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FRIDAY

Peter came every Friday night to our new council house. Like clockwork. At six o’clock when the knock on the door came, the living room atmosphere would take on a sudden air of anxiety. Without waiting for anyone to answer the knock, Peter made his way down the hallway and hovered at the living room door while he retrieved a small black notebook from his pocket and a fancy fountain pen he kept clipped to his jacket lapel. He was well groomed, clean-shaven, with a heavy head of thick rusty-coloured hair carefully combed in a side parting. He was tall and wore a suit and tie and white shirt. In winter he wore a beige mac on top.

We moved out of our slum property and into a new council house when I was seven and a half years old. A slum clearance and rehousing programme saw to it that we had a brand-new house with a spacious kitchen, four bedrooms and a small front and back garden. We had our first indoor toilet and a bathroom. Rent levels were controlled by local government agencies. There were no rats. It smelled of freshly cut wood. We still didn't own a fridge, but that house felt like a precious piece of possibility.

“Hiya Peter. How are ya doin’?” one of my parents would ask with a flustered obsequiousness reserved only for Peter, usually after he’d been hovering for an awkward minute or two. He’d reply with some vague small talk about the weather and everyone would agree it was miserable. Clinging to the banknotes in her hand as if willing him not to take them from her, my mum would chat for an uncomfortably extended length of time.