Now if she imagines a depiction of him, it is vandalized and torn – the only difference from actual vandalism being that the damage has come from within. Her father has defaced his own image simply by being who he is and being unable to hide it – as China emerged, painfully, year by year, from the bright, false amusement park of childhood.

  Apart from anything else, her father was an estate agent. It was embarrassing. Estate agents, China knew, were among the prime beneficiaries of capitalism. So he would hardly have voted for Jeremy Corbyn. Perhaps the Lib Dems at a stretch. Not that, in her mind, they were any better than the Tories. The university fees that she was going to have to take loans to cover the following September when her gap year ended were causing her anxiety already, and she held the Lib Dems responsible.

  Interrupting her thoughts, from somewhere beneath the uncarpeted floorboards of her first-floor bedroom comes the cry of a complaining child – answered with the soft response of his ever-patient, ever-pleading, ever-negotiating father. The bleater is Mason Foale, twelve, and the pleader, Silas Foale, age unconfirmed (China guesses fifty-five rather than the fifty he claims). They are her stepbrother and stepfather in effect, since her mother and Silas have been cohabiting for seven years.

  If she applied blinkers carefully enough, China can imagine what her mother saw in Silas. He was cookie-cutter. The careful use of sentences trimmed to remove offence or controversy. The copies of Bernardine Evaristo and Rebecca Solnit on his homemade bookcase – unread so far as China could make out, stored next to well-thumbed carpentry manuals as well as books on British military history, guides on running a successful small business and several volumes of popular science.

  Silas Foale was tall, he was athletic, he cycled and swam, and meditated for twenty minutes every day. He supported the right causes, marched on the appropriate marches. He volunteered at a food bank once a fortnight. He was a guitarist in a pub band that had a good local reputation. The band, ‘Black Axis’, although all white (except for a Hispanic – no, LatinX – keyboard player), were known for their reggae covers, which included obscure Ska rarities, some Burning Spear reworks and a couple of Linton Kwesi Johnson tributes.

  Silas avoided charges of cultural appropriation with a deft manoeuvre. He claimed to be black, although his skin was verging on the pasty. According to Silas, his father, Vitalis – whom neither Veronica nor China had ever met – had come to escape the sugar cane fields of St Lucia, only to find himself in the West of England, Bristol, home of slave traders, half a mile under the earth toiling for industrialists who sought profit from coal, instead of plantation owners extracting sugar from the land.

  Vitalis, having married Carol, a white laundry worker from Knowle, the toughest part of an otherwise prosperous town, eventually set himself up in a hardware shop, and by the time he died, ten years ago, had three branches in the West of England and had accrued enough resources to send his only child, Silas, to private school. Carol, apparently grief-stricken, died six months after Vitalis.

  Silas had moved to Brighton after his father died and started work as a ‘gentleman carpenter’, as he would have it, in and around London. His inheritance from his father purchased the Brighton house. Despite his expensive education, he was not academically minded and preferred to work with his hands. It was on one of his carpentry jobs that he had met China’s mother, at her grandmother’s house in Buckinghamshire, where China and Veronica had landed up with the ever-bickering Cordelia and Michael, after Frankie had rendered them penniless. Silas was building wardrobes and Veronica made him cups of tea, then brought him glasses of wine, and, as she usually abbreviated the subsequent process when reminiscing, one thing led to another.

  The altercation taking place on the ground floor beneath China’s bedroom increases in volume – the only noise insulation being a cheap, once-fluffy white rug that extended from the door to the foot of the bed. Or it had been white before China’s indifference to hygiene and personal organization had transformed it. Now there are faint stains from herbal tea, kimchi, carrot juice and pesto, none of which can quite be erased by the repeated journeys to the washing machine, which have more or less flattened most of the fluff into a matted, smooth veldt. Elsewhere, distributed across the floor are hair straighteners, several pairs of jogging trousers, scattered trainers, a half-eaten packet of plain chocolate digestives, a scattered box of tampons, three empty coffee cups and a dozen or so pens and pencils sprinkled across virgin A4 cartridge paper. Each of the three drawers in the pine wooden chest hangs half open, with items of clothing – knickers, tights, T-shirts – overflowing.

  Silas’s pleading, although the words cannot be made out through the barrier of the floorboards, displays its infuriating tone of quiet, rational, patient common sense. Irritated, China rises reluctantly from her bed and takes her diary out of the back of the drawer of the nightstand where it lies vaguely concealed under several layers of buff folders. Taking a Uni-ball, she opens the diary and starts to write, pressing too hard on the paper, making scarifications in the wood pulp. There is a tap on the door. China puts the diary and pen back in her drawer, closes it, jumps back into bed and pulls the covers over her head.

  ‘China? China girl? Can I come in?’

  China remains silent and inert, hoping this will discourage the visitor. Disappointingly, she hears the door creak open and then her mother pacing across the room. She knows it is Veronica without hearing her voice, because even at this distance, under these layers, she can detect the faint scent of the pungent neem and turmeric soap her mother uses to wash her hands.

  What is neem anyway? thinks China randomly, then burrows further into the bedclothes. There is a creak as Veronica seats herself on the vintage armchair, recovered from the skip and painstakingly restored by Silas, that stands to the left of her bed. Beyond the chair is a dark wood Ercol-inspired John Lewis dressing table, out of place among the childish trappings of the rest of the room. The table has a mirror built in and it reflects a lava lamp that sits forlornly on the surface.

  The lava lamp is broken. Mason broke it in the summer, trying to take it apart so he could examine the mixture of water, dye and paraffin wax. Silas had had one of his little chats with him afterwards, but had been sympathetic to his son, putting the transgression down to the workings of a curious, probing mind rather than the act of pure mischief that China frames it as. To China, Mason’s mind was as curious and probing as one of the Mars Bars he compulsively helped himself to, contributing to his ever-swelling physique. Not that she was fat-shaming, but the kid was a whale.

  Veronica, having entered, regards the gently rising and falling hillock under the bedclothes through the semi-transparency of the pale muslin curtain. She has little doubt about the reason for China’s reluctance to face the world. She had felt much the same when she had awoken four hours previously, but with five therapy sessions to conduct that afternoon, she has too many commitments to allow the disappointment to immobilize her.

  ‘It’s not so bad,’ says Veronica, just loud enough for China to make out through the bedcovers. She pulls back one of the wispy curtains to clarify the image of her daughter’s silhouette.

  ‘Isn’t it?’ says China audibly, albeit into her pillow which is damp from tears and spittle.

  ‘It’s not great. But everything will keep ticking over. I’ve brought you a cup of green tea. I’ve put some Manuka in it.’

  Throwing back the covers and raising herself from the pillow, China accepts the mug, which announces its colour as Pantone Blue 19-4052. Her father bought it for Veronica as a birthday present two years ago. He still bought her birthday presents even though they had been divorced for nearly a decade. Frankie got a lot of mileage out of their surname when it came to gifts – Kind of Blue by Miles Davis, The Blue Room poster by Picasso, and most recently The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. Veronica, however, had long since reverted to her maiden name, Tree – part of the reason China had the arboreal tattoo etched on her lower back.

  ‘Don’t forget that… ’ begins Veronica, not sure how she is going to finish, but determined to trick China out of her despair.

  ‘It’s my future.’

  ‘I’m just saying that… ’

  ‘What? What are you saying?’

  ‘That we live in a democracy and we have to… ’

  ‘The trouble with democracy is that most voters are cunts.’

  Veronica checks the time on China’s novelty clock, which is faced with a tumble of random numbers and the legend ‘Whatever, I’m Late Anyway’. Veronica, after a few moments trying to decode the time through the jumble of numbers, registers that she is going to have to leave for work shortly.

  ‘I take your point.’

  Veronica has been no less upset than her daughter by the ascendancy and then triumph of Boris Johnson, but, unlike China, had struggled mightily to put her cross next to the party of Jeremy Corbyn. But she had done so in the end. What was the alternative? The Greens? The way they ran Brighton, their only parliamentary seat, was chaotic. Anyway, it turns out that – she reflects – for the overwhelming majority of voters, Boris Johnson was the alternative.

  China takes another sip of the tea. It is so weak as to be tasteless, apart from the honey. This is not, in her mind, an entirely bad thing. It indicates to China that it is probably good for her. Things that were bland or unpleasant usually were, or so she has come to believe. After sipping the tea, she takes a draught of water from the HydrateM8 bottle on her side table, starting her fulfilment of her two litres a day of pure water minimum.

  ‘What’s going on with Silas and the Beelzebrat?’ she mutters, swallowing another teaspoon’s worth of the tea.

  ‘He has a name.’

  ‘Mason. Macy. Mad Macy.’

  ‘Going on in what sense?’

  ‘It sounded like he was having another one of his tantrums.’

  ‘He’s calmed down.’

  ‘What’s his problem this time?’

  ‘He’s only twelve years old. That’s his problem. He has issues.’

  ‘Ish-shoos.’

  ‘He hasn’t got a mother.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Come on, China, you’re better than this.’

  Veronica pats China on the back of the hand. China carelessly puts down the tea on the side table on the other side of the bed, spilling part of it in the process. She flings her head back into the pillow, face first. Veronica can just make out a muffled complaint.

  ‘I’m not better than this! I am this!’

  Veronica rises and dabs at the spilled tea with a Kleenex taken from a box on the dressing table, sits down again, then waits in silence. After thirty seconds, China emerges from the pillow. Veronica is now breathing with such forced deliberation that China feels sure her mother is putting into practice one of the relaxation techniques she has recently learned on her Headspace app.

  ‘Dad texted me,’ says China, obscurely annoyed by her mother’s regular, accentuated breathing. ‘He claims to be disappointed with the election results.’

  ‘Oh yes?’

  ‘Just trying to curry favour,’ says China. ‘I’m sure he’s delighted at the result.’

  ‘Not necessarily. Your father is – well, politically neutral. More or less. As far as I can gather.’

  ‘You mean he couldn’t care less, so long as he gets his pay cheque. He’s not exactly going to be manning the barricades when the time comes.’

  ‘Selling them, more like,’ says Veronica.

  ‘At unreasonably inflated prices,’ says China. She manages a faint laugh. ‘Sorry, I’m being such a bitch.’

  ‘You’re not. It’s okay.’

  China looks at her mother’s face full on. The face is drawn, but she still looks okay for her fifty years. Did the creases on your face really reveal your accrued personality? There are laugh lines at the corner of Veronica’s eyes. Or were they frown lines? China finds it hard to tell. But her overall impression is of someone stoic and unbowed, if somewhat weary and, China guesses, not as fulfilled as she had once hoped to be by this age.

  The door opens again – no knock this time – and Silas enters, wearing faded blue OshKosh overalls, a Muji collarless jerkin, rubber-soled boots, and looking like the overgrown infant China casts him as in her private family melodrama. His expression is open as usual, but somehow, thinks China, artificially so, like a full-blown plastic flower. His eyes slide about like eels, never quite meeting those of whoever he is talking to, except fitfully. The only exception is when he is angry. Then he looks right at you and his eyes blaze.

  He stops and sniffs the air shaking his head, his still-plentiful brown curls flopping around flaccidly as if defeated by the perpetual effort to remain as pert, shiny and tight as they had been when Veronica and China had first encountered him, planing planks of wood in Grandma’s garden in Buckinghamshire.

  ‘Been at the waccy baccy again, bud?’ he says, glancing amiably at China.

  Policeman, thinks China. Veronica shoots Silas a glance. She, too, has smelled the pungency of the extinguished joint, but has mustered the tact to say nothing. They will discuss it later. Veronica and Silas talk with a frequency and depth she and Frankie never managed, but somehow don’t seem to understand one another any better for it.

  ‘No problem, Chi Chi. Just save a sprig for moi.’

  He grins, showing crooked teeth, two of which on the lower rack are missing, although the gaps can only be seen when he smiles.

  ‘I thought you hated smoking,’ says Veronica. She has given up her enjoyment of the occasional cigarette – at least when Silas was around – to pacify his hatred of smokers, whom he categorizes as anti-social, pollution-spreading vandals.

  ‘I hate tobacco, to be specific. Ganja is part of my culture.’

  China, discomfited by this attempt by Silas to forge camaraderie with her, simply stares at him mutely. He continues to grin back, the smile eventually taking on an unsettling fixity. Then Silas slides his eyes critically over her bed. The stickers were peeling as well as the pink paint.

  ‘You should get rid of that bed. What are you, twelve?’ says Silas. ‘I could make you a new one.’

  ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘It’s a bit – you know – young for you?’

  ‘My heritage.’

  A sound of thumping starts from downstairs. Mason, China speculates, is taking his frustration out on the sofa cushions.

  ‘What were you fighting with Mason about?’ she says. ‘And why isn’t he at school, anyway?’

  ‘We weren’t fighting. We were just working something out between us. He’s not at school because he’s taking a mental health day off. The school allows it. He’s feeling a bit edgy. I’m going to take him on my current job. Try and get him to learn a bit of carpentry. Physical activity calms him.’

  ‘Anything you’d like to share? About the argument?’

  ‘No secrets in this household.’

  Silas just continues smiling, though, as if it solves all puzzles, dissolves all mysteries. China knows that any important information will have to be painstakingly excavated.

  ‘Carry on.’

  ‘It’s not really important.’

  ‘I thought you just said no secrets.’

  ‘It’s not a secret.’

  ‘Just tell her what you were arguing about, Si,’ interjects Veronica, an edge in her voice. She finds herself snapping at him far more than she used to. She dismisses this as inevitable. People are always annoying when you get to know them well enough.

  Silas looks only mildly hurt. He turns to China with a serious, concerned expression.

  ‘Mason was just a little disappointed about Christmas.’

  ‘In what sense?’

  She sees a dark ember, dully glowing in the back of his eyes.

  ‘I had to break it to him that I wasn’t going to get him the Nerf Super Soaker.’

  China stares back blankly.

  ‘It’s a water cannon. You know – a toy one,’ says Silas.

  ‘I presumed you didn’t mean one of those that the riot police use.’

  ‘No, no, of course not,’ says Silas, his smile disappearing.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Why not what?’ said Silas pleasantly, hitching up his overalls, then scratching his butt unashamedly. To conceal one’s animality was against Silas’s liberal, green, grassroots principles. He sometimes left the door open when he was doing a shit.

  ‘Why aren’t you…?’

  ‘Why isn’t Santa,’ corrects Silas conspiratorially.

  ‘Why isn’t Santa, who Mason hasn’t believed in since he was five, going to bring him a toy water cannon?’

  Silas stops scratching himself and instead tugs at his left ear, a tic that often appears when sensing any imminent conflict.

  ‘It’s a bit aggressive, wouldn’t you say?’

  ‘He’s twelve. He’s not going to go out and buy an Uzi and start spraying year 8.’

  ‘It is what it is. But it’s the principle.’ Silas smiles again. He has such a wide palette of smiles, all of them, to China, unconvincing – encouraging, sympathetic, curious, engaged. ‘I had a long talk with him about aggression, and war, and weapons of war, and I think I deepened his understanding. He’s taking it on board. He can be surprisingly receptive for someone with learning difficulties.’

  More thumping can be heard from downstairs, more urgent this time.

  ‘Sounds like it. So what are you getting him instead?’

  ‘A punchbag.’

  ‘No, but really, though. What are you getting him?’

  ‘Like I said – I’m getting him a punchbag.’

  China examines Silas’s face to see if she can find traces of irony. But he is deadpan.