from the top of St Giles, the grey-capped boulevard closed to cars and empty. I’d seen flames coming out of the roof on the tv news and known it must be bad, but it only looks wounded in the morning sunshine, not gone to rubble like a V-1 strike. I ride on, puzzled by the scent overhanging the town. Memories of planting silvered potatoes in the ashes of morning-after bonfires, kicking through the remnants at the edge of the burn and hunting for dud firework survivors while we waited for the crop to roast. The smell of the firepit in your clothes and hair on the ride back home.
