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wouldn’t it?’
    A pause, a beat too long, then, ‘Sure, Dan,’ said Caroline, but with that weariness, that tightness in her voice that made her sound like another person.
    He looked at her quickly. He winced: there it was again. Did I say something wrong? Have I forgotten something else? He waited for her to smile, to come back, to say something light, or warm. But she stood apart on the other side of the car, rubbing around her eyes, and silent.
    Overhead, his cloud had changed from a glowing gold to the kind of golden-pink that belonged in an old Italian painting.
    â€˜Look at it now, Caro,’ he tried, but she shook her head.
    â€˜Hopeless, Dan, you’re hopeless,’ she said again, her back turned as she looked down the river towards Greenwich and its magical line of longitude. Stepping out of the quiet bubble of glass, Dan heard shouts and laughs, horns and cars, and then the surge of a tango starting somewhere and he swung Caroline out along the length of his arm and back in again before she had time to speak. There was a stark coldness in the air: it was October, the time of year he most registered the weather. Where he came from, his birthday fell on the cusp of summer, and he’d never adjusted to these autumnal birthdays.
    The music soared, and as he dipped Caroline fast and low for its finale, he heard shouts of encouragement in his own accent. There were three of them, their faces and hands brown, their backpacks scruffy and their jumpers emblazoned with the familiar slogans of surfing. Yes, he thought, he’d come to London on the easy conveyer belt of travellers like these ones, a few years out of uni, wondering what to do. Some were stayers, some were goers, and some, like me , he thought, are drifters. He liked the sound of that; it was more romantic than saying you were a banker.
    It was an easy story to tell.
    The music finished, and he held Caroline close for a little of the silence.
    â€˜I’m sorry I didn’t ring everyone, and I know we’re going to be late,’ he said at last. ‘Let’s get a cab instead of rushing.’ And he grabbed her hand and began to run—half a pace, and half a skip—smiling as she smiled. Saved by a tango , he thought. If he was lucky, he would think of enough things to keep her giggling. He hailed a cab with a flourish, swinging the door wide as Caroline slid inside.
    â€˜I know,’ she said, ‘you love these things, with the true passion of a man who believes they only exist in movies.’
    He breathed out. It was all right—she was laughing. And she was right: black cabs had an impossible glamour. He could ride in them every day and they’d never feel ordinary. The car sped through the dusk, across the river, and into the maze of streets that still disoriented him.
    â€˜What do you want for your birthday?’ asked Caroline, tucking her hair behind her ears.
    â€˜This,’ said Dan. ‘This’ll do.’
    â€˜Nothing else?’
    â€˜I like this, just how things are. A cab, a restaurant, the view . . . you.’
    She smoothed her skirt and turned to look out the window, at the lights they’d just floated above. And when she turned towards him again, her face was tight, and her cheek was striped with the wet track of one tear.
    The street was quiet when they left the restaurant, and Dan felt himself dozing in and out of wakefulness as their train rattled through its tunnels. Caroline was quiet, and he wondered whether he should ask her about her tears in the taxi, or whether to pretend he hadn’t noticed. He closed his eyes and saw a series of images like stills from a suite of dreams: the garden where he grew up, the stars the night he met Caro, the view of Sydney from beneath the bridge—he could feel the wind there, smell the salt coming in from the ocean. When he opened them again, he was sure he saw their station just pulling out of view and he leapt up,