The World According to Bob

prayer.
    After about an hour and a half, we made it to the first stopping off point – the Hispaniola floating restaurant on the Embankment on the north side of the Thames.
    I helped myself to some of the soup on offer while Bob lapped up some milk that someone had kindly sorted out for him. I was feeling pretty positive about the whole thing and was already totting up the miles that I’d done – and how many more were to come.
    But then, as we were heading off the ship, we had a bit of a setback. Perhaps because he’d been refuelled or perhaps because he knew that my leg still wasn’t 100 per cent, Bob had decided to walk off the boat. As he padded his way down the ramp, right to the end of his lead, he walked straight into another The Big Issue seller who was coming up the walkway with a dog, a Staffie. It instantly went for Bob and I had to jump in front of it with my arms and legs out to stop him lunging at Bob. To be fair to the other guy, he gave his dog a real dressing down and even gave him a slap on the nose. Staffies do get a bad reputation for being violent, but I don’t think this one was. He was just being curious, not evil. Unfortunately, however, it freaked Bob out a bit. As we resumed our walk he wrapped himself around me tightly, partly through nervousness but mostly because it was his way of insulating himself against the cold. There was a bone-chilling mist rising off the Thames.
    Part of me wanted to call it a night and take Bob home. But I spoke to a couple of the organisers and was persuaded to carry on. Fortunately, as we headed away from the river, the temperatures lifted a little bit. We wound our way through the West End and headed north.
    I got talking to another couple, a pretty young blonde girl and her French boyfriend. They were more interested in the story of how Bob and I had got together. That suited me fine. Walking around London like this brought back so many memories, many of them too dark and distressing for words. As a heroin addict living on the streets, I was reduced to doing some hideous things just to survive. I wasn’t in the mood to share those details with anyone.

    For the first six miles or so, my leg had been fine. I’d been too distracted by what was going on around me to think about it. But as the night wore on, I began to feel a throbbing pain in my thigh, where the DVT had been. It was inevitable. But it was still annoying.
    For the next hour or so I ignored it. But whenever we stopped for a cup of tea I could feel an acute shooting pain. Early on I had been in the middle of the procession, walking along with the largest numbers of fundraisers. But I had been falling further and further behind, eventually reaching the back of the line. A couple of fundraisers and a guy from The Big Issue office were bringing up the rear and I tagged along with them for a mile or so. But I’d had to take a couple of breaks to let Bob do his business and have a cigarette. Suddenly I realised that we were now cut loose from the rest.
    The next official stop was up in Camden, at the Roundhouse pub, a few miles away. I really didn’t think I could make it that far. So when we passed a bus stop with a night bus that headed in our direction, I made a decision.
    ‘What do you think, Bob, shall we call it quits?’
    He didn’t say anything, but I could tell that he was ready for his bed. When a bus loomed into view and opened its doors, he bounded on board and on to a seat, bristling with pleasure at being in the warm.
    The bus was surprisingly busy given it was well after 3am. Sitting towards the back of the bus, Bob and I were surrounded by a cluster of clubbers, still high from their night out in the West End or wherever it was they’d been. There were also a couple of lonely looking guys sitting there as if they were on the road to nowhere. I’d been there and done that, of course. I not only had the t-shirt, I had a wardrobe full of them.
    But that was the past. Tonight it felt very different. Tonight I felt rather pleased with myself. I know walking a dozen or so miles might not have seemed much of an achievement to some people, but to have made it that far given the state my leg had been in weeks earlier, was – for me, at least – the equivalent of running the London Marathon.
    I’d also been reunited with some familiar faces, in particular, Billie. It had been a joy to see her again and to see how well she was doing. All in all, I just felt like I’d done