Most fun you can have with fifty pence… Buy a loaf of sliced bread, go to the Thames and start throwing that shit in the air. It’s like the fucking Battle of Britain. Gulls whoosh like Spitfires in the sky—screeching, flapping, fighting. One grabs a piece, the others go rabid, chase it, peck until they draw blood. Gulls of war!

Not that day. That day, I was made. I sat on a bench. The air over the Thames was hazy, stinging cold. Its brown water—swollen by the Atlantic tide.

My breath had steadied, so I opened the styrofoam box, taking in the smell. Thick fried cod, vinegar drizzled over chips. I shoved a big piece of fish up my gob with a clump of chips to soak up the grease. The gulls circled overhead.

I’d gone to the chippy with the lads from the estate, as usual. We’d wait for the bloke to clean the fryer and give us a bag of scraps to make sandwiches. But that day, I saw my chance.

A shrivelled geezer was fumbling with his change too long. I broke off from my mates, snatched his takeaway and ran like hell.

Shouts chased me out the chippy, past the butcher where I nearly slipped on pig blood discarded on the pavement, and through the market. I’d run, clutching the box, lungs pumping cool triumph.

I finished my oily feast and stared at the bottom of the styrofoam. I walked up to the railing. My belly was full and I was on top of the world. No more scraps for me.

I threw the box high over the river. Deep fried leftovers flew like golden nuggets in the hazy air.

The gulls of war descended. Screaming, tearing each other apart. Fighting over my scraps.