The girls clap and Alice heads to the bar.

‘So Key-ah-ma,’ Delia says. ‘Why do you have such a Kenyan-sounding name?’

‘Because my mum was Kenyan.’ He usually misses out this part of the story, it’s so much easier to tell people that he doesn’t know where his name comes from.

‘But, er—’ Delia taps her lips with a finger.

‘You’re boring me with all these questions about my ethnicity.’

She strokes his arm. ‘Sorry, but I’m curious about you.’

Yvonne cuts in, ‘One more drink, then we’re going.’

‘Yeah, she’s right,’ Delia says. ‘Even if Purity isn’t back, Sarah will be, and she’ll be rattling her chains, she always locks that gate dead on seven. When you arrived last night you only got let in because we thought you were new volunteers.’

‘Surely, she won’t lock up until we’re all back,’ Yvonne says. ‘We’re only running in to get our bags anyway.’

‘I don’t know,’ Delia teases. ‘Sarah’s a stickler for the rules and the curfew is Kindred Kenya’s biggest one.’

‘Why’s that?’ Kiama asks.

‘A few volunteer houses got robbed last summer. So they brought in curfews. We’ve been right outside banging away once or twice and Sarah’s point blank refused to open the gate just to prove a point. We’ve ended up in the guest house more times than I care to remember.’

The guest house, that’s the place where Joe is resting up. ‘Thought you said it wasn’t for westerners?’ Kiama asks.

‘No, it’s not, it’s a dodgy dump. But,’ she adds with the kind of smile he recognises, ‘we’ve had some fun nights there.’

‘I’m not staying in a guest house tonight, Kiama,’ Yvonne says. ‘And neither are you.’

He’s about to remind her how old he is, about how much travelling he managed to do safely without her by his side when his phone rings. ‘It’s a WhatsApp call. This place has Wi-Fi, why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Why’d you think we hang out here?’ Alice says.

‘Dad?’ He wobbles as he gets down from the stool, surely he can’t be getting tipsy after two drinks, but then he did down them pretty quickly. He tries his best to walk straight, knowing Yvonne is watching, stacking her case with reasons for them to move on.

‘I could do with more than one text a day,’ Dad says. It’s good to hear his voice, even if it does sound angry.

‘I’ve tried, but the reception out here is mad patchy.’

‘Where are you?’

‘In a bar?’

‘A bar? With who?’

Kiama stops on the other side of the balcony and leans over the rail. ‘Some girls.’

Dad laughs, he’s always like this, proud at any hint of his son being on the prowl.

‘Hang on, what? Local girls?’