**A Fresh Start**
When he came back, no one was there to greet him. No flowers, no reproaches. No questions, no embraces. Just silence—heavy, as if he hadn’t been gone for five years, but had simply stepped out for cigarettes and forgotten to return. His absence wasn’t a wound; it was a yawning void the city had failed to notice.
The stairwell was the same, but the door to his flat had been repainted—from faded blue to a cold grey, as if someone had tried to scrub away his memory. New neighbours. New locks. The letterbox hung crooked, its rusted slit gaping like a botched break-in. He slid in the key. The lock clicked grudgingly, like an old joint resisting movement, but it opened all the same.
Inside, darkness reigned. The air was stale, thick with the scent of damp and something forgotten, as though memories had settled into the cracks of the floorboards. He sank onto the old sofa, running a hand over the fabric—dust left a mark, like a fingerprint on a neglected photograph. That trace held more life than the words “I’m back.” Because home wasn’t waiting for him. It would have to be rebuilt.
He hadn’t been here in fifteen hundred days. First, prison. Then, the struggle to get back on his feet. The last few months—no relapses. No slipping back. Almost no letters came. Not from family, not from old mates. Strangely, that freed him: no waiting, no hoping, no explaining. The worst part wasn’t the past. It was the emptiness, realising his days mattered to no one.
The kettle still stood on the kitchen counter. Battered, its lid cracked, but alive. He lit the stove, filled it with water. The stream ran murky, tinged with rust, as if holding onto an old grudge. The pipes groaned, whispering echoes of a discarded past. He flung open the window. Cold air crept in like an uninvited guest—sharp, but real. He drew a deep breath. Not because he wanted to. Because it was the first step in remembering how to breathe.
An old jacket lay in the wardrobe—faded, smelling of damp and time. He pulled it on and stepped into the courtyard. Walking slowly, as if afraid to startle himself, his fingers curled in his pockets—not from the cold, but from tension. The city was unchanged: the same cracked pavements, the same peeling walls. Yet he saw it now like a foreign land. With each step, something inside him stirred, reassembling from fragments.
At the bus stop, a woman stood with a little boy. The boy stared, unblinking. He offered a hesitant, fleeting smile. The boy frowned, ducked behind his mother, then peeked out again. That tiny glance sparked something in his chest—maybe, just maybe, a chance remained.
He bought bread, milk, and a box of matches. Simple things—proof that starting small was possible. The cashier rang them up in silence but looked at him. Not with scorn, but emptiness, as if he were a shadow the light had passed by. That indifference cut deeper than outright hostility.
Back home, he sat at the table, tore off a piece of bread, poured milk into an old mug. He ate slowly, savouring each bite as if relearning not just how to eat, but how to live. Listening—to the quiet, the tap of his spoon, the hum of the street outside. Later, he stood before the mirror. Studied his reflection like a stranger he had to recognise all over again. Smiled—awkward, but real. It was the first thing he’d done for himself.
At five the next morning, he rose. Scrubbed the floors till they shone, the bristles crunching as if scouring away the past. Went to the market. Bought a hammer and nails. Knocked on his neighbour’s door—offered to fix a shelf. Spoke softly, almost whispering, but with quiet dignity, like a man who wanted not just to exist, but to matter.
“Who are you?” she asked, squinting as if searching for someone familiar beneath the years.
“I used to live here. Will again,” he answered, gaze lowered but not evasive.
She hesitated, then let him in. The flat smelled of chicken soup and old paper. The shelf in the hallway sagged, one screw from collapse.
He tightened the fittings, wiped his hands on a rag. “Anything else need fixing? Squeaky window? Loose socket?”
She studied him, then fetched a lightbulb. “If it’s no trouble… My daughter keeps saying she’ll sort it, but she’s always busy.”
He screwed in the bulb. Light filled the room with a soft glow, and suddenly, it felt alive.
“Thank you,” she said. Paused. “You… alright?”
He shrugged, smiled slightly. “Learning. Starting fresh. Not from nothing, but close.”
She nodded, as if understanding more than he’d said.
That evening, he sat by the window. Watched teenagers kick a football about. An old woman scattering crumbs for sparrows. A couple embracing under the dim glow of the streetlamp. The light in the flat across flicking off, then on—someone just up for tea.
Normal life.
He opened the window. Leaned into the chill, watching the courtyard below—the lamp casting long shadows on wet tarmac, two smokers huddled by the door, a silhouette moving in the window opposite. Maybe a woman putting the kettle on. Maybe just another ordinary evening.
He stayed until the cold seeped through his jacket, then finally shut the pane. Lay down to sleep—for the first time without clenched teeth, without the weight in his chest, without dread for tomorrow. Because he understood: if you start with bread, with a lightbulb, with a single step—there’s a chance. Fragile, but real. And if the chance is real, then maybe he was too.