‘I’ll be careful.’

There is nothing special about the steps, however much we’re making of them. I want to run past him, jog to show the ease of it, up the gentle slope and around the bend ahead. My knee can take this now.

To my left, on the other side of a white three-rail fence, a horse is being inspected. A vet or owner is down on his haunches while another man leads the horse around the enclosure. It’s chestnut, with a dark tail and dark legs. The pace picks up to a canter, and still it moves evenly. Beyond it, in a covered dressage area, a rider is taking another horse over some low jumps. The equestrian centre is a surprise at the end of Lung Ha Wan Road, unless you’re expecting it.

Simon is taking my knee into account, that’s all. My busted, semi-fixed, never-the-same-again knee.

I wave for him to keep walking. ‘Let’s go.’

The path ends only metres around the bend, at an expanse of cleared land with a sign that reads ‘Lobster Bay Kite-Flying Site’. There’s a paved area where three bench seats in a U-shape are under the cover of a timber roof, and a separate picnic bench is set at the edge of the trees, in full sun at this time of the morning. The area is roughly circular, maybe fifty metres in diameter, fringed by trees and low timber fences, with the bay and its forested islands beyond. There is no kite-flying going on, no-one here but us.

I’ve carried a water bottle all this way and drunk almost nothing. I pop the top open and the water’s warm, but I take a couple of mouthfuls. I have Australia between my thumb and fingertips, a gold map of the country where it sits on the bottle in the middle of the logo of the Australian International School Hong Kong.

Simon puts his hand on his chest and takes a breath.

‘Are you . . .’ I take a step towards him before I realise it’s just a habit, an instinct to guard his surgical wound. He’s taking in the view. He is not having chest pain.

He laughs, pats his chest. ‘Yeah, I’m good.’

His sternum was split three months ago for the bypass. Which he now calls ‘the cabbage’, having picked up the medical jargon. CABG – coronary artery bypass graft.

He points to the green spine of a ridge line rising to our right. ‘That’s the one I’m working up to. Eventually.’ He sucks some water from his bottle and surveys the slope, as if he’s planning his route right now. ‘Fifty-five, hey? Fifty-bloody-five.’

‘Forty-five and sideswiped by a van.’ I point to my knee and its mess of scars that knit and bulge in a way that disguises the absence of a patella. ‘I’ve got ten years on you and I’m not making any bold claims about that hill myself right now.’