Jogging down the front steps of our little weatherboard, I can see other kids walking but they’re all primary schoolers. There’s more than double the number of them compared to the high schoolers and only five other kids in my grade, but we’ll be the biggest graduating class in a long time. If we all graduate.

At the mailbox I stop dead. A few houses down, right on the path that I always take to school, a hunched figure is pacing. Now that I’d noticed, I realised all of the littlies were crossing the road to go around. Stick-thin and clothed in one of those old-fashioned cream nighties that cover you from head to toe, Mad May Miller is doing her usual thing – bent forwards like she’s searching the grass for something, muttering to invisible people and throwing her hands around like she’s demanding they listen. Hopefully someone has rung her mob, God knows I can’t. The hate our families have for each other is legend. One of those small-town things where no one knows how it started but every generation keeps it alive, me included. I’ve always thought most of the Millers are a waste of oxygen, but seeing May just makes me sad. Nan used to say she wasn’t always that way; something bad happened to her so we should always be good to her, Miller or not. Then Nan would pinch her lips together and ignore my questions. She used to tell me a lot, but if she shut her mouth like that I knew not to push.

I hear the sound of a familiar engine turning into our street and I spot the white Corolla seconds later. Damn, should’ve left when I had the chance. The car barely stops in the dirt track that passes for our driveway before she’s out and pointing at me in accusation.

‘Stacey Claire Thomson, where dya think you’re goin?’

‘Umm, school?’

I think about running for it, but she’d probably chase me. Dad used to say it was like cornering a sand goanna – better make sure there was something bigger around or you’d get cut up when it tried to climb you. The reminder of Dad hurts somewhere deep, and for a moment I can see him in the doorway telling Mum to ‘Leave my namesake alone, woman!’ She’d sigh or yell back, ‘I should never have named her after you.’ She’d turn on him then, ready for a fight. He’d drop me a sly wink, waving a hand behind his back for me to sneak off. Dad was my tallest tree.