It's heavy and it's narrow. I might have to turn sideways to get in. And the air is warm and smells of smoke. And the cold air smells of cars and holds on to the back of my head until the door closes behind me. And the noise changes. Voices. Things moving. People moving. Things like washing up.

All I have to do is walk to the bar, like I did with Jo. And ask for a drink. Like she did for me. It's over there. Not very far. Let's count the steps. But get some money out first. She asked me what I wanted to drink. I didn't know. I didn't care. But a pint of bitter came to mind and she bought it. I'll get something different this time. Somebody laughs, loud. A girl asks me what I want. A pint of bitter.

And suddenly there's music. Not music in a little box spilling out into my room. Not music smearing out of a shop doorway that you can walk through and get out the other side without having to think about it. Music that somebody is playing right next to you. Almost next to you. A piano.

She asks for money and I look in my hand and I give her a note.

A piano being hammered joyfully by a man with white hair. People all around him clapping and shouting. Close enough to walk to. Far enough to stay away from and still hear. His hands moving fast, though I can't really see them past the piano. Notes and notes and notes.

She drops my change on the bar next to me. I remember to say thank you but she's already gone.

****

He switches to a faster rhythm, cast iron left hand and lots of blue notes, and three men at the table behind him clap and shout, nodding their heads hard from time time to time, fitting in a sip from their glasses, a grin or a word to the one next door. And he's finished, he stands up with the last chord held down, picks up his hands and walks out. Three mouths drain their glasses and hurry after him.

The piano just stands there, and he hasn't put the lid down, and I'm glued to the bar but it looks like the invitation of a lifetime. This really is a special day.

A man walks past me, and I'm staring at the top end of the keyboard I can see without moving.

"D'you want a go?" Is my tongue hanging out? He's heading behind the bar with a load of dirty plates, but he looks me up and down for a second. "So long as you don't empty the place." That's worth a grin - on both sides. The lunchtime trade has disappeared back to its various shops and offices - how do I know that? - and I can see perhaps four people in the whole place, a few more round the corner perhaps. "What's your name?"

"Paul." He nods and leaves me to it. Whoosh! My head is swimming. Left alone. In control. Of nothing.

****

There's a problem with pianos and boogie. Sometimes they get hammered and go out of tune. Sometimes they're so out of tune in the first place that boogie's all you can get away with. As if I know.

I look round. The piano's in it's own space so I can walk over an poke at a few nonchalant, one-handed notes before committing myself to a seated position. Sounds pretty good, actually. Octaves are octaves. A glissando sounds clean and all the keys I press down come back up. Running out of excuses.

The only thing available is a bar chair, but I don't seem to be wearing my tails today. The glass goes on the posse's table for safety. Middle C boasts a small chip in its front edge, but all other signs suggest a well looked-after instrument. And I've come as far as sitting down in public without too much sweat or anxiety.

Now what can I play? SWEAT, SWEAT, SWEAT. Today's the day - a special day - and somehow there's something even bigger than the fear. A few chords appear from nowhere, and it just feels so good to hear something I'm doing sounding out in a sympathetic space. I relax - you can't relax - you try to relax - the kind of long slow breath that says all's right with the world for a couple of minutes at least - and find myself moving into a slow G minor blues. Nothing clever, mostly block chords with two note linking phrases. But then clever isn't really an option with my lack of practice. Glad the boogie merchant's moved on.

The great thing about playing on your own is that it doesn't matter when it turns into a fourteen bar blues or you suddenly trail off into a middle eight that you've never heard before and have to find a way back so it sounds as if you meant it all along.

The great thing about playing on your own when you're in the mood and sounding convincing and the pub's quiet is that a pint can appear on top of the piano, and that's what happens. The blues is several verses old, so I finish it with a bit of a flourish.

"Thanks." And the manager nods.

"That's to pay for the audition," he says. "Nobody gets more than a pint or two except maybe at the weekends, but if you're any good I'll put you on the list. Try another few while it's quiet." He doesn't hang about for a response, and I'm glad of that, because I could have cried. It's years since I played the piano, years since I played anything with any conviction, and here's somebody practically offering me a gig.

Transferring the second pint to the table behind me - old habits apparently forbid the mixing of liquids and musical instruments - I raise my hands again, looking at keys between fingers. The door ahead of me swings shut - another couple of people leaving, but I don't take it personally. It feels like G minor once more, but this time I pull one of the things out of the drawer that I put together for some people I knew all those - even more - years ago. The different chorus for verse three trips me up even though I knew it was coming, and I find myself muttering "sorry" to the empty air, but it comes out OK in the end and I cut it short just in case.

Over a few long swallows of beer - careful to finish the old one first - I take stock of my repertoire. The cupboard looks pretty bare. How many different tunes can I actually come out with? OK, I have no history in this kind of thing, but those hundreds of hours of heavy rehearsal in darkened rooms have to count for something. And if I keep on feeling this good you never know. Ask me tomorrow, Mum.

To keep things predictable I step off into Famous Blue Raincoat - how old Lennie the C got away with those simple ones always made me laugh. I'm going to need some straightforward practice, but this one seems somehow right for the dispersed light from faraway front windows and 40-watters behind me.

A figure walks past. A woman in jeans, I do register. On the way to the toilets, you have to assume. And I don't miss a beat, which is reassuring. But then my ears pick up a few unwanted details - a chair dragging, hitting a table - and I know she's sitting somewhere behind me. Somewhere close. Things get a bit clunky, but there isn't far to go and I manage to finish with a breathy "Sincerely, L. Cohen" before sitting back in the chair, not even wanting to make the half-turn to retrieve my glass, as relaxed as a rock teetering on the edge of a cliff.

"Was that a Tom Fitzgerald song you did before?" she asks at last, and I have to look at her. It's only polite. And she does seem interested.

"Yeah, Train. You know it?"

"He doesn't get a lot of exposure nowadays. Pity." She smiles, but she doesn't look at me, thoughts elsewhere. Young. Late twenties, thirty maybe. Glasses, short dark hair, slim, square chin and cheeks.

"Before your time, perhaps." Half a second near to panic, then try to banter, but she looks quite sharp when she meets my eyes.

"A bit, but I do have the CDs."

"I used to have the vinyl," I reply softly, and it's my turn to look down.

"Used to? What happened...?"

"Not sure where they ended up." She's two tables away, but neither of us makes a move. I sip my rather flat pint to keep that distance between us.

"You done?" The manager appears from the door by the end of the bar.

"Oh, sorry Mike," the woman says quickly. "I interrupted him."

"I'll need to hear more than that before you get any kind of booking. How about a couple more quiet afternoons to prove it?" He's not throwing me out, not that he wants to stay and listen.

"I'll give it a go. It's a while since I played in public." He nods and returns to his duties, which obviously aren't going to include getting me another pint.

"Sorry. Didn't realise you were singing for your supper."

"Just lunch." And I down most of the rest of it. This time she stands up - she's tall and angular. And she looks strong.

"D'you know any more Fitzgerald?" she asks.

"A few, but I get the impression I might have to stick to the standards in here."

"Oh come on, it's not a piano bar. Nobody knew what Kenny was playing earlier on. Most of those things probably don't even have names."

"I'm just scared people will want to sing along and I won't know the tunes." She looks hard at me.

"I haven't seen you in here before."

"Just trying out some new places - fed up with the old ones." I'm not going to tell her where I have been. "Gotta go," back to a mutter, draining the last, warm mouthful, standing up.

"Hey," she says with a sudden smile. "Try this one." She takes my place by the piano, and she's doing all the moving, so I'm still shuffling back out of the way when the music starts. Four bars in she looks up at me with a fierce grin, misses the response I'm half-way through thinking about making, returns her concentration to the keyboard. The song's fast and spiky, but it is unmistakeable. Maybe I'm supposed to applaud on recognition. Maybe I'm supposed to fire up one of a herd of lighters across the stadium.

"Wine into Water," I mouth as she comes to the chorus, and try to follow the notes. It's hard to play properly from a standing position, but when there's only one chair... And that's a great excuse when you've never really played the song on the piano and only know it in a different key anyway. I can pick out a few notes, one finger at a time, giving up at one point, rearing back as if to say why bother. But today I am not going to give up. By the end of the second verse I can do the changes in two-finger chords, but I don't see the chorus coming and she knows it. She turns to me, she sings it and I say it.

"Wine into water... water from the wine"

But playing without an eye on the keyboard doesn't work for her either, and that chorus is just about the end of it. She comes to a dead stop, laughing, and I'm laughing too. I haven't felt that good in years. Years. Years and years.

"When you've quite finished..." Embarrassment strikes. Making a juvenile noise in a public place. I did assume it was the manager, but I know the voice is wrong even before I stand back and turn round to see him - about my height, scruffy, heavy eyebrows which go well with the laughing mouth. "She really shouldn't start something she can't finish."

"Look who's talking," the woman laughs back. And I just stand there. "Hey..." Moment past. I just try to catch my breath, maintain vital signs over the turmoil inside. "I'm sorry, but we should have been somewhere else about ten minutes ago. Come again and I'll let you play on your own. We're in most afternoons."

I'm not sure it comes naturally to her, and I certainly didn't ask for it, but she looks me straight in the eye and shakes my hand. Then they've gone. Moments later the door closes behind them.

I take a look about me but there's nothing to see. I have the clothes I stand up in, nowhere to go but no reason to stay. Closing the piano lid - it's only polite - I follow them at a less determined pace.

I know every note Tom Fitzgerald ever played.