Layal took small steps. She looked across a field of rubble, befallen houses and distressed foliage. “In that house, in that house,” she said, pointing with her arm outstretched at what remained of Uncle Sharif’s two storey mansion, “in that house my uncle, my three cousins, his wife and mother stayed.

There once was a boy who was constantly told how to be, how to do and how to grow up. On television, MTV told him to wear lose parachute pants, spike up his hair and lyricise suggestive words. In the theater, movies told him to act suave and to accept everything and anything as the truth.

Emily died. Suddenly. Unexpectedly. In a rather terrifying manner involving a slippery staircase, a glass pane and high heeled Jimmy Choos.

At first, Steve wanted her back. If that wasn’t possible, then he was going to join her. Still, he never felt death reach out with its claws to grapple that soul of his.