– The Iron Lady has much to answer for.

The doctor listened to his heartbeat.

– Community is going already, doctor.

– Aye.

– The young laddies who would ay been working wi the rest ay us down the pit by now – are sniffing glue in the park!

– So I’ve heard!

– Next it’ll be AIDS in Midlothian.

– Uh-huh.

– I dinnae think anyone’s got it there yet.

– No.

– What do you think, doctor? Do you think AIDS is more of an Edinburgh thing?

– It doesn’t discriminate, Ivor. Most illnesses don’t.

– They’re eradicating an entire generation ay young men, nae jobs, nae community, our infrastructure ripped apart and so many people are taking heroin now they are calling Edinburgh the HIV capital of Europe, ye ken that?

– I do.

The doctor nodded sadly.

– This panic that you are experiencing, Ivor, how long has it gone on for?

– Since I was wee.

– What age?

– Always. My earliest memory is sitting on Porty beach with a box on ma head.

– A box?

– A cardboard yin, it was the only way for my ma to stop me greeting.

– I see.

– I could hear the sea. She would hold ma hand to go paddling. I was the only laddie on that beach with a box on his head. I tell ye, everyone knows ye at Porty, the whole ay Bilston was there when it was sunny fir the day. I felt like a total fud.

– A what?

– It means vagina.

A smile, a nod, the doctor checking over his arms and back, tense then.

– What are these marks from?

– Ma work, it gets nuts down the mine, doctor.

A blank stare.

The man did not believe him.

What’s the point of saying fuck all? He’s never going to let Joanne take another dig at him anyway.

Ivor sits down on the bust armchair.

He does not want to think about the doctor’s final diagnosis.

It’s still too hard.

This grass is dry at least.

All the attic eaves are dusty and dirty and they crumble to touch.

The roof is punctuated by toothy gaps.

Missing tiles and slates – expose insipid city stars overhead.