After lunch, Sergiu and Victor scratch their full bellies and belch. Do they hang around Mama all day? As soon as it’s late enough to be served alcohol they wander slowly up the lane towards the village, where Papa had gone to do ‘business’ with a man from another village just after breakfast. I could see Mama bite down on her cheek as he informed her of his day’s plans. What would his new venture entail? Would it be scrawny chickens that arrived with a disease, or a rotting tomato plant that had no hothouse in which to grow, or a goat that frothed at the mouth if you walked anywhere near it?

When the boys have disappeared from the lane, Mama and I breathe out at the same time, and without saying anything we go to the shed to check up on the sheets. They have washed clean. We hang them on the line under the high blue sky, where they flap gently in the breeze, the dog growling at them from the shade. It did not go with Luca, without me.

Just as I wonder if Maria and Luca are swimming in the river, I see her running down the path towards the house. I have to stop myself from sprinting to her and throwing myself into her arms. The strange energy that visited me in the night charges me with restlessness and tears. Perhaps the Sandman did come after all; my eyes are scratchy and my skin sore to the touch. Mama is watching me carefully, so I smooth back my hair and nod at Maria coolly.

‘Are you ok?’ She is breathless. ‘Luca said you were sick.’

Mama asks her if she would like some compote. I look at her, surprised. The last time we had this treat was my twelfth birthday, almost a year ago. ‘You two sit down out here under the tree and I’ll bring you some juice.’

‘Thank you, Mama Zanesti. I can’t stay long. Papa will be worried.’ When Mama can no longer hear us, Maria tells me her papa has forbidden her to come to my home. It is not a safe house for a young woman; it is a house of too many men.

‘But you have two brothers,’ I say.

She shrugs. ‘Not the Zanesti brothers.’

I have heard this whispered in the school yard before.

‘Did you go swimming with Luca?’

She shakes her head. ‘I was too worried about you.’