The city smells stale, like day-old breath and rubber tyres.

It's early morning, and the sunlight's stale too, tinged grey with tiredness. In the sea of nondescript faces, he's indistinguishable – a little pale, a little sharply-pointed, fair-haired. He's twelve, maybe thirteen, and in uniform.

He changes identities as casually as another would change his shirt.

He closes his eyes. The city's sticky-sweet, like banana peels and apple cores and car exhaust and urine, and when you close your eyes, you're part of it, part of the tip-tap-tip of polished shoes and hum of conversation and –

Someone bumps into him, and the spell's over. A man looks down at him apologetically and says, "Sorry, sorry," and his smooth round face is creased because there's something vaguely familiar about the boy's evenly-spaced, mild grey eyes and he wishes he could put a finger on it – but the latte's hot in his round little fingers, and he doesn't want to be late for work and already, the moment's gone.

But the boy watches the man intently as he waddles away, like a duck, he thinks, stomach thrust forward; like a pig, all smooth and white and pink.

And then he closes his eyes.

He breathes in; this time, cologne, fabric softener, air freshener. They're all comforting, familiar smells. He feels different too; his clothes feel softer against his skin, but tighter, and there's a faint throbbing in his knees.

He opens his eyes.

It's a squarish, large room, white walls, high ceiling, and hardwood floors. Modern but impersonal, like a hotel room, with the blue blinds pulled down, and the round, white face of the clock telling him half-past six. He's standing in front of a full-length mirror. He looks at himself.

He's middle-aged, rotund, in a three-piece suit and expensive shoes. His face is round and a little bewildered-looking, his hairline receding.

He moves out of the room. He can smell something good, from the kitchen and he can hear something too. A woman has her back turned to him, her shoulder moving rhythmically with the knife as she chops vegetables, her tight glossy curls bouncing. She turns to face him and he studies her round, snub features and the way her mouth stretches into a half-smile.

"Dinner in five," she says and he smiles too, because she makes him smile.

"Sit down," he says gently, and he takes the knife from her, "let me help."
And then he kills her.