroom. KROOM! KRRM! It got louder and louder, forcing Andrew’s mind back to consciousness. The washroom door stopped vibrating, and slid open, to reveal an immaculately dressed policeman who stared irately at Andrew.

‘Can I see your passport please’, asked the figure curtly, adding as an afterthought, "Sir."

Well not as bad as a policeman, thought Andrew, his brain defuzzing with annoying sloth.

Andrew made a few waking up noises, which eventually formed themselves into an affirmative answer. He then rummaged through his bum-bag, having a mild panic, before he discovered his passport and handed it over. The passport was then scrutinised by the disappointed Custom’s Officer who gruffly acknowledged that it was in order and passed it back.

‘Could I ask you to please return to your seat, sir. I think you will find it more comfortable there’. Obligingly, Andrew complied, happily discovering that Mr. Insensitive from Geordie-land had been replaced by a much more agreeable female traveller. They were now in the tunnel - Andrew had slept through Hertfordshire, London and Kent, and several ticket checks, he surmised. The shiny hands of Andrew’s watch were indicating that the afternoon was well underway, but thankfully, he was feeling more refreshed after his impromptu snooze and felt almost able to deal with his ticketless international journey. Brussels was just over two hours away. How far could he get without a ticket? Brussels? Cologne? All the way to Frankfurt? Andrew’s mind started scheming.

The ticket check happened just after Brussels. By this time Andrew was well prepared. He had just said goodbye to the female traveller who had disembarked at Brussels. Having explained his great interest in international train tickets, backing this up by impressing her with the many stamps in his passport from exciting destinations, Andrew had managed to persuade the girl to donate the ticket from her now completed journey to his collection.

The ticket inspector had a rather bemused look visible fully from his creased forehead down to his expanded cheeks. ‘Puis-je vous aider, Monsieur. May I help you, sir’

‘Oh! Yes! Thank-you. I’ve got my ticket stuck in the upholstery. It’s jammed between the table and the window’, replied Andrew. He was crouched down on the table tugging at the top half of a ticket which was just visible .

With a look of mock-concern, the inspector said, ‘If I may help sir’. Moving out of the way, Andrew then allowed the inspector to attempt to liberate the ticket. The inspector tugged, in a scene that was rapidly becoming a farce, on the ticket, immediately tearing it in half, with the jammed half left behind, and the inspector left on his behind in the aisle, much to the amusement of fellow passengers. Andrew had hoped for a ‘Zut Alors!’ at this point, but it was not forthcoming. Instead, with only a mild look of exasperation, the inspector picked himself up and examined the truncated ticket he was now holding. Finding it in order, complete with the correct date and seat number, the inspector enquired where Andrew was headed, the only remaining travel details being ‘London (Londr’.

‘All the way to Frankfurt’, replied Andrew, then with slight concern, ‘as is shown on my ticket - is it not?’

‘Unfortunately, sir, it seems that your ticket has lost some information. I shall reprint it, for the remainder of the journey’. The ticket inspector then produced a mini-computer held in a leather carrying case, typed in a few details and then handed a freshly printed ticket to Andrew. ‘Might I ask that you take greater care of this ticket, Sir. It will considerably ease your journey.’, the inspector had lost interest in this discourse, and had already moved onto the next customer.

Frankfurt is Europe’s premier financial city. Frankfurt annually hosts the worlds largest book fair. Frankfurt is Europe’s most advanced and modern city. Frankfurt has Europe’s busiest airport and Europe’s largest train station. Frankfurt is a city where everything is recyclable and everyone is healthy, wealthy and happy. It is also the most expensive place in the world to buy a beer. These were Andrew’s thoughts as he sat at a small bar, a brass island within the darkened vaulted chambers of the city’s hauptbahnhof. He had a couple of hours to kill before the overnight departure to Prague. Two hours to buy some food, buy a bottle of Jagermeyer, drink more beer and consider how many smug lies were told about ‘Bankfurt’.

Barclaycard had come to his rescue. Andrew now had a confident air to him, buoyed up by the satisfying wad of deutschmarks in his wallet and the thought of the first-class sleeper he had booked on the nighttrain. He knew his mind had left Britain far behind because he had managed to lose the slightly sick feeling which had plagued him until now - it had only returned briefly when he calculated the exchange rate. But that was Lamont’s fault, not his. Yes, he was definitely on the mend, regaining the ability to blame bad situations on other people was always an essential quality in recharging the happy register.

Cities have character. Guide books tell you this; a shuffle through a London tube station, an Orchard Street Shopping Mall in Singapore, or through the Chadni Chowk market in Old Delhi tells you this. What guide books never romanticise about are the suburbs. Andrew was watching a suburban street clacketting past the tram window. Suburbs seemed to always be scum-filled by neglect; streets never lived in, merely a home to passengers. A place for bridges to be vandalised by displaced youths in an inappropriate environment selfishly inflicted upon them by working middle class pedallers, their eyes constantly focused on a distant city centre. A city centre reached by countless buses, trains, metros chuntering through the suburban boroughs, the corridors to be undertrodden in a rush to reach the terminus. Suburbs had character, but a character that did not vary from London to Bangkok to Berlin to Prague.

The rapid separation of the tram doors, accompanied by a loud beeping awoke Andrew from his cynicism. Some prams and shopping bags disembarked at the stop, next to a junction and some shops. Overlooking the crossroads, a dilapidated four storey house was home to an overly large painted advert, showing two bottles of Coca-Cola lying next too each other, mimicking two curvaceous lovers. Beneath the picture in three foot letters, the legend commanded ‘Drink Coca-Cola’. Andrew, suddenly feeling the need for a sweet fizzy drink jumped up quickly, exiting through the closing doors of the tram. He was headed for a small shop which he imagined would be filled to the ceiling with a variety of foods in brightly coloured boxes. With disappointment, Andrew glanced through the window, noticing the lack of faded children’s toys and yellowed pieces of card advertising second hand coffee tables. The shop was not fulfilling the stereotypical image which he would have found so comforting. Instead, it was a cold and functional place with everything easily accessible. No boxes of tissues placed unreachable close to the ceiling, no awkwardly placed stacks of canned vegetables to catch the unwary. The only slight compensation was the expanse of wall covered in a vast selection of pornographic magazines, all with the low quality look which guaranteed a hard core centre. After a certain amount of browsing (well, he was alone in a city hundreds of miles from any moral ties), Andrew selected a magazine entitled Erosz. The cover picture showed a rather plump lady allowing candle wax to drip off one her nipples onto her lover’s penis. It would make a fine addition to his already fine collection of international pornography, thought Andrew. At the till Andrew also picked up a bottle of Coke, and rather animatedly purchased a packet of Pall Mall cigarettes which the young girl eventually selected correctly after three hand-waving attempts.

Outside, Andrew sat on a bench and waited for the next tram to arrive. Inwardly smiling, he thought of the giggling which would have been ensuing now if Heather had been with him. She probably would have insisted on him maintaining a look of mock-nonchalance, coughing nervously and walking self-consciously out of the shop, with the magazine hurriedly stuffed beneath his jacket. She was very much an exhibitionist, revelling in causing scenes, acting out everyday dramas for the benefit of ‘tut-tutting’ old ladies or sanitised businessmen.

Andrew was uncertain as to how he had returned to Prague again - maybe it had a certain magnetism for him. He had travelled here many times – it was a familiar home where he could be totally anonymous. Andrew’s head held many memorable landscapes with him painted in, his arm around a girl, or in an embrace with a tall Slovak boy. None of his mental pictures however contained Heather. This made Prague a refreshing break where he felt confident that the sweet smell of waffles or the frees-frong of a tram grating around a corner would not bring emotional pictures of Heather bouncing into his head.

From memory it was a couple of streets further, at a junction at the top of a hill. The small guest-house was unremarkable, but had been cheap and clean with a friendly twenty-something girl on reception. Andrew had once stayed there with Anna, a girl he had met in Berlin. They had fantasised about the girl’s secret life. She was the daughter of the owner, a man who Andrew suspected to have played a bit-part in several 50’s gangster movies. The daughter was called Petra and was dating Janska, a sharply dressed man who worked for the Czech equivalent of MI5. They would meet for lunch in a secret rented apartment near the Karlov bridge. Rarely would they eat much for lunch, for the apartment was where they played out their wild sexual fantasies, away from the stern eyes of her father. Now Petra, was sad though for Janska had been reassigned to Bratislava and they could no longer have their secret lunchtime meetings. Petra polished glasses with a faraway look in her eyes. She did this allday, everyday awaiting the return of her lover.

Andrew’s memory had not failed him, the guesthouse was exactly where he had remembered. Sitting at a desk in a small reception room was the same girl Andrew had remembered. She smiled and asked, in good English, if she could help. Andrew explained that he wanted a small single room, which she showed him. After negotiating a price she left Andrew to unpack.

A hot shower - which Andrew reluctantly left after 20 minutes, a nude smoke with an ashtray balanced on his stomach and a cursory flick through the Prague News thoughtfully left on the bedside table, left Andrew feeling refreshed and ready for some cultural sight-seeing. He dressed quickly and left, catching a metro to Starometska. There, he walked into the first bar he found and ordered the first of many half-litres of Staropramen beer. A familiar routine of looking up and shaking his glass left Andrew feeling very drunk after several hours contemplating the decor, the people, the beermats and the busty barmaid. Walking upright, trying to look sober in a way that made it obvious to any onlookers that he was completely wasted, Andrew traversed the root back to the guesthouse via metro and tram. Getting close to his destination Andrew decided to leave the tram and get some fresh air, he really had no desire to throw up over a disapproving Czech passenger. The customary kiosk located next to the tram-stop obligingly was able to furnish Andrew with a refreshing orange lolly which Andrew sucked the juice from as he walked towards his guesthouse, just beyond a massive road and rail intersection up ahead. Dragging himself up some steps Andrew, heard the roar of the road buzzing in his ears. But it buzzed too quietly - it couldn’t block out anything, it was just background noise. Walking across the bridge, Andrew ran the lolly stick along the concrete parapet of the bridge, seeking comfort from the scraping noise. When Andrew reached the centre of the bridge he stopped and looked down at his bloodied hands. Bloodied hands that had worn against the abrasive side of the bridge. Hands that made a much more satisfactory sound than the lolly stick. The numbing pain of skin scraping from his knuckles causing a mental ringing in his ears. A pain that was real, a pain he understood, a pain that had an obvious cause. None of the speeding cars and lorries passing beneath the bridge knew Andrew’s state of mind. Yet for Andrew they were escapism. They flowed in a constant stream which seemed able to wash away anything. If only he could let them wash away the burden of his life. Andrew’s throat felt swollen, he was having trouble swallowing. He felt thoroughly sick. His shoulders creaked from sleeping on trains. His hands were a mess of blood and skin, torn flesh. Why should he continue? He was a mess. He hated his life. He hated life.

How long Andrew wallowed there, he did not know - his watch was the only part of him that had found liberation on that bridge. Walking towards him was a bright looking young girl with several brown packages. As she neared he recognised Petra who was looking at him with unfathomable kindness.

‘Are you OK, Mr. Carter?’ Petra’s eyes were deep with a mixture of sympathy and concern that Andrew felt quite undeniable. He dived in, throwing himself into an embrace which almost threw Petra off balance. ‘I think we should go home, sir. I have much kava’, comforted Petra, pointing down to a catering sized tin of Nescafe in her bag.

When they arrived back at the guesthouse, Andrew allowed Petra to dress his wounds. Over several hours, her attentions numbed the pain more successfully than any conventional medicine could have achieved. For the first time in many weeks Andrew slept soundly.

At breakfast Andrew poured some orange juice into a murky, fingerprinted glass. Obviously, Janska had never existed - or maybe he had returned, thought Andrew, as he smiled inwardly. The orange juice was sweet beyond belief. But now the orange juice was in a paper carton, the contents vibrating in time with the motion of the train. Petra and Prague were far behind; Andrew was being hastily shaken back to reality.