This is fiction, but reads like a memoir piece. Holgate was born in Jamaica and lives in London, and this story shines a light on the subtleties around how race and social interactions intersect.

I wait in the queue, for ice cream, and listen for any grumbling about the sun’s warmth. There is nothing as well loved here as meteorological gossip and fulminations against the sun, the wind, the rain. What kind of weather these people want, my mother would ask.