The laptop screen pulses with the sickly blue light of a low-resolution scan. On the Brighton-bound train, the carriage is nearly empty, smelling of damp wool and recycled air. Roisin leans into the glare, her grey-green eyes reflecting the 1992 Falls Road pavement. She drags the cursor back, scrubbing through the canvas tapes she filmed just yesterday in Belfast.
Bernadette Brennan’s kitchen had been a mausoleum of unwashed teacups and a small boy's coat still hanging on the peg. Now, in the digital rushes, the nine-year-old Conor Brennan walks toward the camera. He stops, looking directly into the lens with a distinctive, crooked smile that hitches higher on the left. In the background, a man in a navy uniform crosses the street, his face caught in the same sharp evening sun.
It’s him. The postman who has delivered her mail for thirteen years stands frozen on the screen, the adult mirror of the boy’s impossible grin. Roisin’s finger traces the freeze-frame, and slowly pulls the Brighton postal schedule from her bag.
