Dormansland Hall owned farmland adjoining the school grounds. There were plans for a sports complex and an extra boarding house, but until money was raised, a roofless barn and dilapidated farmhouse remained. Teen couples sneaking out of school earned it the nickname Shag Shack.

Julius searched the Shag Shack, with his torch catching the graffitied walls. He settled on a battered couch, pulled up an armchair for his feet, took off soggy shoes and socks and set the alarm on his phone for 5:30.

He only managed a couple of naps and bought fruit, toast and coffee in the station cafe, before boarding the 5:56. His ticket didn’t open the automatic barrier at London Victoria and a wiry inspector explained that it was valid for the previous day. He tried to fine Julius twenty pounds, but lost heart after Julius pulled his Nigerian passport for ID and gave a home address in Akure.

Rush hour was getting underway as Julius stood for a packed Underground ride to Sloane Square. He did a quick refuel with a double-egg McMuffin and imagined black-suit-and-sunglasses immigration officers bursting from the flower delivery van parked across the street as he turned his key in the smart black door of the Chelsea house.

The door clattered against something, and his nose caught cooking that reminded him of home. There was luggage stacked in the entry hall, coats piled in a chair, juju music blasting from an upstairs bedroom and a girls vs boys football match in the passageway leading to the dining room.

‘Hello,’ Julius told the kids warily.

They didn’t seem fazed by a stranger.

He glanced into the living room, which was scattered with plates and beer cans, then darted upstairs, fearing for the state of his room.

But it wasn’t his room any more. An obese, shirtless man sat on the super-king bed, with his hand down a bag of Cool Wave Doritos. The two chests of drawers were topped with travel cribs, and a tiny twin slept in each one.

‘Cousin Julius,’ the flabby thirty-something man said, smiling broadly, but keeping his voice down for the sleeping babies. ‘Too long! It has been too long!’

People tended to remember Julius because of his size. He wouldn’t have placed this cousin amongst a hundred others, except Orisa had mentioned visiting her brother’s new-born twins.

‘Kenny?’

‘Always Ken,’ he corrected. ‘You must have been on a farm. No offence, but I know cow shit when I smell it.’

Julius must have got used to the smell. He realised the stares he’d been getting on the Tube and in McDonald’s weren’t just because of his height …

‘Cross-country, in the dark,’ Julius explained, smiling at his tiny baby cousins. ‘What’s going on? Why are so many people here?’