She couldn’t have been more than fourteen. Pale as a ghost and slumped against the brown bottle recycling bin. Some blood trickled from her nose but not as much as was spreading rapidly across the front of her pretty pink T shirt, soaking the rainbow unicorn. A huge blot blossoming out from where she was holding her hand over her podgy little belly. Wet and shiny. She looked up at me for a moment, her eyes wide, scared and staring, before they rolled upwards. I reckon she’s done for. I reached down and took her phone from her hand. It was streaming a video of daft looking youths rapping. I flat buttoned it and dialled the emergency number. “Ambulance,” I said. I gave directions. I wiped the phone on my shirt and put it back in her hand. She couldn’t hold it though and it fell on the ground. ‘How does a fourteen year old kid around here afford a twelve hundred pound phone?’ I thought. But I knew really. That’s partly why she was bleeding out by the bins. I dropped my empty gin bottles into the white bin. I’d seen them, her and that Ryland. I’d seen them together lots of times. Them and the other kids, barging me off the pavement like they own the place. Deliberately standing in my way when I try to go in the shops. Laughing at me. Calling me ‘old man’. Calling me ‘peado’. Mind you, those girls don’t cover anything up, it’s a wonder they don’t catch something. Horrible little shits. I saw them come down here. She was staring at her phone. That Ryland was angry. He was doing that weird arm-wavy thing. That down pointing thing with his fingers shaped like pistols. Learned it from American videos I suppose. Looks stupid. Sticking his face in her face. Stepping up to her then back, like an animal squaring up for a fight. She wasn’t bothered in the least, she just held her hand up, palm to his face. He was spitting with rage. I could see it flying off his lips as he shouted at her. ‘Be-aach!’ he called her. Who talks like that? Then she smiled at him. That took the wind from his sails. Funny how that works. Back in the army I remember blokes, who would snap you in half for tuppence, melt like butter if some tart smiled at them. He put his arm round her and she sort of snuggled in. Then he grabbed at her tit. She pushed him off with both hands, really quick. That’s when he stabbed her. It was so quick. I didn’t even see the knife till he pulled it out. Wham, straight in the guts. Done. He turned away and walked past me down the path. As he passed he gave me that ‘I know where you live’ look. Kitchen knife I think. Best keep shtum. Keep myself to myself. Better watch that Ryland though. Nasty bastard.