Soon Gone: A Windrush Chronicle

At the start of a new century, 21 year-old cousins Malcolm and David reflect on their radically different upbringings and consider their current situations: Malcolm, black and in trouble with the police; David, never really thinking about his mixed-heritage and enjoying life at university.

Malcolm is fiercely conscious of his colour, instilled in him by his activist mother, Yvonne. For David, life with his parents, Samantha and Kev, was much more relaxed. But Malcolm has a secret that David unwittingly unlocks when he invites him to a university event and the two young men reach for an understanding that will make them closer than ever.

It is 2011 and there are riots outside the house, but Cyrus confuses this uprising with previous ones where black youths have protested against government and the police.

Dementia forces his memories to fragment, bringing back painful incidents from his early life in England, as well as reinforcing his feelings for his family and his love for Eunice; his relations with his son Kev still seem problematic. There is one shocking revelation that is too much for him however - and that he will do anything to avoid.

As we come full circle from Cyrus's arrival in London decades earlier, he balances sober reflection with his trademark humour as, in the midst of his confusion, he contemplates whether life in England has been worth everything.

Teenager Michaela Williams has always considered herself as black, but looks white. Fighting for her right to self-identify at school she was puzzled when, years earlier, her great-grandmother Eunice seemed to approve of the fact she looked like she did.

She was close to Eunice, but went to her great-aunt Yvonne for answers. Now, the Windrush scandal of enforced repatriations, detentions and denial of healthcare and provisions has brought the question of heritage and belonging into sharp relief. A school project gives Michaela an opportunity to look at her own family, explore the wider implications for the Caribbean community in Britain, and consider how much longer the community can survive with a discrete identity.