Early on Saturday morning, I head off to talk about myself at the Hexham book festival. There is an immediate hitch in my travel plans: the overground train that my phone recommends me to take doesn’t turn up, so I appeal to my phone again and, after a panicked sprint across the park, I manage to catch a bus that gets me to King’s Cross station with minutes to spare.
A gratifying number of people come to hear me talk about myself in Hexham. Afterwards, I sign books in the foyer, while a local photographer moves my beer out of his shot.
Two women approach, with a book between them. “We wonder what you’ll write about us next week!” one says.
I smile, thinking: that’s not how it works. I explain that I never write about things going well. I tend to concentrate on personal failures and humiliations, which Hexham has singularly failed to furnish me with.
“I suppose there’s still time for something bad to happen,” I say. But there isn’t: a taxi is already waiting for me outside. The whole trip has been, disappointingly, a triumph.
As my train leaves Newcastle, I send my wife a text telling her that I’m on my way home. I’m sharing a carriage with a large group – perhaps 10 people, all mates. They have an amazing amount of alcohol with them and they’re already very jolly. I check Twitter. A picture of me signing books has already been posted, beer just out of frame. I check my email, then go back to Twitter again.
I wake with a jolt as the train pulls into York. I realise that I’ve been asleep for almost an hour. In the meantime, the large group of friends has become even more voluble. Empty bottles and cans now litter their tables and seat-trays.
I occupy myself by eavesdropping. It’s clear that they’ve just come from a Gateshead match, but I can’t figure out who they support; I don’t even know what league Gateshead play in, so I decide to look it up.
I stare at my empty hand. I’m still a bit groggy from my sleep and it takes me a while to understand the problem: there is no phone in it. I check my pockets and the seat. I rummage through my coat pockets and my bag. Then I get down on all fours to look under the seats. I do all this two more times.
Finally, I arrive at a difficult and humiliating conclusion: my phone has been snatched from my hand while I slept. The culprit, or culprits, may have got off at Darlington, or at York, or they may still be on this train. I begin to suspect – with no justification – that the large group has pinched my phone as a prank. Then I notice that the man across the aisle from me has two phones. Neither of them is mine, but still I think: what kind of person has two phones? A collector, that’s who.
I don’t like to think of myself as phone-dependent, but withdrawal is swift and severe. I cannot address the problem of not having a phone without a phone. How do I determine its whereabouts? Who do I complain to? What league do Gateshead play in?
Then I remember that I have my iPad with me. It’s old and the touchscreen is dead around the edges – I have to keep rotating it to type anything – but I manage to send an email to my wife explaining the situation before it dies. I settle down for a long, phoneless journey.
When I get home and open our front door, I see my wife on her phone, wearing a coat.
“Never mind, he’s just walked in,” she says. At that moment, I realise that my email may have been unclear – I might have made it sound as if I’d been robbed and left for dead.
We are due to go out for dinner that night, and I have just enough time to check something on my computer before the taxi arrives.
“I can’t believe anyone would steal such a shit phone,” my wife says as we pull off.
“I know,” I say. “I think they may have done it to humiliate me. Or to celebrate Leyton’s 3-1 victory over Gateshead.”
“What are you doing?” she says.
I look down to see my left hand clamped around nothing, my thumb pushing imaginary buttons.
