I always wanted to be good at music. To be able to sing, carry a tune, play an intricate melody, to move someone with an expression without comparison. Music is a faster route to emotions than any other art. And here I am, stuck between an incomprehensible scream and all these convoluted words.

In front of me, the sun sets behind the tall chimneys of the old paper factory, creating the illusion of a single lit candle on a dinner table of rooftops and tree crowns. It’s getting cold, but I don’t want to leave. The oncoming darkness is easier than the complexity within the light waiting at home. The pain of the cold external, the pain of the warmth internal.

It is with renewed understanding for my parents that I acknowledge that it is the music of the 90s I keep returning to when I need to be understood. I guess the time of our teens shapes us in more ways than we realise by emphasising the language by which we communicate.

It’s too cold. I have to surrender.