A story, inspired by a day with my B. Part 1.

The two friends had been out, walking, talking. One taking photographs, the other having left her camera at home. A shared passion, photographs. Both loving the unexpected beauty in the carved, the unlooked for, the unloved, the unintended.
Crossing the busy road from the shell of the building being eaten away by time and the march for progress, for more housing that would be hard for most to afford, for more shops few would visit, for offices while so many lay abandoned in the rest of the city, their concrete and glass no longer en-vogue. They walked towards the monument, adorned with statues of great men of the past. Perhaps once an awe inspiring roundabout, admired by those in horse and carriage on their way to and from the grandest railway station in the country. Celebrating the modern, the innovative, the new, now consigned to verdigris,traffic fumes and grafitti. Out of place, but immovable, a thing in the way, to be driven around with care as it blocked the view of oncoming traffic. An obstacle.
The two stop, dumping their bags on the lowest step, looking up at the statues, blinking against the rays of the sun shining past them.
"I've always wanted to climb up there and sit on the knee of one of them.." she pauses, grinning "Yanno, just sit there. see if anyone notices."
The other grins back and climbs the first step, the first hopping up after, the pair of them looking at the height of the next step.
"Second thoughts.. I'm not sure I can jump up there without falling off."
The girl with the camera, looks quizzically at the step, then around. The girl without does likewise, partners in some semi-imagined crime, already looking around for police who may not think the game so fun.
"Go on!" encouraged the girl without as the other rested her hands behind her on the ledge, nonchallantly, nothing to see here.. then she pulls herself up and gives the statue nearest her a hug, as the girl without reaches for her friends camera, fumbling with the flash to counter the low autumnal rays of brilliance from behind the monument..
Giggling, she wraps the camera back in its case and drops it into her friend's bag, looking around to check none of the few passers by had any hats or stabvests she scrambles up beside the statue on the other corner, turning to sit on the lap of the once shiny copper man, the friends grin and wave at each other. In itself, their enjoyment another degredation of the monument, of the great men's achievements. Did the statues mind? Did they care? Did they know?
It would seem not, that they did.. and oh, most certainly.