Ultid

Ell Arr taking me to see the abandoned block of flats where he lived. I gathered he'd been evicted from his apartment some 2 years previously but on some insistence had remained there. We wandered up to the fifth floor or so and he showed me how the lock on the front door had not been disabled and that the flick of a breadknife allowed him access. Once inside the flat he told me to hide, seemingly aware that the demolition contractors or the council or suchlike were on their way. I crouched down behind an obscured half-height shower screen in the bathroom, while he hid in behind the door at the sink. Unfortunately for us part of the front door, the metal flange surrounding the lock, seemed to vibrate consistently and noisily. Ell exited several times in an attempt to silence this source of frustration and a means of pinpointing our location. He had no success and before we knew it the bathroom was swarming with middle-aged business types, keen to read us the riot act with their spectacles. Ell encouraged me to take off the minute they entered the bathroom and I did not hesitate, barging my way through the crowd and racing out the front door. Ell was in hot pursuit and I remember the pair of us pelting down the stairwell, leaping over the bannisters, taking several steps at a time, in order to speed to our freedom-