Brendan sat next to Wilbur on a bus as it slowly threaded its way through the leafy northwestern suburbs of Corviston. Brendan would have honestly preferred an Uber, just to get in and out as quickly as possible, but Floriana had a firm policy of getting around on public transport only, and she had a knack for finding out when people had contravened her edicts. The bus rounded the umpteenth roundabout. It was the offpeak. Most of the other passengers were housekeepers, maids and old ladies with shopping trolleys. 

Brendan looked out the window and watched the expensive houses go past. Most of them were obscured by shrubbery. The forested foothills loomed in the near distance, obscured slightly by heat haze, walling them in like a hedge around a well-manicured garden. This was the type of place where he imagined the guy from yesterday might live. He felt a slight sense of dread well up in his gut. 

His old school had been not far from here, but he had never had any cause to come here since he had left. He realised that there was a slight chance that he might be recognised. For once in his life, he hoped that the "all Asians look the same" thing might actually be true. He had not been that well-known in school, even in his final year, but there was always that chance. 

The tall ivy-laden fences and elm trees gave way to open parkland. Gray Park, was, like the airport, main city centre thoroughfare, Department of Education building, seven streets, five community centres, three schools, four libraries, several trams, at least one train, at least two buses, and countless other things in Corviston, named after Ruth Gray. the founding mother of the Republic of New Carinthia. 

They alighted and headed for their target, the jumble of curved concrete in the middle of the park. Despite the fact it was only a few blocks away from his old school, he had never really been here. This was where the rebellious kids went to wag school and smoke, and well, he had never been one of those. He had never had the time. 

The skatepark was rather well patronized for a school day. Brendan felt the dread knot up in his stomach. He wanted to be in and out as fast as possible. He wondered why they had even agreed to come in the first place. Maybe they should have tried to negotiate with Floriana. But that was pretty futile, usually. 

Wilbur was going to do things by the book, though. He always did. Here goes, Brendan thought.
As he got closer he could see that some of the kids were wearing chains. There were a lot of eyes on him but none of them seemed to belie recognition. He breathed a sigh of relief. 

There was a kid with a nose ring at the front who seemed to be the leader, at least to Brendan. He didn't say anything, just glared at the two newcomers. 

For a moment there was an awkward silence. This was definitely a mistake, Brendan thought. We should have gotten, like, a really famous skater on board to try and sell this project. But I don't know any famous skaters...

Brendan tried to garner up the courage to speak, trying to remember tips on public speaking from school that he barely remembered. 120 words per minute is ideal. Pick one person in the audience and stare them in the eye and deliver your speech to them. "Uh, hi. I'm Brendan-" 

"And I'm Wilbur, and we're from an organisation called the Corvistion Intelligent Neighbourhood Co-Operative," Wilbur completed his sentence, with a noticeably more peppy delivery. 

They were met by complete silence. Brendan estimated that only half of them were even looking at him. They did not look very excited. Some of them were giving them sidelong glances and whispering amongst each other. Not very confidence-inspiring.

"We've got an exciting new project we'd like to run past you guys. A really exciting one." Wilbur had decided to do most of the talking, something which Brendan was grateful for. "You'll actually be able to ride your boards on it." 

They had their attention. Brendan breathed a sigh of relief. This was going to be a bit easier from here on. 

"We're going to redevelop this park," Wilbur made a sweeping gesture. Brendan prayed that he would have the tact to not mention that they were demolishing the skatepark. "We're going to build a guideway you can ride your boards on. But first you'll have to get them fitted with special guidewheels and motors."

"So like a Boosted Board?" Nose Ring Kid asked.

"Sort of. But there's no battery. There's a third rail next to the guideway, uh, hidden away." 

Brendan racked his brain for a comparable real-world example they would be able to relate to. "So kinda like the trains on the Wythaven Metro." 

They just looked at him quizzically. They had no idea what he meant. Brendan swore internally.

"So it doesn't have power once it's off the track?" Someone else in the crowd yelled out. 

"No," Wilbur clarified.

"That's kinda dumb," Nose Ring Kid said. Several people laughed at that. Brendan really wished they had hired someone who these kids actually respected to do the talking. 

"Well the idea is that you just ride it like a normal board off the track," he explained.

"Well it's got all that shit on it, like the guidewheels and motors and stuff. It's going to be heavy as fuck, so why didn't you make it battery powered-" 

"Back EMFs," someone yelled in the back.

"How fast can it go?" Someone else asked. 

"About, uh, I think 40 km/h on the track," Wilbur ad-libbed. 

"That's kinda slow." Nose Ring Kid said, smirking. A couple of the kids behind him giggled.

 "Wouldn't be easier to just build a train line and let us carry our boards on it? I mean, it's cool, it's just kinda useless."

Brendan winced internally. This was not going well. 

"So how much does it cost?" Another person in the crowd asked. "To modify the board."

"Uh, it's free. We give you a small rebate to get the parts. That will be funded by the, uh, the city council," Brendan hoped his improvisation was not too obvious. He felt the sweat on the nape of his neck. 

"So you want to pay us to make our boards worse?" Another kid in the background piped up. "That's stupid." Some of the others laughed. 

Brendan tried to think up of an answer to this. His brain was frozen. Wilbur did not seem to notice the setup of the joke. 

"Are those the Barefoot Is Legal Jordan 1s?" Nose Ring Kid inquired, looking at Wilbur's sneakers, with a noticeable note of excitement in his voice. "Are they legit?"

"Yeah," Wilbur replied, glad to find some common ground. Brendan winced internally. 

"StockX verified and all that?" 

"You know they let in reps," the kid standing next to him said. 

"Yeah, but still-" 

"Yeah, they are," Wilbur clarified. 

Brendan noticed that the others had fallen silent. The whispering and glances had stopped.

They had also discreetly formed a semicircle behind them. Some of them seemed to have their gazes directed towards his colleague's feet.

"Cool." There was silence for a few moments. An arpeggio thunderclap of plywood on concrete sounded as the entire horde dropped their boards and swarmed as one. A tidal wave of teens swamped Wilbur. 

Brendan swore and dove into the human tidal wave in front of him. His plan was simple. Get Wilbur and run for it. To hell with getting the community on their side. 

"Hey!" A voice called out. Everybody in the melee froze. 

Nose Ring Kid stared up. Brendan, looking up, saw that there was fear in his eyes. Actual fear.

Brendan disentangled himself from the melee and looked in the same direction. For a moment he couldn't really comprehend what he was seeing. 

The stranger was dressed impeccably, and he cut an imposing figure at the edge of the skatepark. He looked like he had stepped straight out of one of the Korean dramas his mother liked to watch. Brendan found himself imagining him as the scion or the heir of a pack somewhere in the northwestern fringes of the island. There were many in Corviston- studying, buying real estate, keeping the nightclubs and luxury boutiques and law firms buzzing. But what was someone like that doing in a skatepark? 

"I have your father on speeddial, Oscar." He said, without raising his voice. The crowd of kids had fallen silent. "Get your things. And give the guy his shoes back." 

"Who the hell are you?" Someone in the crowd yelled. Nose Ring Kid - Oscar - gave him a black stare, then turned to face the tall stranger. 

"You're going back to school," the sartorially well-endowed stranger ordered. "Now."

"No," Oscar retorted. "because it fucking sucks." 

"Remember what we talked about last time, Oscar? You can't just skip classes if you feel like it."
They stared each other down. There was an impasse, which must have lasted no longer than 5 seconds, but felt like half an hour to Brendan. 

"Fine," Oscar said, finally. Brendan watched on for the next few minutes, not sure what to do with himself while his colleague put on his shoes and Nose Ring Kid got his school bag, said goodbye to his mates and left, and the other kids went back to what they were doing. 

"I'm his art teacher," the stranger said, by way of introduction, once only Wilbur, Brendan and him were left. "And apparently, the only teacher he listens to."

"Thanks for that." Brendan felt slightly awkward. 

He shrugged. "No problem. You guys want a lift?" He jangled his keys. 

Wilbur opened his mouth, but Brendan beat him to it. "Sure." 

"Lovely. I'm just parked around the corner." He pointed at a navy blue Jaguar, which was the only visible vehicle in the parking lot of the park. "I'm Adrian, by the way. Nice to meet you."

***

"And he claimed that the new design had ruined the crosswind stability of the old one-"

"Yes. Good old LJK Setright. He was a funny fellow." Adrian feathered the throttle, and they inched forward almost inperceptibly. They had been stopped at the same jam for almost 10 minutes. The intersection with Sewell Rd was in sight, several hundred metres in front of them, but judging by the pace of things they weren't getting there anytime soon. With every traffic light cycle they moved ever closer, but never seemed to get there. 

"I used to commute here every day," Brendan said. "The traffic's even worse now." 

A thousand thoughts were whirling in his brain. What was he doing here? Why was he here? How did they keep on meeting? Was that a coincidence or was it something else? "This is going nowhere." 

Adrian weaved into the right lane, squeezing into a space barely large enough for the big Jag. "So what are you doing all the way over here?"

"I'm an intern at an urban planning office," Brendan replied. "My colleague and I were doing, uh, community outreach. Not very successfully, as you can see." 

"Ah." Adrian inched the car forward slightly. "The 13-18 year old market. Notoriously hard nut to crack." 

"This is just as bad as the other lane." Brendan commented, from the beige leather and burr walnut-ensconced front passenger quarters of the Jag. 

"That's fine," Adrian said, spinning the wheel, squeezing into an even tighter gap in the right lane. "We won't be here for long." 

Putting one foot on the brake while he turned the wheel right to full lock, Adrian gave it the beans. The rear wheels broke traction and the tail snapped to the right in a cloud of smoke. And then they were facing the other direction, on the other, empty side of the road. 

"I believe it's called a Jarno Donut. Or something like that," Adrian said, offhandedly, veering across the empty lanes to the left. He turned left into a side street, then into another one, then they turned left again and merged into the sea of vehicles heading west across town on Sewell Rd. They passed the intersection they had been stuck just before. The cars in front of them were still stuck there. 

Brendan felt a sense of deja vu wash over him. Every building was familiar to him. He thought about the five and a half years of getting off at Sewell station and queuing for the Route 60 bus every day. It was one of the better memories from the last few years. 

"So where you do want me to drop you off?" Adrian asked, as they crossed the wide expanse of Ruth Gray Memorial Boulevard. 

For a moment, Brendan got a glimpse of the central square, the bridge over the river, the industrial complexes on the other side.

"Just drop us off at Briarleaf Station," he said. "That'll be the most convenient option."