That everything could get worse didn’t seem like a possibility at the time. Not to a child, since fear of the future is a pastime of the aged, who don’t have any future anyway. Back then Don’s world was fine, except for the fact that she didn’t have a fence around her bed, or, better yet, a little room in the basement where she could lock up her brother. The brother whined. He was probably pissing the bed again. Don almost thought she could

Hear the urine running out of him and

Don was—

Furious.

Many couldn’t manage it. To muster such a righteous rage. Most of the older people who hung around Don’s city were numb and tired and squatted in corners and barely had enough energy to lift their heads. Once in a while they’d be fed. But their stomachs couldn’t tolerate it, this solid food in an empty existence, and they’d throw up, only to be too weak to lift their heads out of the vomit. Most of the people Don encountered were old. That was no wonder at seven—or nearly seven. Or nearly eight, but, of course, older looking. Or at least believing she looked older. Don’s hair grew straight up. Her eyes were crooked and dark, and Don was little, even for a nearly seven- or eight-year-old. She was little and furious. Don’s rage was so ever-present in her daily routine that she would never think of saying: “Fucking hell, am I pissed off today.” She knew no other condition. She’d been furious since birth. Or at least as early as she could remember. She hated the world where she had to live. Which was a few square meters large.

She hated this world and refused to come to terms with it. She had no relationship with her place in it, or rather the place allotted to her by virtue of her birth, with the preordained path set out for her, that would start with a poor education. In the event she survived that step without accidentally getting caught up in a stabbing, then would follow an attempt to secure an apprenticeship.