‘Cat and mouse game, ain’ it? To them. My mum’s old, don’t do that. They won’t spend no money, they’re knocking it down. Well, they broke open the sewer. No, you move out or you’ll get condemned – you won’t get rehoused, you’ll get evicted. We pay our rent. Don’t matter, non-compliant, you’ll get moved round all the dumps, at her age, door’s closing, think about it –’

My dad interrupted, ‘Who’s saying that?’

‘Council bloke – private like, tells me, that new estate up the Oval, get two more wanna move we can fit you in, what about a garden? Fuckin’ ridiculous!’ He looked round at my mum leaning up on the door handles, ‘Ooh, sorry!’

Busola laughed, she’d been sitting next to my dad watching. My dad shushed her and let him go on, and my mum listened because she wanted a garden.

‘Think we’re stupid? I work bins for the council, that’s not stupid to you got no one collecting ’em! I won’t take no rubbish where I live!’

‘What do you want to do?’ my dad said.

He had a piece of cloth bunched up in his fist and was shaking it like he wanted a fight, but then he slowed down. ‘Got my guv’nor get the lights back on, we don’t pick up bins in the dark. Had to get police on ’em! Oh, they say, like no one’s reported it. Take yer energy, dunnay?’

He rubbed the back of his neck, his hands were thick, with big fat fingers and broken fingernails. He frowned and there was a low line across his forehead where his short, curly brown hair came down and made him look even more bulky than he was. He was big, but his face looked soft and upset.

‘Like for like they’re saying, two-bed, fourth floor. How long we lived that ground floor? Dug our heels in, no estates, we won’t move for that. She can’t do stuck up a tower block. That new estate’s maisonettes, modern – wallpaper walls, ceiling on yer head, but inside loos and it’ll last her out.’

He shook his head and blew his cheeks out into dark red and purple knots that made him look like the wind had gone out his sails and he couldn’t blow any more. ‘We’re giving up,’ he said. ‘We have to, it’s not far. If you wanna go and have a look, she says,’ and he looked round at my mum again, ‘let yer know, it’s up to you. It’s on offer.’

They were asking us to come with them. My mum and dad looked at each other. I didn’t think his mum liked us, there weren’t any children, it was just them. But then I didn’t know why I thought that, we didn’t have anything to do with them.