It was the hottest day in Paris for a generation. The flesh was out in abundance.

‘Where did all of the tattoos come from, all of a sudden?’ He contemplated as he negotiated the early morning rush hour. Nine am and it was already twenty-six degrees.

‘You can’t have one, it’s Haram,’ she’d said when he’d suggested it, before she disappeared back into Islam.

‘It’s a tattoo, not a bacon sandwich or a blood product,’ he’d responded, chuckling. She’d given him a cold, steely stare.

As he dodged an Uber delivery cycle piloted by an Eritrean boy, he glanced down at the inside of his wrist. The four swirling letters, in Arabic, a reminder of her departure, and his defiance.

“Look out, you idiot!” The voice called as its owner collided with his shoulder. The young woman’s phone sprung from her hand and skidded across the pavement.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t paying attention,” he grovelled.

“Forget it, moron.” The reply slapped him hard. He continued his journey, cursing the tiny ink on his skin. It was as much her fault as his, walking along, head buried in her phone, earbuds in. ‘That’s two of her five senses absent, yet I’m the moron?’

The morning was getting worse. He was sick of people. The giant station was still a ten minute walk, hundreds of people, more humiliation. Yet, here he was in Paris, one of the most densely populated places on the planet – why? Because of that fucking book. Its creation hung around him like a bad smell.

He deftly avoided the next three people buried in Tiktok or Instagram and stepped over the protruding legs of a man sleeping in a shop doorway. It was now twenty-eight degrees. Any attempt at anti-perspirant was futile. He reached around his waist and pulled the water bottle from his backpack.

Dodging into one of the few unoccupied doorways, he took a swig of the already tepid liquid. His view of the onslaught of humanity was now side-on and he studied his fellow travellers. Not a flicker of emotion amongst them. He took another gulp and prepared to re-enter the flow.

Her tanned shoulders glowed in the sunlight, covered in an intricate floral pattern. She glanced sideways and he smiled. She looked right through him. ‘Invisible,’ he pondered, ‘always invisible.’

He followed her rangy walk with his eyes. She was the object of casual perfection. Yellow vest top, several sizes too big, loose fitting jeans, defying gravity, swinging on her razor-sharp hips, and red Converse that had seen better days in the last century. The tattoo weaved its way from shoulder to shoulder like a black vine strangling a tree branch.

Tucking into the station-bound hordes, he followed her bouncing blond mane, clipped under her white Bose over-ears. A gaggle of children in tiny gillets-jaune, led by a stressed teacher distracted him. When he looked up, she’d gone, absorbed by the human tide. The grief was instant, deep, like a knife plunged into his already shattered heart.

He stepped onto Place Napoleon III and the giant portico of Gare du Nord towered above him. The plaza in front was strewn with colonial cast-offs in varying stages of hopelessness. The optimistic ones, selling counterfeit cigarettes or perfumes to unsuspecting American tourists. Those, less fortunate, lay under tattered sleeping bags, a stray hand or foot protruding like that of a corpse.

The labouring air-conditioning hit him as he entered the concourse, a literal breath of fresh air, recirculated a million times. The battered Steinway Model K upright stood in its usual place, the stool nestling under the keyboard; an ebony testament to his visibility. He strolled over to it, dumped his backpack and pulled out the stool. He was now in another world, as the lid revealed the familiar array of ebony and ivory.

As his fingers found their place amongst the keys, Mozart’s Piano Sonata No.16 in C Major filled the concourse. He didn’t notice Paris coming to a standstill under his spell.

The young woman stopped in her tracks. She removed the white headphones and hung them around her neck. Through the static crush of bodies surrounding the source of the sound, she spotted him. Waves of red curls bouncing on his head as he stroked the keys. She closed her eyes and absorbed the sonic perfection, imagining those fingers caressing her skin.

‘At last. A touch of humanity in this sterile world,’ she thought.