Rosa was talking to a customer in the suit shop. You wouldn’t know that anything was wrong. Her eyes had flickered over to Matty for a moment at the sound of the bell, and now were back at the big man by the counter. Mrs Jackson was standing behind the counter too, holding a pair of trousers over her arm.

Outsizes a speciality, Matty thought, wandering past the shelves and rails, touching the odd suit, shiny and pressed flat. Minty green polo shirts were in a neat pile, with braces hanging next to them. Mamma did some tailoring at the back of the shop, where it wasn’t tidy like out here, but full of material and tape measures and the loud clatter of the sewing machine.

Mamma would bring something leftover for Dad occasionally and make him stand taller, pulling back the shoulders, tucking up the cuffs, walking round him in a circle while Dad winked at Matty. He wasn’t much of a suit guy. ‘Weddings and funerals and that’s your lot, thank you very much,’ he’d say, when Mamma said how much better he looked.

The hair in the bathroom had definitely been his – Mamma’s hair was raven-black and Matty’s curled and never went gold, only a lighter grey-brown in the sun. Matty had emptied a matchbox and placed Dad’s hair in it. Stored it under the bed. A piece of him.

The large man took the slip offered to him and turned, passing Matty. His face was really red, and his shoes were polished to the shine of rainforest beetles. He would definitely need an outsize.

As the bell rang on the door, Mamma’s whole face and body sagged.

‘You’re doing really well,’ Mrs Jackson said, and Matty lingered at the rail of pinstripe blazers, pretending not to hear. ‘I’m sure it’s the right thing to do. Keep your head down and work hard.’

‘I want to keep my head held high,’ said Mamma, and her voice was like a child’s.

‘No, of course you do, my love.’

Matty tried to picture being grown up and wearing a pinstripe suit. Bowler hat. Tie.

Mamma was blowing her nose. ‘Go to the cafe. I will see you there,’ she said more loudly, the first acknowledgement that Matty was even present, and disappeared round the back.

‘Oh dear,’ said Mrs Jackson to the room, in a sort of quiet sigh that really she wanted to be heard, and poked a handwritten slip on a spike. ‘Right. Let me have a look at you.’

Mrs Jackson had a big mole at the corner of her mouth, and Matty often imagined tearing it off and putting it on top of a chocolate chip muffin. She stared, very close. Matty gazed past her to the stiff collars behind the counter. You could hear Mamma blowing her nose again.