Patchwork bow tattoo on a limb

The officer at the Dover desk turned the bow over three times before he believed it was only cloth. I had sewn it from every scrap Mrs Okafor left behind when she shut the shop on Union Street: the orange from a cushion cover, the teal from the curtains she never hung, the black from my father's work trousers, cut square and patched with whatever colours the bin had given me. He asked what it was for. I said it was for my sister, who would be waiting on the other side of the barrier with a cup of tea gone cold.

He did not ask about the stitching across the knot, and I was grateful, because that band is the part I got wrong four times. Pale turquoise thread, pulled tight enough to hold everything together but not so tight it puckered. Mrs Okafor always said a seam should look like a decision, not an accident. I thought about that while he drew his finger along the edge of the pink swirls, looking for something he could write down.

Then he waved me through, and the bow went back into my coat, and I walked into the grey light of the arrivals hall. I did not recognise anyone. Then a figure in a yellow coat lifted a hand, and I saw that she had pinned a scrap of my old black lining to her collar, exactly where the knot would sit if you were wearing it.