Oliver's diary

5Nov

The Room Kept His Score

I felt the room turn before Hugo came back. For one horrible second I thought I had spent years becoming the exact sort of man people accuse of arranging everyt…

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4Nov

The Lock Knows My Secret

Of course the first man to notice my tool is the one standing in the dark at the boat shed. I suppose that is funny. I laughed once while I was twisting free, b…

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3Nov

The Lie I Kept

Elsie admitting she stayed silent unsettles me more than the accusation itself. She handed me the shape of the lie, and I recognised the cowardice inside it bec…

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2Nov

The Van Knows My Name

The boatman’s shout bothered me more than the van did. Men like that remember the useful parts of you: your face, your hands, the job you thought everyone had f…

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1Nov

The photograph knows too much

Arthur’s photograph feels less like evidence than an invitation written by a dead man. The damaged corner should bother me, and it does, but not because of the…

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31Oct

The Box Was Cheering

So the first box was cheering. That would be the joke if I weren’t already angry enough to taste metal. The photograph made the London skyline look smug, but th…

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30Oct

The joke landed badly

The first useful thing I felt today was anger, because the knee was faster than me. Being clipped by a forklift and then crawling across the pavement while grow…

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29Oct

The Shame of the Clean Exit

My first clean decision in weeks, and I nearly ruined it by waiting to feel triumphant. Calling the police instead of trying to recover the carrier felt sensibl…

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28Oct

The Courier Saw Me

Mara’s offer was better than I expected, and that made it more dangerous. A public retraction, her word against the Scaffold Boy story, and all I had to do was…

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27Oct

The Number on the Wall

The council arrived precisely when the interesting part did. Typical. I suppose I should be grateful the nameplate was already safe, though nobody asked whether…

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26Oct

The Lead I Refused to Take

Cleo had my collar in one hand and my attention in both. She said the programme could clear me, and I understood exactly what she was offering. What I disliked…

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25Oct

The joke stopped landing

I laughed when they called me Scaffold Boy. Just once, hard enough to hurt my ribs, because if I got there first then I could control the shape of it. That laug…

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24Oct

The bag slipped, so I kept going

I hate that the first thing I felt was relief when I hit the trench floor. Not because I was hurt, although my knee made that clear soon enough, but because Ral…

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23Oct

The Missing Tray Stayed With Me

I opened a rusted cupboard and immediately confirmed what employers mean by “clear route.” Clearly the route was clear if nobody had a pulse. The supervisor cal…

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21Oct

A Lie With Weight

I enjoyed handing over the decoy. Not enough, never enough, but there was a nasty little thrill in watching the officer believe he had taken something from me.…

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20Oct

The blank roll lied

The blank film bothered me more than the damage to the brass. Damage can be dated, measured, photographed. A blank roll feels like someone reaching into the pas…

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19Oct

The Locked Camera Case

I keep telling myself this is procedure now, but the camera case is still a hiding place, and I am still the boy who wants the prize before anyone else can turn…

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18Oct

Eighteen Minutes Too Convenient

Well, Northbank Heritage Recovery managed to accuse me of trespass before I had even entered the reservoir. That is impressively stupid, or impressively prepare…

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17Oct

The Name Felt Too Light

It is humiliating how much I wanted those volunteers to know it was me. Public courage says let them cheer; privately I wanted their voices to stitch my name in…

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16Oct

My Mark Found Me

I keep coming back to those two words: CLAIMANT IDENTIFIED. Not suspected. Not questioned. Identified. The split-notch mark is mine, and somewhere behind that s…

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15Oct

Keeping Every Receipt

Basil Trent announcing my past to a crowd of cameras was not subtle. Still, there was something almost decent about him pointing straight at me instead of inven…

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14Oct

Evidence Has a Funny Sense of Humour

Femi paid me in paperwork, which is a disappointingly honest substitute for money. I nearly laughed, but anger had hold of me. I kept thinking: if the promise m…

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13Oct

Fraud Is a Strong Word

Fraud is a strong word for a man who confused technical evidence with a personality. Still, I felt it land, and that is the part I hate: the cameras made the ac…

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12Oct

The Bit That Stayed Untouched

Keeping the recording private would have made a rather poor headline. Still, I sent the producer the amended rider, and I felt cleaner than any headline could h…

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11Oct

Successful exits and trusted people

Ben's date chose the bus and I called it a win because that's what I do — I make the exit sound like a feature. She didn't want to stay. That's the data. I logg…

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10Oct

Architect of my own trap

Ellis did it tonight. He stopped mid-sentence, looked at this woman across a table full of fake plague victims, and said "I'm nervous." Just that. No joke. No N…

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9Oct

The woman with the lanyard

She had a supermarket lanyard. Sainsbury's, maybe. Didn't clock the name because I was too busy not existing — hood up, staring at my phone like it was a legal…

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8Oct

The Northern One

The bloke in the Black Cab fleece said "good luck with the Northern one, mate" and I didn't correct him. I could've said "it's Edinburgh, actually, the show's a…

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7Oct

Kit can have it

The Chortle thing I could have laughed about. Kit's a mate, right? He's done the Torrington slot before, he deserves it, he probably didn't even know it was min…

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6Oct

The Drabble pile and the closed notebook

Rae not smiling should have told me something. I clocked it and then I didn't. Eight Drabbles and I thought I was winning and she was looking at me like I was s…

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