The air in the small car is warm, the harsh sun as filtered by tinted windows and sun shields graces the grey fabric-covered dashboard as it might a parked car during European summer.

The traffic lights turn from red to green.

I understand now why people say that cars purr. The slow acceleration of the engine is met by a polite resistance from the pedal and a gently hummed awakening of the engine. Nothing like genuine German mechanics, Dad had said. Away from country-side hills and rolling greens, instead near the beach, German mechanics become a coast-goer’s dream. It used to smell like mothballs, but the coconut-surfboard-wax air freshener dangling from the rear view mirror has bound driving to the scents of summer as it has been warmed by and muddled with sunshine. Faux red poppies from who knows when are wrapped tightly around the rear-view, too. They bounce gracefully against the upper seam of the windscreen, dancing with the horizon.

On today’s episode of hack, we’re talking about…

The radio babble cuts to static as driving becomes a rolling downhill descent. The sound is lost in purrs and turning wheels.

…debt. So are we worse off…

Each bump on the road is heightened by the closeness of the car to ground, a foot or so feels like inches.

…some are doing really well…

The steering wheel turns with the same polite resistance of the accelerator. The white bonnet dissolves into the path ahead and destination is forgotten.

The smell of rain is fresh. The streets are silent.

Colonial buildings loom by the sidewalk, discoloured by years of pollution and yellowed by the gentle gold glow of intermittent street lamps, their shadows illuminated by light bouncing off the glossy gravel road.

A car passes by at the end of the street, its wheels ripping from the ground like velcro.

A block away a young couple stands in embrace. They pay no mind to the younger passing waitress as she walks closely behind them on the small footpath.

“I love you so much”

5:16pm

The sun hangs low on the horizon, a rare watchable and watching round of warmth hovering a few minutes above cobalt blue water. It divides the sky into a perfect split half, the warm gradient from peachy orange to hazy baby blue marked as a counterpart to the cool clouds, dyed purple by their shadows, hemmed by brilliant halo’s. Their violet limbs reach greedily around the sun, hungry for light but polite enough still to allow the courtesy of not obscuring its sight.

The ocean moves excitedly, but calmly. Not still, but not full of swell either. It disrupts its own insulting colour, softening the blow, by allowing for shadows to blacken its face with sporadic speckles and stripes.

A 70s building faces outwardly from the street. It is cubic, three great rectangles of thick white concrete boarders framing large slabs of impenetrably dark tinted windows, near as wide and as tall as the face of each floor should allow. Their dirt and grime is alleviated by the wash of golden light. In the reflection of the dark surfaces of their glass, the sky is distorted into an amorphous wash of luminous mid brown.

A small handful of streets away, a train pulls noisily into the station, announces that its doors are closing, and departs again.

Impolite.

The birds don’t sing prettily here, they squawk noisily at each other as they compete for the better branch and the bigger bug. It is sunny, but cool. Windy, but still. The streets are greyed by the lack of people. The bright red flowers on the poinciana trees hemming the curb-side dance delicately. Their stained glass colours are brought to life by the midday sun, warming the bunches until molten and dripping. One drop falls at a time, slowly, steadily. They darken on the concrete and become brown sludge with new rain.

The roads are quiet at 4pm, the school pick-up traffic rush has just come to its end and the mad hurry home from work is yet to begin. A middle-aged man walks along a foot path that runs behind a series of 70s brick-walled buildings with slightly mouldy white wooden windowsills. He stops at a bus stop, a post in the ground, lights a cigarette, takes a deep inhale. He releases the smoke slowly through closed teeth and parted lips, tilting his head towards the sky only slightly, though just enough for him to notice the fine drizzle of rain that had already formed a light blanket of water droplets over his puffer jacket. He takes a step back from the curb-side, so as to huddle with the trunk of a close by tree. The difference of shelter made by its sparse winter leaves is minimal, but the man doesn’t seem to notice. He cranes his neck forward, inhales deeply through his cigarette and inspects the intricacies of the bark closely, or perhaps he follows the path of an ant, or reads a scratched-in love letter.

The rain thickens.

The tungsten light shone with brutality from directly over head, carving the lines of 80 odd years of tiredness further into her soft round face. Her eyes, blue at the iris but yellow still where they should be white, were blank.

Holding her careful upright posture and her still mask, she readjusts her scarf. Despite being indoors it is a necessary addition on account of the terracotta tiles hoarding the little lingering warmth. A pale blue check is wrapped slightly further around her neck and thrown gracefully over her shoulder. It matches her sweater and her eyes.

Her shoulders and elbows are drawn in close.

A dog is sat by the window, still at first, seemingly pensive, as he stares blankly at the little view of the outside world the low reaching glass affords through the small shrubbery and thick leaves. He is silent, and but for the soft sound of a buzzing fly occasionally tapping the glass in desperate escape, it is still. His eyes follow the fly, slowly from left to right.

He stands, tail rigid, leans back, and lunges, making his considered and withheld attack, jaw open and hungry.

Missing, he recoils slightly, returns all four paws to the floor and readjusts. Standing at a distance he continues to watch, measuring the endangered insects movements so that he may calculate his own.

The regular rhythm of weekday coffee making is disrupted by silence. The music is softer, the tourists less frequent, and time progresses at a stalled pace.

The barista stares into space, awkward and unsure of how to spend his time between coffees. Readjust his hat, steal glances at the till girl, think about things that need to be thought about, or perhaps not think at all.

His brow furrows. He grinds, locks, pulls, pours and delivers each cup with a shortbread cookie before the next order has been received.