And then some junkie scumbag manages to pull his trousers down and take an overdose, right in front of me on the tube, at half past 10 on a Friday night: I mean he actually pulled his flies down and spread his legs, right there opposite me in the end carriage of a Central line train, reached for his needle, pulled his filthy pants to one side and started rooting around in his groin for a vein. I only looked up from my book because of the stink.
Like any other British person, I averted my eyes and carried on reading, of course. Needles don't bother me, and neither do junkies, especially since I qualified and became the hardest man in the world. I just filed away a mental note that young people these days were shooting up in public on the tube instead of going to church.
Anyway, I happened to look up from my book just in time for that magical Trainspotting moment when he plunged the needle in and made a face like he was getting the world's biggest cuddle from a bounteous matriarch with a special thing for scabby smackheads; and then he threw himself into the air, jumped around for a few seconds, doing some pretty convincing fitting, fell to the floor, landed right on top of my feet and started frothing at the mouth and looking like he had definite plans to stop breathing.
The entire carriage freaked out. I remained seated. A girl to my left pulled the emergency alarm and shouted: "Is anyone here medically trained?" Now that's a very good line, I thought, and made a mental note to use it myself next time. Everyone was looking in our direction. I put my hand up sheepishly. "OK," she said, and looked.
It was at this point that it began to dawn on me that my dubious authority might well be undermined by my rather louche, retro 70s party gear. It had never occurred to me that a pair of purple flared loon pants, a tight flowery polyester shirt and a big-arse paisley kipper tie that used to belong to my dad might impact negatively on my bedside manner. Surely all doctors looked like this 30 years ago?
But what was really undermining my confidence was not having an entire A&E department to hand, because frankly, I'm pretty much useless without one. A crowd formed around us. "What shall we do?" they said. "Nothing," I smiled helpfully. They didn't look impressed. "Well, I mean, he's just some guy who's taken a bit too much heroin, and the only problem is if he stops breathing. In which case..." Everyone watched him breathe attentively; there was no naloxone, no oxygen, no tubes and no anaesthetist. "In which case he's shafted," I finished, and thought about kicking him to keep his attention, if the worst came to the worst.
"Why was he fitting?" piped up a clever dick at the back of the class. "No idea," I said, smiling again. "Interesting, isn't it?" It's the kind of comment that would be quite normal in A&E. Everyone looked on in horror. I was the only person in the whole carriage who wasn't standing around me, apart from the frothing junkie, who was lying on the floor breathing.
And then, the million-dollar question: "Can't we give him mouth to mouth?" Well, I thought, looking at the froth, I can answer that one quite easily.
He was covered in spatters of blood. I lifted him gingerly into the recovery position with my feet. God knows where the needle was.
Finally, we get to the next station. People start shouting for an ambulance.
And then she arrives: the first-aider. Panting. "OK everybody," she says, "I'm a first-aider." And dives on top of the patient. "How long has he been here?" she barks. This, truly, is her moment of glory. She celebrates by sticking her hand right down inside his mouth, and has a good root around in there.
"I wouldn't touch him without gloves if I were you," I say. "He's covered in blood. And he might have Aids." Everyone glares. I shut up. And she starts ordering people around, with no apparent purpose, and refusing, infuriatingly, to let any of the London Underground staff move him, so we all have to stand around being late. I sigh. The trouble with these first-aiders is, they wait their whole lives for this special moment; and I hate to be a spoilsport, but they're so melodramatic. I blame it on the telly.
"If you put your hand in there once more," I mumble, "I swear he'll bite it off." But no one's listening. He's coming round, but she's not letting anyone move him until the ambulance arrives. I've waited for them before; I head for the sky and get into a taxi.
