Excerpt: Tomorrow (tentative)

The darkness descended especially quickly on these wintry evenings. Clouds shifted over a pale, wheat-colored sun, casting long silhouettes along silent streets. In the busier parts of the city, lights still twinkled weakly behind drawn curtains, and vague shapes still moved within clustered houses. Furtive figures crept along the edges, careful to keep out of the revealing light of the street lamps; illicit lovers entangled themselves soundlessly in blackened corners. Here, the secret lives of many began at this time.

But on the other side of the city, almost all was still. No lights shone in these streets; no bright windows alleviated the unrelenting darkness. Grim, lonely buildings glared down, casting an impregnable gloom on their surroundings. And in the midst of one such deadened street, a solemn-faced seven-year-old treaded with a slow deliberation across the cracked sidewalk.