16:58 is a bad time to use the Underground. It is hot and there are lots of people. I stand on the platform and watch a train arrive, the doors open and there is a mess of bodies forcing themselves onto the train as other bodies force themselves off the train. This lasts for about five seconds and then a voice commands that the doors will close, and they do. Not everybody makes it on, but the platform is clearer now. I decide I will get on the next train but the platform fills up again before it has arrived and so I hold back.
    I am sweating; my back is tingling as though all the drips of sweat are acidic and burning my skin. I want to know how deep I am. I want to go to the deepest spot on the whole Underground system and sit there on my own. I will take out my charcoal barbeques in their self-contained foil trays and light them; Sinusoid will never get to see the sign that I have made with her name on. She will wander around Heathrow Terminal Four forever, like a ghost.
    I let three trains go past and then, conscious of the LED’s flicking by, I stand close to the yellow line and allow myself to be pushed and bullied onto a train. I don’t have anything to hold onto but I am supported by the mass of bodies crammed into the small space. I have memorised the route and know that I will have to change from the Victoria Line to the Piccadilly Line at Green Park in three stops. From there it is a straight run through to Heathrow. The Internet said to allow forty minutes for the journey, and Sinusoid has to clear immigration and baggage, so I think it will be ok.
    At Green Park I follow a series of mosaic tunnels towards the westbound platform for the Central Line. There are less people now and I walk as fast as I can without running. I arrive on the platform at the same time as a train and walk straight on without having to push people out of the way. There is a free seat. As we travel west the train gets quieter and quieter, it is as if we are travelling towards certain doom and as people realise this they jump ship. I stay on the train to the end of the line.

After the confined space of the tube, and the sweaty darkness of the underground platforms, it is pleasant to walk through the wide corridors of London Heathrow Airport. I drift along on the conveyor belts; it feels like levitating. Whole walls of advertisements are dominated by the red and white of HSBC, offering to help you save, plan, and spend your future. I have a HSBC credit card, but I have only ever experienced the red part of their logo. I suppose that I should thank them for my upgrade to first class.
    There is a gathering of people at Arrivals, formed into a semi-circle by fabric tape strung between metal poles. I look up at a computer screen and find the inbound flight from Charlotte; its status is LANDED. I pull the piece of cardboard from my bag with Sinusoid marked on in black pen and hold it in front of me.
nbsp;   I am nervous as I watch other people emerge from the customs area, looking confused until their faces become animated with recognition. Suited businessmen drag small briefcases on wheels and shake hands, or the friendlier ones clap each other on the backs. Families and friends run and hug, mothers cry. Holiday Reps smile and wave their charges to follow, offering to carry their luggage. How am I meant to react when I meet my Internet acquaintance, should I hug her and give her a kiss on the cheek? Should we shake hands as though our relationship is more business than pleasure? What if it’s a big joke, or a set up, and she shrieks, ‘It’s him, Quasimodo, he was going to make me do it’?

A new crowd of people surge through the corridor and into the arena, some of them rush forward and away, most of them pause, and then disperse. One woman stands in the middle of the semi-circle; she is holding a piece of paper with the word Quasimodo written in black ink. We have seen each other but neither of us moves, maybe realising for the first time that this is real.

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