I go to the sites without anyone accompanying me

I missed a friend this morning.

When I have seen two guys walking, well wrapped, chatting, laughing, I realized that I have to go out alone. Yes, I have acquaintances and here where I rest now they are all very friendly, but friends what is said friends, not even one.

Both here and in my country I go to places without anyone accompanying me or I accompany anyone. How I remember the good times with Mike! It is true that then we were two mindless that we could have fallen in the blackest, but we were kids. After some stumbling with the pigs each one went on his way and, apart from a couple of letters, our relationship faded as it happens with friendships that are not taken care of.

And although with five brothers, I have not enjoyed being on Tuesdays of every week with any of them to have a coffee, a beer or go to the movies like a factory colleague did.

This fucking winter reminds me of the coldest days of Nottingham, when you froze to the balls if you went out for a pack of cigarettes. Although now that I think about it, the damned frost that accumulated in the bars of the railings was the one that, somehow, protected my lungs against the bitumen of the Woods.

I've already said, my best years were spent with Mike. I've always liked to boss about people a little bit – as I did with those assholes at the Borstal - and Mike was a piece of meat that did what I proposed without question and, best of all, without realizing it. We were the perfect team. At least until that five-pound note slipped down to the policeman's shoes. Because Mike was pure muscle and the other boys had to be careful not to look at us in a bad way -as happened to a neighbour who moved to our neighbourhood and was cross-eyed. Because in the blink of an eye they could receive a punch in the face with the force of selfsame Tommy Loughram. And I am not saying with this that he was the brute force and I am the smart one, because after the gutter they will agree with me that a mosquito has more brains than me, as I have already recognized at another time.

This has nothing to envy Skegness; I have the mountain at one step, the beach at half a step, a city that I can go to in a flash if I want to see a movie premiere and, above all, the brolly is an object that is not used frequently in these parts; that's why when a day like today is born and you see the lits of slush landing slowly, it's when I miss the most that I'm not alone.

From my Borstal.

LDR