‘That’s as maybe,’ my mum said, smoothing her dress down over her knees, which was saying your skirt’s too short, and putting her hand up to her chest which meant you were showing too much up top, ‘but if God wanted us to go naked, He wouldn’t have invented clothes. So, girls –’ we always blushed at that and left them to it, ‘smooth down, cover up.’

But Busola said she was going to choose her own clothes from now on and she didn’t care what anyone thought.

‘You’ve been doing that for years,’ my mum said.

Manus shook his head and got up, like he’d heard it before, ‘Why d’you always have to cause trouble?’

‘Why don’t you go on lugging an African name?’ Busola said as he went out. She turned on my mum, ‘None of them do!’

‘What’s wrong with your name?’ my mum said.

‘It’s bush,’ she said.

I wasn’t sure what she meant. Like it was rubbish, or she was tired of it? I could feel it, but it could be she got the word wrong. All of us had African names. Jimoh for me, Manus was Yemi, Connor Yinka – only our dad called us that any more. When we stepped out the door to go to school they switched our names and said, By the way, you’re Michael. You had to get used to that being your name when they called the register and your mates called round for you to play. But Busola didn’t change. She went on being Busola. You had to go round her. My mum said because she had a strong will. Only Nana could call her Kathleen, or Kit, or Kitty. But Busola gave my mum a hard time, even calling her Alannah! which all of us were when we fell over or got hurt. My dad said it was because they were just like each other. My mum said it was because she was like him, a daddy’s girl, it was him who called her Busola. Anyway, she was changing now.

‘Bush?’ my mum said, looking at her.

‘African,’ she said. ‘Backward.’

‘Where did you get that idea?’ my mum said.

It turned out Busola was getting teased at school. Some of the girls asked if her dad had a tail on him from Africa. Could you see it coming out the back of his trousers?

‘And what did you tell them?’ my mum said, as if she knew it was going to be difficult.

‘I said he did.’

Busola smirked and fell over backwards off the sofa on to the floor and rolled over trying to get her breath back. My mum pursed her lips. I could see but Busola couldn’t, my mum wasn’t trying to stop herself from laughing even though it was funny. She was watching Busola roll around on the floor and her eyes were still.