Meet The Street

Meet the Street: Sophia

Everyone had a life before.

My name’s Sophia.

I notice things.

Not the big things first. The small ones. The bits people step around without realising they’re doing it. How long it takes someone to answer a question. How often the same sound repeats. How quiet it gets before something happens.

Before that night, I kept notebooks. Not diaries. Lists. Observations. Drawings that only made sense if you knew what they were meant to be. I liked having somewhere to put thoughts so they didn’t pile up in my head.

The night the world broke, I was inside.

There was a barbecue. Noise. Laughter that didn’t quite fit the news coming from the TV. The radio kept cutting in with updates that didn’t add up properly. People said it’ll be fine too often. That’s usually how you know it won’t be.

When the bang hit the window, everyone froze.

I didn’t scream. I watched.

I saw how fast the adults moved the younger children back. I saw which neighbours locked their doors immediately and which hesitated. I saw the way Jay positioned himself without being asked. I saw Emma stop listening to the TV and start watching people instead.

After that, the patterns changed.

Some things happened at regular intervals. Others didn’t happen at all anymore. Phones stopped working. Sirens stopped returning. People started repeating the same questions, like saying them enough times might make the answers appear.

I started writing again.

What time things happened. Who went out and who came back. How many people were on the street at dusk versus morning. Which houses stayed dark. Which didn’t. I kept pebbles in my pocket to count things when I didn’t have paper. One for each person. One for each night everyone made it through.

People think watching means being afraid. It doesn’t.

Watching means being prepared.

Emma reads what I write sometimes. She doesn’t ask questions. She just nods and adds it to whatever map she’s building in her head. Jay checks my numbers. He trusts them. That matters.

Justice says I’m creepy. He’s joking. Mostly.

Queen’s Road used to be a place you passed through on the way to somewhere else. Now it’s a system. A set of rules. A collection of people who stay alive because they pay attention to each other.

I don’t mind being quiet. Quiet makes it easier to hear when something’s wrong.

Everyone had a life before.
Welcome to Queen’s Road.