Something trés étrange happened this morning. I was having my hair cut. (My mother insisted. She feels that somehow i'll be better equipped to take on the vicissitudes of university life with slightly shortened hair) Well, not just a cut, it was being died and everything. I've started trying to defend the fact that i dye my hair by reminding myself my hair was once so blond as to be white. Previously when this has been done my head has just looked like the shorn scalp of a plastic doll. Now, though, my hair is long enough to fountain up and form a fluffy (And, oh dear lord, is my hair fluffy! It looks ridiculous, but i rather like it all the same. It feels nice.) dome about two inches (Inches are so much better for being inaccurate with. It's true. I do try to use metric, but saying "about five centimetres" here would just feel so wrong.) from my headWas remained of my hair was mostly occupied in tickling my eyes and nose. So, what with the rubber cap, my invasive fringe and the fact that i was obviously not wearing my glasses, I wasn't able to see more of the boy who came to take his place in the seat next to me than a trainer and a suggestion of dark hair.

I was slightly surprised, as this isn't a salon generally frequented by the male of the species. I go because the owner has cut my family's hair for years, back from the days when she cut hair in the same hospital my mother midwifed in. Besides, alt5hough i of course still go in armed with my usual reticence, i rather like her.

There was little conversation between myself and the assisstant painfully tugging my hair through the rubber cap with a sharp hook, either because she wasn't blessed with this vital skill of the hairdressing trade or because she had seen by now that there wasn't all that much point talking to me. Anyway, this meant that i was able to clearly hear the conversation taking place to my left.

Obviously, he was roughly the same age as me, as he was to be going away, to university, (I assumed, and was later confirmed in my assumtion.) The next day, Saturday. That's tomorrow, same as me. When it transpired that he, too, was going to Sheffield, i realised that i should speak up. And normal would have and, who knows, things could have turned out well abd i'd have another friend there.

This became even clearer when he identified the length of his course: four years, with a year abroad. Obviously, and here i demonstrated deductive reasoning to astound any detective, a langauge student. Probably, the way things were going, staying in the same accomodation as me, most likely in the next room. In fact, it was almost a certainty that not only would we grow to know one another, but that we already had.

We were only a couple of streets away from my primary school, only about twice as far away as i'd had to walk in the mornings from my child minder's. Of course, back then, i was half the size i am now, so it evened out about the same. I'd seen people from my old school before, even spoken to them, though never at great length. It seemed perfectly plausible that this should be another old acquaintance, with whom i would soo, no doubt, be reacquainted.

Not today, however, as he was now getting up to leave. But now came the question i'd been dreading. The shame of my silence was to be revealed, i was moments away from having my cowardice unmasked. I had the decency, at least, to attempt to show that i realised i had been silly when i answered "Sheffield".

What, it was asked, were we studying? (I wish i could claim to have realised his identity here, but sadly i can't, as that would be a shameful, shameful lie.) He was going to do Hispanic Studies and Linguistics, I, French and Linguistics. There, he realised who i was, and said so. I, know even more convinced that this must be someone from my primary school. Without my glasses, it took me a moment to realise that this, in fact, was P. Obviously it had been. He'd even told said, the previous day, that he had "a hair appointment" (I couldn't take this phrase seriously. I'm not sure i can justify why.) today at half past eleven. I had told him, too, that i had (I find it very hard to talk to him without a sneer in my voice. Any remotely neytral topic is seized upon.) such an appointment, but at that point mine had been scheduled for half past one. It had been moved so i could meet up with my friends in Birmingham. So really i was much more at an advantage in this guessing game than he. I suppose my complete ineptitude at identifying him just shows how very much less i care about him than i once did.