‘¿Ya habías venido a un concierto antes?’ the woman asks – Ever been to a concert here before? – while opening a metal thermos and slowly pouring the tea into a little cardboard cup. The r of her ‘concierto’ sounds so hard-edged and Anglo, so familiar, so mercilessly parodied by residents and Raizals when they speak Spanish.

‘No, but I’ve heard they’re incredible,’ I shrug.

‘¿Acaso de dónde visitas tú?’ she asks authoritatively – And where might you be visiting from? – pronouncing the t and the d as if blowing them out from the tip of her tongue, the s intensified and serpentine. She hands me the tea, narrowing her wide eyes before she turns her back and moves towards her chair.

‘I’m from here.’ I cup the hot drink and straighten my back.

The woman stops short before she sits. She tosses me a piercing glance and applauds, cackling; I jump. ‘You’re from here? I’ve never seen you before, mami!’ she exclaims in a silky purr that curls up from her throat. ‘Who are your parents? Let’s see, I know…’ The whole neighbourhood could hear my story right now. Her ruckus reassures me. I let out a long exhalation. She’d inject me with glucose if I fainted.

‘They’re not around anymore, but I’m Raizal on my father’s mother’s side.’ I’m eager to test her – and to share the narrative as if their blood were my own letter of introduction, like Livingston’s from his mother.

‘Yo deh Raizal?!’ shouts the black elder, thrilled. ‘Ay! Tell me, mamacita, how yo niem?’

‘Lynton and Bowie,’ I reply, letting out another deep breath and taking a sip of hot tea. I focus on Josephine’s broad silhouette to ward off the dizziness, distracted by her commotion. My priority is to stay conscious, forcing down more sugar cake between waves of nausea and the cold sweat that has started to dry on my forehead.

‘Bowie and Lynton… Bowie from Bowie Bay, and Lynton come from Little Gough,’ she whispers as if to herself, nodding to the same steady beat. She looks full of grace, crowned by the braids that ring her brow. I see the furrows of her dense grey roots.

‘Do you know the history of those names?’ I ask her in Spanish. I hear the longing in my voice and imagine the look on my face: simple, stupid. She claps her thick hands together and flashes her gap again.

‘Of course!’ Her voice rises with excitement. ‘There’s only one Lynton,’ she says, gesturing with an emphatic index finger, ‘so you’re the great-great-granddaughter of Mista Jerry Lynton.’

‘Dat so! Jeremiah…’ I echo. I stand and pull my chair closer to hers.