The distance from the cub reporter’s desk to the chief’s corner office, inch by inch, was a measure of how far he had come. He looked out at the team of weekend staff through the glass wall that separated them, as they sifted through the details of the day’s breaking story – the death of Akbar Khan. He’d been left reeling when Jia had phoned him with the news. So when John got in touch to see how he was, he offered to come into the office to help piece the story together, even though he wasn’t officially supposed to start until Monday. It would take his mind off the personal fallout from this news. Ahad’s grandfather was dead before they’d even been introduced.

The newsroom hadn’t changed much in the years since Elyas had left. Newspapers were still strewn across the floor, desks and printers, some of them yellowing, their edges beginning to curl. Subs still shouted at fresh-faced journalists, and endless cups still filled the kitchen sink. The smell of the fridge left Elyas wondering if anyone had cleaned it since he’d left. Reporters still hunched over desks, stared at their screens, bashed keyboards and snapped pens, as news editors with papers to fill remained as antsy as ever, if not more so. The arrival of the internet age had made life for print journalists precarious.

John, who’d never left, was now their crime reporter. His reasons for staying were mainly family-related. His wife was the social affairs correspondent and their three children were settled in local schools. He’d thought of moving, especially with the industry dying, but had never quite found the right post. John was an old-fashioned hack: TV and radio were not for him, and the jump to internet… Well, that was too risky with a family. ‘I’ve got a comfortable seat on a sinking ship,’ he’d told Elyas. ‘Let’s see if a lifeboat turns up, eh?’ And so he’d stayed. Easy to get along with, he looked like a newspaperman out of one of the 1920s detective novels he read and wrote for a hobby.

First day back on the job and Elyas found himself knee-deep in photographs and clippings as he and John looked through the background on Akbar Khan. Not all content had been digitised. Elyas knew most of Akbar Khan’s history by heart and the cuttings did little more than refresh his memory. Heartbreak and Google were stalking companions, and while there wasn’t much about Jia online, there was plenty about her father.

The men stopped as one of the reporters came in carrying newspapers fresh off the press. The reporter piled them on Elyas’s desk and left. ‘Why are we going through these old stories and not getting someone else to do it?’ John asked.

‘This is personal to me.’