London bus companies are participating in a conspiracy to make the city’s travellers feel like giants.

Moving the bus seats closer together a millimetre at a time means we feel as if we are slowly growing, no longer able to comfortably fit into the spaces they allow us.

I have played space invaders on public transport for years. Mostly, it’s someone’s knee, thigh, elbow or bag, quietly competing with you for minute gains in seat or standing room territory.

This morning, it was someone’s hair.

She sat in the seat in front, neatly contained within sensible suit, but her hair gave her away. Blonde, unkempt and tumbling, it hung over the back of the seat, and rested its ends on my lap in gentle curls.

It was part spun gold, part surf bleached straw, and she didn’t seem to be aware that it had a life of its own when the bus cornered and accelerated.

When we turned onto the main street, the mane swung gently to the right, brushing my knuckles. When we eased over a speed bump near the school, her loose waves bounced, as if mounted on springs.

She tossed her hair unconsciously - the kind of movement she must do hundreds of times a day, and with each movement, I was minutely wafted with the warm clean scent of her shampoo, barely whispered across my face.

When she leant forward to pick up her dropped bus pass, the golden waves retreated, like an ebbing tide, and my space became my own once again.