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Christmas [London]

#15

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She had mentally checked out. Dispatched to a grim corner of North East London. Sunk waist-deep in filth and left to rot on a broken bench dedicated to some old guy, clutching a bottle of mulled wine in a paper bag and phone in the other. She pictured him for a second, maybe a guy with a busted-up face, someone who'd fought tooth and nail for something bigger than himself. But she wasn't him. She wasn't fighting for shit. She was just existing, barely, in the sludge and noise of a world that didn't care if she drowned in it.

She didn't feel strong or stoic. She felt like the bench itself - broken, forgotten and left behind, like her life's too much on Groundhog Day mode. She looked down at a crumpled wrapper of a mince pie someone had abandoned on the ground. A youth sleeping next to his own vomit opened one eye, "It’s illegal to have an open container, y'know?"

"Cops don't care. Pro tip - hide your booze, not your face in puke," she said and kicked at a pile of slush, watching it splatter onto a parked car. "Sorry, Santa," she muttered to the inflatable Santa strapped to the roof, looking all smug with its big stupid grin. Her phone screen lit up with an old text from Mo. Ghost town. He hasn't replied in… what? Three days? Maybe four? Not that it mattered. Big surprise there.

"Shit," Zoey hissed. The phone felt heavier in her hand, like it knew the weight of what she was considering. Her eyes remained on the target but things were starting to get messy. Quite literally. Not a good thing as far as she was concerned, and even her undeveloped, fish-level brain could sense that.

She could already hear the conversation in her head. "Hey, uhm, so I've been thinking… maybe we cut Mo loose? Start looking for a new drummer? Someone who actually gives a damn?" It sounded good. Reasonable.

Tomorrow. Maybe.