Truth be told, she didn’t care a damn about what her father thought at the moment. He was off enjoying himself at the markets with Maive. Sofia felt a stab of jealousy at that, without being able to pin down exactly who she felt jealous of and why. All the fifteen-year-old knew for sure was that she was stuck here in the loft concerned about the horses and bored out of her brains.

She sighed and her breath fogged up the glass directly in front of her face. She rubbed it clean with the arm of her sweater, wiping away a few marks she hadn’t known were there. They looked like ghostly impressions of her face – probably left over from the last time she’d stood pressed to the window while being held prisoner in the apartment.

The glass vibrated against her forehead. Living one floor above them was a rail-thin, long-haired meth head who cranked his stereo up during the day to sleep off the previous night’s drug binge. His favourite pastime of late was to stand in his window, waving his genitals to passers-by while shouting ‘I’M OKAY! I’M ALL RIGHT!’ Complaints to the landlord and the local authorities achieved nothing. There weren’t enough cops to respond or medical personnel to treat him, and they didn’t have room in the jails or psych wards anyway. She knew that from her part-time job, her three afternoon and evening shifts a week at North Kansas City General. The man was a public nuisance, but no one could quite bring themselves to throw him out on his own. He was a veteran, anyway, and so virtually untouchable. Her father had threatened him more than once, which a sane man would have taken to heart. But their neighbour was not sane. He was a crazy fucking loser. Papa had eventually given up trying to do anything about him. Like he had given up on so much else.

The meth head was just one of many in the neighbourhood. On the rare occasion she watched the news, Sofia saw a fantasy version of what life was like here in Kansas City. Safe streets patrolled by friendly cops, and militia working side by side with wholesome, smiling families – they always seemed to be gringo families, to use her father’s embarrassing term – rebuilding America.

Above her, the volume went up, as her neighbour started dancing, rattling the plates in the kitchen cabinet. She considered going upstairs and punching the genital helicopter square in the face, but thought better of it. One assault a week was enough.