Walter. Ashley Sievwright

quickly. Paparazzi, Walter thought, and he thought it as he would have said it, with an intonation of irony, of ridicule, of distaste, and of pure disbelief that he, Walter Kovak, should be hounded by paparazzi.

      Behind these thoughts on hospitals and paparazzi, like an incongruous soundtrack, Walter could hear the sound of the train, rickety-clack, rickety-clack. Nobody else in the carriage heard the sound. Of course they did, but they didn’t notice it as Walter did. He heard it all the time, listened for it, heard it in his head perhaps louder than it really was. Rickety-clack, rickety-clack, like the foom-foom of his pulse.