January 9

Perhaps I was walking too gingerly, trying too hard not to fall. I slipped on the ice and slapped down hard on the pavement, landing on top of my right arm and wrist, the hand sticking out and wriggling like a squashed squid. I lay stunned for a moment.

For some reason, I thought of the poster I had seen in the library, showing an old woman on the floor, pressing a red alarm button. The caption on the poster read: ‘One day this could be you. Get an alarm.’

At the time, walking confidently pass, I had thought – one day that might be me. I hope one day I will be a father present at the birth of his first child; a lover proposing to the woman he loves; a novelist finding his own book in the book shop; a man happy with himself.

I hope I won’t be a pensioner sprawled out on the floor, knowing something went ‘snap’ and feeling hot piss pooling under me; pressing the button and hoping someone would come any minute, any second now.

And now I feel like an old man on the floor, struggling to get up, noticing not the sky or the cars to the side, but the fact that the people around were walking on. Ignoring me.

Except for one old woman in a long beige coat.

‘You alright?’

‘Yes, sure,’ I say still on the floor.

Time to get up. It took a few agonizing seconds. I wobbled on my feet like a pensioner and felt my wrist and right lower arm pulsing with pain. Were they sprained? Broken? I could flex the fingers so probably not broken.

‘I fell. On my face,’ said the old woman pointing to her mouth. ‘Cut it up here.’

I winced, more to show sympathy then in response to any scar; I couldn’t see a wound. But I could imagine falling on my face. Like a right old man.

‘You’re lucky you fell on your bum.’

‘Yeah, lucky,’ I said and emotionally limped onwards, flexing my wrist, walking slowly, scared now of the ice.

One day it would be me.