‘This is serious,’ he said. ‘I can’t stop what’s going to happen.’ His face wasn’t telling us what he meant, everyone was looking at him to see what he’d say. ‘From now on she will have to be coming and going to the hospital. But please, don’t go under those railway tunnels. It’s not safe. I don’t want police to bang on the door and tell me something has happened.’ None of us said anything, so his voice got harder, ‘What do you want down there?’ He looked at me. ‘Playing what?’ I was frightened he was going to tell me I was bad, it was me who took Busola down and showed her the stain on the pavement. But he didn’t, he looked at Busola and said, ‘You are playing with fire. It’s those people – drunk and fighting – out of control – living down there. And you–’ He was looking at Manus. ‘You don’t know any better?’

Manus had nowhere to go. He couldn’t hide behind us because he was the eldest, it was his fault. He hung his head down and the tears fell one by one on his lap because you weren’t allowed to cry when you were being told off.

‘You have to go down there? You don’t know police are watching you?’

I thought he was going to be telling him off, but he picked Manus up and walked over to the window, swaying and rocking him like he was little and it was just the two of them holding on to each other, Manus crying and my dad whispering in his ear and lifting open the curtain. It was black outside and they reflected back in the glass, from a time before I was born, when it was just them, holding on, waiting for Mummy to come home.

‘What you tell him?’ Connor said.

‘Nothing.’ It was Busola, stung from being told she was lying and all because of us telling her not to say. ‘I only told Susan.’

‘What did she say?’ Connor said, turning over to go to sleep. We were whispering because our mum came back while our dad was making us brush our teeth, and he put us all to bed quickly because it was late. We could hear them moving about upstairs. Manus was awake but he wasn’t saying anything.

‘She can smell the gas, she says stop playing with matches.’

‘Tell her to mind her own business,’ Connor said.

I was sharing the bottom bunk with Busola because it was warmer and I didn’t want to be on top on my own, but her feet kept digging into me. I tried to kick her off and she said, ‘Go up the top if you don’t like it.’

‘You go,’ I said.

‘It’s all your fault.’

‘Shut up, you two,’ Manus said. ‘Go to sleep.’