It’s a case like the one I was dealing with in Mexico City, the day I fainted on the way to my ex’s flat. A client was trying to buy – late – a material damages policy after the building had already burned down. I shake my head, entertained. It’s absurd. The schooner captain was seeking compensation through a policy that didn’t cover the schooner, but its sinking. That’s one of the things that could be questioned, I think – one of those coincidences in the obiamán’s iguana hole. I know it’s pointless, not to mention boring, to try and understand the sequence of events on this island through reason alone. It’s the duppy’s way of telling me that things are on offer to anyone who looks for them, that it’s my job to vindicate the histories, the Histories, of it all. I think that might be the value of what I’m writing, even if my story sounds implausible. Islanders would find it normal, ordinary, even; foreigners, affected. I stop. It’s time for the creed. I check my monitor. At last, drops of water start to strike the roof like bullets.

*

Cell service and data have grown even more sporadic in the unrelenting storm. Thunder has shaken the house for three days now.

‘My team plays yours tonight.’ Jaime texted me this morning, although my phone didn’t even alert me until now, around midday, when the rain has finally abated a little. He flies back this evening, if he can make it out. ‘Well well well! Your team, huh?’ I mock the cachaco, who asks me if there’s anything he can bring me from Bogotá. If I’d known he was travelling, I would have asked him to pick up the sensors, but it’s too late. It’s basketball season. Today, Saturday, rain and all, the Barrack team faces off against North End. ‘We could do something at my place, if you like.’ I don’t feel like going anywhere. San Andrés in the rain is unbearable.