Taking a left onto New Oxford Street, sun low in the sky suddenly gave purpose to my fruitless search.

London before me was now alive, my body a cell propelled in a perpetual circuit through its arteries, in & out of its essential organs, expending and replenishing myself on its blood, people who shared my stream, subconsciously for the most part – aware of my existence only as one would be of chords of a half-felt song sirening from a shoe shop, a cheap fragrance lingering on an empty escalator.

At these moments of contemplation, of a memory false or true, they stepped onto a plane of common existence. Their stillness or their gesture punctuating the pulse of their passage through the streets. At these moments they revealed themselves both unique and universal. At these moments they were ripe for me.

This afternoon, the West End was lit like a B-movie. Obscured doors invited their covert occupants to step centre-stage blinking in the sunlight, groping for their lines like an opening night debutante. Although at the periphery of theatreland, the junction at Centrepoint always pulled in the punters for the matinee performance. The language students dealing out ‘Learn English’ leaflets vied with a suitcase – stuffed shifter of pirate CDs for the attention of the latest batch of ascendees from the underground; the more reckless spilling onto the road, into the path of oncoming Routemasters laden with East and West-enders on their way out of this place of promise and compromise.

Pendulous security passes laminated with the image of their other selves, headphones hard-wired to massage the transformation, their eyes focused on the space ahead but their thoughts roamed faraway in this particular trance of street – walking home.

Here I found a feeding ground, rich with those opportunities I trawled for and cherished.

The shrill of a whistle immediately followed in its slipstream by a bike messenger full – pelt out of Soho Square caused a momentary eddy in the flow across a side street. In that heartbeat of time, conversations continued inside and out of people’s heads but their bodies dallied, readjusted and set themselves in motion again. Chance meetings were made and missed, serendipity beaten at its own game.

For me, time stood stiller than for anyone else. The coincidence of body against mass versus light overtime was a formula I’d defy any Nobel laureate to transcribe. Yet it’s a natural phenomenon, natural to the city at least. Figures caught on the threshold of stepping off pavements into their future, thrown into relationship with others at the whim of an eyeblink. A dance of order amid chaos.

The moment passed. I was left to wonder. Was I alone with my peculiar gift? Or was I a mere prelude, an appetiser, a parasite in a bigger food chain?

Over my shoulder, I heard another whistle, but this time the people moved on.