My storage unit is a few minutes back down the Seward Highway. The Saturday life of Anchorage goes on as the rain I have chased here takes itself further west, over Fire Island and across Cook Inlet. A plumbing contractor’s van drifts along in the right lane as the driver taps his phone screen, updating directions. An SUV passes with a family in it, a boy around Cedar’s age loading fries from a McDonald’s box into his mouth as quickly as he can. At first I think it’s just the three of them – mother, father, seven-year-old – and then, beyond him, a baby’s arm waves into view. It’s silhouetted momentarily against the square of daylight framed by the far-side car window, fingers clasping and unclasping, grabbing at an idea, practising movement. Mother, father, seven-year-old, baby.

I drop my speed back and I let them pass. My nineties playlist is annoying me all of a sudden, so I turn it off and there’s just the hum of the tyres on the road, the engine.

There is good news in my day. A listing to present to Rob McCord, some tool cabinet sales. There is progress in this life.

Somewhere nearby, Rob, a good fifteen years older than his photo, his hair two shades less golden, greets prospective buyers at one of today’s properties. I checked the list this morning. He’s up to the two-storey family home with downstairs Airbnb potential in Spenard or the entry-level two-bedroom condo in North Star. Lots of tyre kickers at that one, for sure, first-time buyers proving themselves with their knowing criticisms in the vain hope of getting change from a hundred grand. That’s every Saturday for him.

All is quiet at Dimond Mini Storage when I turn in from Brayton Drive. There is likely to be someone in the office, but the windows overlooking the entrance are closed. I punch my code into the keypad and the gate hums and clunks and lifts to let me in, its upright bars folding in on each other as the boom rises. I drive down the avenue of orange roller doors and take a left at the end. My unit is near the back.

I have ten-by-fifteen feet of storage, which looks ambitious right now, since a lot of it is air and stacked cardboard. But the smallest feasible shipping consignment is a half container – ten by eight by eight – and the next storage unit down is too small for that. Somewhere over the fence, maybe in the nearby scrap-metal yard, a dog barks. Otherwise the only sound as I get out of the car is the distant hum of the highway. As I pull the roller door up, the clatter echoes down the alleyways between the buildings.