Balham

You're getting paid to be here and I paid to be here that's the difference I thought to myself as I imagined the change to fall from my pocket as I gathered tobacco, papers and filters from the inside of my jacket. I need to stop smoking I said to my partner as I sat down again at the table that we have our laptops laid out on. I'd just had a roll-up outiside the cafe. Half of one anyway. I'd bounced it off the curb and into a drain. I stood there and watched people pass by. It was busy for some reason. We'd spent the whole day here. Well in this cafe and the one across the street. Clara's got deadlines coming up and I'd been writing for my own leisure. I watched people pass as I stood by the lampost. I thought about the area. 20 years ago it was a shithole though twenty years ago I was in SOuth-East London unaware that this place ecver existed, I don't think that I even knew about it seven or six years ago for that matter. A boy watched me from the other side of the road. Trains passed the hotel to my right that I have fond memories of being inside andj the there was a taxi halfway over the corssing of the road waiting to turn around. People walked past. I didn't wonder who actually lived here. I belived them all to. Bussiness women and the people that weren't wveryone walking past. It's 7:14 now. I guess people are heading home. I don't live here. I've stayed here for the past month now but I don't live here. I'm just staying with my partner and her family.