Nowhere else in the city have I felt the deep unease I feel in this place. Windows empty of glass. Concrete monoliths featureless but for the mottled ravages of time. Nobody around. At least not until the kids come back.
There's something about them. One young lad says to me 'I know who you are,' with a smiling confidence unnatural of his age. Where are their parents? Older siblings? There's no one here for these children but the grey bones of the city.
Their earliest days have put a violence in their hearts that sticks like thorns under the skin.
Paddy Dobson
9th April 2023