He rarely left the house, and even then, it was only to gawp at the fires. He looked up some old friends in the fire service: he had once written one of his odes to them. Out of habit, they would call him up and tell him about the blazes. He dressed quickly and, groaning, carried the bike down to the yard. Just picture it: this stubborn old man riding across the city to a street which had just been shelled, greedily breathing in the smoke that carried away the ash and molten paint. He stood and waited until the entire house had burnt down and turned into ruins, and he then got back on his bike, picked up supplies from his cigarette pusher, and headed home.

I could never shake this sinking premonition that something might happen to him. I begged him to stop going out. He listened indifferently, but if the artillery kept up, he would agree to be taken down to the basement.

There was a notice stuck at the entrance to the flats: “When shelling begins in residential areas, immediately take refuge. The keys to the basement may be collected from the flat supervisor.” I couldn’t quite take in the fact that this sign—was not something somewhere far, over there, but in Europe, in the twenty-first century. The dissonance grew only stronger in the basement.

A whole community had formed down there. We were lucky: our basement was spacious and still connected to the power grid. The first time we went, during a bout of shelling, some of our neighbours had already taken up residence and converted it into a bomb shelter.

They brought pickaxes and shovels in case a shell hit the wall and blocked the entrance. Residents of the various blocks agreed they would dig one another out if needed. The floor was carpeted, and old armchairs and wooden chairs placed in the corners. Folding beds were arranged in a row, mattresses were laid out, the table had been covered in newspapers, Tupperware dishes and bottles. A television chattered away in the corner. Old calendars and an advertisement for Wella hair products (“glorious shade”) hung on the ragged walls. A languid girl with lush hair looked down from the poster onto the basement dwellers. A small window had been punched through to the street and a fan installed in it to suck out the hot summer air.