“Jesus, Terry, how long’s she been sat there?” Simone asks, lifting Jasmine into her arms and having a go at the dried crisps with a wet wipe.

“Well you wouldn’t know, would you? You’ve been off fannying around, haven’t you?” Decisively, Terry takes Jasmine back from her. “Your mum just left you all day, didn’t she Jas? What’s that?”

Terry has spotted the box sticking out of Simone’s bag.

“I dunno. Chocolates apparently. That new woman next door gave them to us.”

“What for?”

“To say sorry for the builders’ noise, she reckons.”

Terry takes the box out of Simone’s bag and opens it, Jasmine tugging at the wrapping. “Truffles!” he exclaims, dumping them on the floor, and Jasmine next to them. Jasmine promptly opens the box and helps herself. “Well la-di-da.”

Simone says nothing. She lets Jasmine take a handful of the chocolates and then scoops up the rest from the floor. There’s a bowl on the table and she fills this with what’s left of the sweets to save for Dominic.

“You’ve taken a bit of a shine to them, haven’t you?” Terry asks. “That couple? I saw you watching them.”

“I was just having a cig,” Simone answers.

“Yeah I saw. Having a cig while I’m up here with this.” He points at Jasmine. “What do you think I am? A mug?”

Simone says nothing. She knows he doesn’t mean it. Terry’s not perfect, but he’s wonderful with Jasmine, with both the kids. She notices other parents smiling admiringly when he’s kicking a ball with Dominic, or carrying Jasmine on his shoulders. If he’s not going anywhere, he doesn’t normally mind an hour or two at home with Jas. It’s the street that has rattled him.

“I see the way you look at all these rich idiots,” Terry continues. “Are you in love with them?”

“Course not,” Simone says.

It’s the street. With the move, he’d done something at last that she’d never seen before – he’d stepped outside. Not only of the estate, but of his comfort zone, his world that though minimal, was reliable. Predictable. You can make that kind of thing work for you if you have to. This was one of the first things Terry had impressed upon her when he was sorting her out. There’s a certain vibe you need, he’d explained, a don’t-mess-with-me aura. You have to live in a state of readiness. But once you’ve learned that, a kind of security emerges, because yes you’re living on the edge, but you know you are, and so you navigate it with that knowledge, like a goat on a cliff top, or a fish in shark-infested water. He’d used these metaphors. He’s been poetic and enchanting. What you don’t do though, he’d told her, what you mustn’t do, is attempt to shift course, or change things. You could fail that way, slip, fall, be knocked down by something you were unprepared for. You don’t risk that. You don’t try to make things different. You don’t try to be or do anything.