Like Tippi Hedren in The Birds, I first become aware of the unusual assembly in New Street on 8 April without totally comprehending it. I’m on the phone to my editor, strolling past Blank Street Coffee, musing on what I’ll have for dinner and the mistake I’ve made in picking a thick spring blouse for what has turned out to be a surprise summer’s day. But suddenly, I realise what’s happening around me.
Christ, I think. There’s a lot of teenagers about.
There are hundreds of them, choking the junction where New Street joins forces with High Street and the path through the Bullring. Some giggle excitedly in clusters, heavily gelled heads whipping about, looking to see who’s looking back. Others jerk their limbs around in tandem, mugging at phone cameras filming their movements. Tinny bluetooth speakers blast dancehall tracks from Spice and Vybz Kartel.
The city centre is a greyscale wash; whether sportswear or the hotpants and bandeau combo favoured by lots of girls, the approved colours seem to be grey, white or black. The only bright splashes are the tiny handbags sported by a few, and the artificial shades dyed or woven into adolescent hair.
Big reveal: I’m not from Birmingham and I spent a sheltered youth in rural Herefordshire. At 31, I don’t hang out with teenagers. So frankly, I have no gauge on whether a weekday evening gathering of this size, in an urban city centre, is normal or not. Maybe there’s a pop up? Some TikTok person giving out trainers? Free chicken at Wingstop? Regardless, the business of those below voting age is not of my concern, so I keep walking and talking until suddenly, I’m being swarmed by a mass of Nike string bags and bucket hats.
It’s an onslaught, children pounding down the steps towards St Martin’s, screaming and whooping. “They’re everywhere!” I yell to my editor, above the melee. There is no discernible thing they are running to; Central Cee isn’t waiting to greet them and nor can I see the knot of people that suggests a fight is underway.
Yet boys in balaclavas are leaping from the top stair to the bottom in their haste, while girls hold onto their scarves and necklines to stop any slips as they scramble down. “Moya,” says my editor on the other end. I can barely hear him above the screams. “Are you witnessing a link-up?”
The stampede begins. Video: The Dispatch
A “link-up”, for the uninitiated, is the new term for a large number of British teenagers amassing in one place, causing bemusement and/or chaos. Over the Easter break, link-ups in London, Milton Keynes and Birmingham have been reported in the press, with six arrests in London and a “handful” in Birmingham. All the episodes have started with events advertised on social media and finished with local politicians wringing their hands in despair.
When the teen wave hits me, I don’t know any of this. So I start asking questions instead.
“Excuse me,” I say to a boy sauntering past, tidy in a khaki two-piece. “What’s going on? Why is everyone running?”
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