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roundabout sounded its horn too, probably in protest rather than sympathy.
    Toby’s face was hot, he stared ahead, blinkered with embarrassment.
    â€”The banner was Angie’s idea. She hung it up last night, after it was dark. We were just praying it wouldn’t rain. She was so determined it would be the first thing you’d see.
    Angie and Naomi had found the house together; it was a maisonette, with a front door up concrete steps around the side of a white-painted nineteen-thirties semidetached. It didn’t look like Naomi’s usual sort of place—not “arty”—but the gardens were full of flowers and there were trees everywhere, as if the suburb had been tucked inside a little wood. Angie was waiting for them at the top of the steps before the car had even stopped. She was small and slight like Naomi, but younger and more definite; when they were together Naomi seemed dreamier and vaguer than she really was. Angie had short-cut hair and very bright eyes with a distinctive extra fold of firm flesh beneath them that made them pixielike; her glances, like all her gestures, were quick and pointed and compact.
    â€”Hello, Toby, she said, reaching out a small cool brown hand laden with silver rings. She had a butterfly tattooed on her upper arm and another one appliquéd onto her sleeveless white vest. Meet Angie: I’m the new light in your mother’s life. We’re both very proud of you.
    Toby felt large as an elephant—or perhaps a giraffe—between them in their little home. Their tables and chairs only seemed to reach somewhere around his knees, and he kept walking into doorframes as though they were built to a different scale. They had baked him a cake with three candles for the three years of his degree and decorated it with the University logo, which he didn’t recognize until they pointed it out. The sitting room was hung with paper chains and balloons and more WELCOME HOME banners; it was very tidy and bright and full of plants and pictures; there was even a color scheme, with a blue sofa (which would turn into a bed for him later), blue curtains, and yellow walls. They got out a bottle of champagne from the fridge. Toby didn’t know how to open it so Angie did, and they drank a toast to him.
    â€”I only got a two-two, he protested, blushing. It’s honestly not worth all this.
    â€”Nonsense, said Naomi, putting her arm around his waist and her head against his chest. We’ve had such hard times and such a lot of bad luck. Now everything’s turning out to be for the best. Here’s to you, my brilliant boy. Here’s to us. Isn’t this a bit better than where you last saw me?
    â€”I’d say so, said Angie. Better than that dump.
    Naomi and Angie had planned out the whole evening. They showed Toby around the garden, which belonged to the owners who lived downstairs but which they were allowed to use. It was a big garden, rather neglected, overtaken by clumps of pampas grass and wandering up among trees at its far end.
    â€”I’d love to get to work out here, said Naomi, who was good at plants. Perhaps they’ll let us put a few things in and do a bit of tidying up.
    â€”Perhaps, said Angie tolerantly, if we get the time.
    Then there were cocktails and hot homemade appetizers, followed by vegetarian lasagna and expensive ice cream. And for after dinner they had rented a video, Shine , which they thought would be suitable.
    â€”I know you’re not into blockbusters, said Angie.
    He politely didn’t tell them he’d seen it already, or that he hadn’t liked it.
    Over balloon glasses of brandy last thing, when they had pulled out the sofa and made up his bed, Angie explained to Toby that her name wasn’t short for Angela. She had been rushed into hospital when she was only a few hours old, and the nurses had called her Angel because they didn’t think she’d live. A man walking his dog in a park