‘Well,’ Simone says. It is killing me that she has no expression I can read, that she is always blank as a doll. ‘Kudos to you for being at least semi-woke when it comes to the issues. More than semi. I’m he/him when I’m Simon. Still that. It’s not sexual and it’s not exactly gender identity. There is no conflict with Simon. It’s also not a disguise, even if it does involve costumes, and even if my build has made it a bit more Mrs Doubtfire than I’d like. I’m working on that, though, as you’re aware.’

I always knew I was making up the Simon I pictured in the nineties in his Hong Kong life. After that I thought about him less. We have spent ten days together in twenty-nine years. We have not been at family barbecues together year after year, have not hung out at each other’s houses, have not debated the issues of life, and all the time hidden things. I am not a confidant who has been shut out or deceived. I had blanks and I filled them in, and the truth is different. It was always going to be different.

He did not leave me. He was not there, but he did not leave me. Not willingly.

‘It’s a relief,’ Simone says. ‘That’s the feeling when I change. A freedom. It comes with no effort at all. It’s a ritual, putting on the layers and, as I go through it, a fog clears and Simone is there. I never have to go looking for her. Simon has thinning hair on his head, more hair elsewhere than he’d like, and wrinkles and jowls. I hate those Simon jowls, that turkey neck. Simone? Simone is flawless. Look at me. And Faye and me? We’re good.’

‘We’re good,’ Faye says.

‘But I should have fixed things before now.’ Simone twists in her seat to face me, to leave no doubt that she’s facing me. ‘Things between you and me. It was up to me to do that. Totally. Faye and I had miscarriages. We had eleven cycles of IVF to get Annabel. I should have got on a plane last May and gone straight to Anchorage.’ From inside the mask, there’s a sniffing sound. Her breath catches. ‘I should have put the shit aside, and been there. That’s what a brother should have done.’

‘It’s okay,’ I tell him, and Lacy says, ‘It is. Really.’ She slides her hand next to mine, squeezes it tight.

There’s a knock on the door. Simone shudders. Her hands hurry to the arms of her chair, as if she’s about to move.

‘Hey,’ a voice says from outside, a young female voice. ‘Mum! Dad!’