Spider’s face creased in and in on itself in the smile.

‘Bloody hell! Sammi! Hello yourself, matey.’

The placard hit the ground as he came in for a hug. Elliot winced.

‘Elliot, this is my old friend. You’ve met him before but you were very little.’

‘Gah, this is the baby, eh? Number two? Where does all that time go? Where does it go?’

Elliot scowled. ‘Is your name really Spider?’

‘It sure is, buddy boy. It sure is.’ Spider was apparently one of those people so uncomfortable around children he had to affect an American accent. Still, she felt surprisingly warm to him. Although she had seen him around, the last time they’d met had been in the corridor of that lawyer’s office, Spider coming out having given his testimony as she was ushered in. He’d given her elbow a squeeze as he passed, whispered ‘Go on, gal’ in her ear. She was aware that the others had met up occasionally afterwards but she wanted no part of it, or them.

But Spider was a good soul. She’d always liked Spider. He was smoothing out a crumpled flyer – still hand-drawn and photocopied, in 2018.

‘Social and cultural preservation, Sammi. Taking one more stand against the wankers in suits. They’ve got the whole bit earmarked for demolition and another block of luxury fucking flats.’

He looked down at Elliot’s suddenly thrilled grin, caught himself, hacked out a cough in confusion.

‘Sorry. Sorry. Tell ya what, tough guy, they’ve got history, them arches. You should ask your mum sometime. There was a whole subculture living in them back in the day. Parties all night, an great big debates in the daytime. We was making the world a better place, eh? Wasn’t we, Sammi?’

Knock it down, she thought. Burn the whole fucking lot to the ground. Cover the ashes with your smooth-fronted residential developments that block out the skyline and drive up the property prices, just so I never have to think about it again.

She snapped back to herself. Elliot’s eyes were pinballing between the two of them.

‘This all true, Mum?’

‘This is a smart lad you’ve got here, Sammi. A smart lad. Anyway, how are you? Still at the old social work?’

‘Nah, mate. Not for years now. I – I had to take a bit of time out. After. Wasn’t doing so good for a while there. And we had the settlement, so I – yeah. You know.’

He knew. He knew too many things, understood too much, in that kindly crumpled face. She was thinking about how to make a quick exit, with Elliot already pulling at her hand, when Spider stopped her.

‘Here. Bad business about Clio, eh?’

‘Clio?’

‘Yeah. The, you know, kkkch,’ he drew a finger across his throat. ‘You know?’

‘Is she dead?’

Spider tried to turn his face away from Elliot, who was still following everything very intently. He mouthed ‘Su-i-cide.’