CHAPTER 1
MAYA
The morning ritual never changes. Same corner table at Brew & Bytes, same oat milk cortado, same worn leather journal where I pretend to write profound thoughts but mostly jot down grocery lists and complaint letters I'll never send.
The café buzzes with its usual Tuesday symphony with the espresso machine hissing, barista Sarah calling out orders with theatrical flair, the businessman in the pinstripe suit who always orders alarge black coffeelike he's personally offending the craft coffee gods. I've been documenting these patterns for three months now. Material for the blog, I tell myself.City Living Hack #47: Find Your Anchor Spot and Guard It Fiercely.
My phone glides against the scarred wooden table. Text from my editor atUrban Pulse.
Maya - need the gentrification piece by 3pm. No extensions this time.
The cursor blinks mockingly in my Google Doc. Seven hundred words about neighborhood displacement, and I've managed exactly forty-three. All variations ofChange is complicatedandHousing costs are rising. Groundbreaking journalism, truly.
I take another sip of cortado and?—
Thud.
The sound cuts through the café chatter like a dropped anvil. Deep. Resonant. Wrong.
"Did you hear that?" I ask Marcus as he wipes down the counter.
"Hear what?"
Thud.
This time, the businessman's coffee cup rattles against his saucer. The art student in the corner looks up from her MacBook, earbuds dangling.
"That." I point vaguely toward the street. "The...thumping."
Jeffrey shrugs. "Construction? Council's been promising to fix the water mains since Brexit."
Thud.
The rhythm's too regular for construction. Too deliberate. Like a heartbeat amplified through concrete.
My cortado has gone lukewarm. The foam art, a questionable attempt at a swan has devolved into beige sludge. I close my laptop with more force than necessary.
"See you tomorrow, Jeffrey."
"Same time, same table?"
"Always."
The morning air hits my face as I push through the café door. London's perfected the art of being simultaneously gray and bright, like someone's adjusted the contrast settings on reality. Two doors down, my building squats between Brew & Bytes and Mrs. Dan's flower shop. Victorian brick facade, art deco lobby that's seen better decades, four floors of residents who nod politely in the lift and pretend not to hear each other's domestic dramas through paper-thin walls.
Thud.
Louder now. Much louder.
I fish for my keys while balancing laptop bag, journal, and the remains of my dignity. The building's entrance hall smells like floor polish and someone's overenthusiastic air freshener "Spring Meadow" that's never seen an actual meadow.
Thud.
The sound seems to be coming from everywhere. Radiating through the building's bones.
Mrs. Patterson from 3B emerges from the lift, clutching her tartan shopping trolley like a shield.
"Dreadful noise, isn't it?" She adjusts her glasses. "Started about an hour ago. I've phoned the council twice."
