‘I know you get cranky at us, but if someone’s hassling you, you’ve only got to call. I’ll have a mob of good men round there in a flash.’

‘Thanks. I’ll be okay.’

‘Geez, you’re a hard man to help. Bloody hell, there are people everywhere wanting to do something for you, and you just keep throwing things back in our faces.’

I look out the window, and sulk. The idea of people doing things for me, fussing around, getting in my space, telling me what to do, is a version of hell. So I ignore his frustration. He is driving so fast that the country is ripping past too quickly to study. The McPherson’s massive house, built only a hundred metres from the road, whizzes past, as do the Bruces’ skinny cows and the Hailstons’ poorly picked cotton crop. Marko goes on about me a bit more, and I think how he and the rest of them will never understand until it happens to them, and then they won’t want all the help being offered. I’m not being fair. I know that. They’re just searching for ways to do the best for me, and they can’t find one. It is not my problem.

Marko is the one sulking now. He is not talking, gripping the steering wheel too hard and pushing his top row of teeth into his bottom lip. Eventually he gets over himself, and says, ‘Elaine?’

‘A neighbour. Pretty much.’

‘A hot neighbour.’

‘Sarah’s got a girlfriend.’

‘We were wondering if she told you.’

I am the last to know everything. Up ahead, a black car has stopped on the side of the road. Either the driver is making a phone call or he is lost. The car is not fully off the road, which tells us it is someone from the city; someone who thinks there won’t be any other cars on a back road like this, and if there are they will just be driven by stupid rednecks.

Marko slows to check there’s no trouble. A man in a dark-blue suit is sitting in the driver’s seat, and looks like he’s been bashing his phone against the dashboard. His face is deep red beneath short, black hair. He winds his window down, and looks like he’s going to tell us to piss off.

Marko gives him a bored ‘Everything okay?’

‘Fucking GPS, fucking hopeless fucking thing.’

‘Where are you trying to get to?’

‘I’m supposed to see a guy called Tito Slade who lives at Five Trees. It’s out this way somewhere, but the fucking GPS keeps telling me it’s on the other side of Waterglen. Fucking stupid thing.’

I look at Marko, and shake my head.

‘Never heard of him, mate. Sorry.’

‘Yeah, well, fuck you too, you stupid hicks.’ He winds his window up.