Our offices are in a red-brick building directly above a newsagent’s. There are only six of us who work out of here – two snappers, two reporters, including myself and a trainee called Ellie, Ted and Sue. Our headquarters are on a trading estate a few miles out of town. We type up our copy, then send it down the line to the subs at HQ. Jack and I often joke that our office is where the dregs are sent. The staff they don’t want to get rid of, but don’t want hanging about the main newsroom. I can’t understand what Jack’s done to warrant such a situation. How could anyone dislike him? I tell him that he’s only here because he was the last in. As soon as a snapper leaves HQ (and it’s amazing how high the turnover of staff is there, how quickly they jump ship to a daily like the Bristol Daily News), Jack will have left before he can say ‘digital camera’. I doubt the other photographer, Seth, will ever go anywhere else. He’s long past retirement.

I can’t allow myself to wonder how I’d cope without Jack if he left. I know it will happen eventually. Jack pretends otherwise, but underneath his easy-going persona he’s ambitious. It’s only a matter of time before he moves on. I, on the other hand, am happier here in our little office, away from prying eyes and ears. And Ted is a good boss. Despite his grumpiness, he trusts us and leaves us to make our own decisions (and most afternoons he leaves early to slope off to the local pub). I don’t want to be stuck out on some soulless industrial estate. I like being able to walk out onto Park Street. I love the hustle and bustle, the shops, the cafés, the buskers. It reminds me of London. Not to mention that I can walk to work from where I live.

I’ve been given a second chance and I’ll always be grateful to Ted for that. He took me on when nobody else would.

We have our own entrance: a single blue door set into the brick wall. There’s no sign, nothing to suggest that a newspaper operates behind it. Sometimes a homeless man huddles under a dirty blanket in the doorway. He’s called Stan. I often bring him a coffee when I’m getting one for Sue. Today he’s not here, just an empty can of Foster’s scrunched up in the corner and the faint whiff of urine. I shelter in the doorway and light a cigarette, inhaling it deeply.