Ava has wanted a Silverton shirt since she was five, which is a very long time when you are seven.

The Silverton shirt. Red, with a white lightning bolt straight across the front. Two whole years she has wanted it, and she has explained this to me several times, with her hands.

She has drawn that bolt on paper, on the pavement, on the back of a leaflet, and once, briefly, on Louis.

On Spend Street it is twelve coins and it comes in a shiny bag with a handle. On Budget Bend it is five coins, no bag at all, and the bolt is not quite straight. Louis measured it. Say what he said.

A bit wonky.

Ava: “It is not wonky.”
Louis: “It is out by about a thumb.”
Ava: “If you stand HERE it is completely straight.”

Ava then stood in four different places to prove it, one of which involved crouching. From the crouching one, I have to say, she had a point.

Louis: “Wonky one still says Silverton on it.”
Ava: “Everything says Silverton on it, Louis. We LIVE here.”

Ava had eight coins. Which is five plus three. And also four short of twelve. Both of those facts were doing a great deal of shouting.

Mum: “Come here. You have wanted this a long time, love. I know you have.”

Mum did not say no. Mum hardly ever says no. Mum waits for you to catch up, which is far worse, because then you have to do the thinking yourself.

Mum: “What do you want it to feel like? When you put it on.”
Ava: “Like I am ON the team.”

Ava's chest was pulling towards the window like it was on a string. That is where Ava gets it. You might get it somewhere else completely. I get a sort of hum.

And nobody on a pitch, at any point, from any distance, is going to notice one thumb. Say it one more time.

A bit wonky.

And I will be honest about the bag, because somebody ought to be. The bag is nice. It crinkles. It has a handle. It is a genuinely good bag.

It is also, by about Tuesday, a bag on the floor of your room.

So. Eight coins. Five today, no bag, one thumb of wonk. Or twelve later, whenever four more coins turn up from somewhere.

I have got no idea. I have not got a chest. Ask the person sitting next to you.

Tap. Tap. Pause.