“Jazz,” I said. “You wouldn’t like it.”

“Yeah,” she said. “Swing, Latin, or fusion?”

The entourage duly laughed and pointed. I gave her the eye but she ignored me.

“We did jazz last term in music,” she said.

“I bet your mum’s looking for you,” I said.

“No,” she said. “Can we come and watch?”

“No,” I said.

“We’ll be quiet,” she said.

“No you won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“I can see into the future,” I said.

“No you can’t,” she said.

“Why not?”

“ ’Cause that would be a violation of causticity,” she said.

“I blame Doctor Who,” said James.

“Causality,” I said.

“Whatever,” she said. “Can we watch?”

So I let them watch and they lasted two minutes into “Airegin”—which was longer than I’d expected them to.

“That’s your dad, innit,” she said helpfully when my dad put in an appearance. “I didn’t know he could play.”

It was weird watching my dad sit down and play keyboard with a bunch of musicians. I’d never seen him play live but my memories are full of black-and-white photographs and in those he always had his trumpet in his hand. Trying to hold it in the same way as Miles Davis had, like a weapon, like a rifle at parade rest. He could play the keyboard, though. Even I could tell that. But it still felt like the wrong instrument to me.

It bothered me for the rest of the session, but I couldn’t figure out why.

AFTER THE rehearsal I’d expected us to troop up Leverton Street for a pint at The Pineapple but my mum invited everyone back to the flat. As we headed up the stairs the mouthy girl from the rehearsal stopped me in the stairwell. This time without her posse.

“I heard you can do magic,” she said.

“Where did you hear that?”

“I got my sources,” she said. “Is it true?”

“Yeah,” I said, because sometimes the truth shuts up kids faster than a clip around the ear and has the added advantage of not being an assault on a minor in the eyes of the law. “I can do magic. What about it?”

“Real magic,” she said. “Not like tricks and stuff.”

“Real magic,” I said.

“Teach me,” she said.

“I’ll tell you what,” I said. “You get a GCSE in Latin and I’ll teach you magic.”

“Deal,” she said and stuck out her hand.

I shook, her palm small and dry in mine.

“You promise on your mum’s life,” she said.

I hesitated and she squeezed my hand as hard as she could.

“On your mum’s life,” she said.

“I don’t swear on my mum’s life,” I said.

“Okay,” she said. “But a deal’s a deal—right?”

“Right,” I said. But I was suspicious by that point. “Who are you?”

“I’m Abigail,” she said. “I live up the road.”