But if breakfast had bolstered Julius’s spirits, they crashed as he crossed back to the apartment building and down to the basement storage cages. Taxis weren’t practical if he got in a situation where he needed to get away, and the closest Julius had come to driving a car was a tractor in a field, not a car in city traffic. But he’d ridden scooters around his family village as soon as his feet were able to reach the pedals.

The basement was lit by slit windows that cast long shadows into the mesh storage cages. Duke had died here and he imagined Collins’s crew laughing as they posed with his corpse.

Julius turned the key in Remi’s storage cage. He’d forgotten to ask about Duke’s scooter before Remi left, and for all Julius knew it had been sold.

The cage had a battery-powered light that worked on a motion sensor. It showed an old bedsheet over the scooter as it flickered on. The petrol tank was two-thirds full. Julius remembered a seat with a split big enough to fit your hand in, but Duke had replaced it for a better one before he died.

He wheeled the scooter out of the cage and down a short hallway. Out in sun, the engine had a debate before starting, and since Julius hadn’t ridden in two years, he decided to practise, riding figure-eights around the concourse. The sun dazzled, but over several circuits, Julius noticed how concrete around one of the pillars was cleaner than everywhere else.

Where they scrubbed Duke’s blood …

Julius couldn’t look once he’d seen it. He throttled up angrily and blasted on to the street. He was a wary rider. Taking it slow, getting the feel for steering and earning honks from more experienced riders when he stopped rather than brave narrow gaps in traffic.

A roadblock took a couple of the two-hundreds he’d rolled up while eating breakfast. A tiny paper ticket gave him a pass for the rest of day, provided he didn’t lose it.

Pedestrians didn’t look, and truck drivers seemed to target scooters for sport, but Julius’s major fear was cops. Traffic police rarely wasted bribe-earning time arresting people, but they’d clean out his wallet for riding without a licence.

Julius tensed as he took the ramp on to the beltway, but while some cars moved scarily fast, he soon realised the straight road was less stressful than city traffic.

‘Young Julius,’ the guard on the development’s main gate said brightly. ‘Very long time! And taller than ever.’

Julius had worried about being let in. Now he’d been recognised, he worried the guard might tip someone off. After public roads, the deserted streets of the gated development felt like carpet. Unsure what he’d find at his former home, he buzzed past slowly.