I rushed to the kitchen and said, ‘Mum, Busola’s gone out!’

‘She’s gone on an errand for me,’ my mum said, putting her lips tight and rattling the pots on the cooker. ‘And you can be minding your own business.’

I put it together in my head that Busola had told about how Manus had thumped her and my mum was letting her out to stop it building up.

‘Go on, out of the kitchen, I’m busy,’ she said.

I walked down the stairs slowly, away from the others, and lifted the flap of the letterbox open to the street. There was no one out there. It was empty. There was frost in the air, the smell of fireworks drifting in against the smell of the cooking. A stream of cold air blew on my eyes and made them water. It wasn’t fair, she wasn’t treating us equally, I wasn’t stealing, Busola and Manus were stealing that money, that’s what happened. Was that what happened?

‘Did you steal out that money, Manus?’ I asked.

‘So what?’ he said.

Connor looked up at him.

‘Not all of it. It was my money, I put the mask on.’

‘And you let Busola take some?’ I said.

‘She wanted it, if that’s what she told you.’

‘So what about me kicking their door in?’ said Connor.

‘You’re lucky their dad wasn’t home,’ he said. I thought they were going to fight. Connor was looking at him and Manus was just being brazen, ‘What you gonna do about it?’

‘What about the money I put in?’ Connor said.

Manus went behind the sofa and pulled out a packet of sparklers. He opened it up and gave one to me and held out one to Connor.

‘All right?’ he said.

Connor shook his head and looked at him, but took it. They sent me into the kitchen to get matches from under my mum’s nose. She was cooking, so it was easy.

‘Go on, out of the kitchen. Don’t go in the cupboard, we’ll be eating as soon as Daddy gets home.’

We leaned out the window together and lit the sparklers, waving them in the air and letting the light burn itself into our eyes so they left an afterglow once they’d gone out.

‘Don’t tell Daddy,’ Manus said, and pulled back into the room.

I stayed leaning out with Connor, listening for fireworks, but he was quiet and I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He thought in flashes, he had a temper.