‘Yeah. But I’m not stopping you from going on to the hotel if you want.’ Please go, he thinks, please see that I need a break from you, from it all.

‘We said we’d stick together.’

‘When did we say that?’ Why doesn’t she get it? ‘Look, I’m not your chaperone, if you want to go, go.’ He doesn’t mean for it to come out so harsh, but maybe it’s what she needs to hear, how she needs to hear it. ‘I’ll make my own way up to the lake in the morning after I’ve spent time with Purity, which is what I came here to do. But right now, I’m staying for a drink.’

‘One more and you’ll be hardly standing.’ This time, she sounds harsh.

‘I don’t need to be parented by you, alright?’

‘But you’re acting like you do. What do you think this is? Your gap year?’

He laughs. ‘Did you seriously just say that?’

‘I’m here for you, out here, disrupting my life not because I want to, but because you asked me to.’

‘You only agreed to this trip to feel better about yourself. But you didn’t expect to be dealing with a real adult, did you?’

‘Actually, I did, but you’re acting like a child, throwing your toys out of the pram because I won’t help you waste your money.’

‘Ooh,’ Delia says, ‘don’t think we should hearing all this.’

He had almost forgotten the girls were there.

‘This isn’t how your mum would have wanted you to turn out.’

It’s like a fucking train hitting him. She really just said that.

‘She would have hated to see that you’re so,’ she looks for the words, ‘so, entitled and so bloody spoilt.’

‘Shit,’ Delia says, as Yvonne moves away from the table and into the crowd.

‘That came out of nowhere,’ Alice adds.

Kiama flops back on the stool, like he’s been winded. But the shock doesn’t last long before the anger sets in. How can she say that to him? How can she think that’s alright? He pushes through the crowd and takes the steps two at a time till he’s outside on the street.

She’s already walking away.

‘I can’t believe you,’ he shouts. It makes her jump and turn to face him. ‘You came all this way to tell me Mum would have been disappointed in me. Entitled? Spoilt? That’s what you really think of me?’ Even if she does, how could she say it? It’s such a betrayal.

‘Kiama, wait. I didn’t mean—’

‘No, don’t apologise, you’re right, I am spoilt. My dad and Nana let me get my own way all the fucking time. So, I’m sorry if I’m not the best turned-out teenager you know.’