‘What, to a restaurant?’ she spits it like a swearword. ‘Where you do not know who is making the food, what they are putting in it, how they are washing their hands. Then you pay them for it.’ She shakes her head. ‘It is not good. Like these girls here,’ she nods upstairs, ‘always wanting to eat food outside, at Chick Burger. I tell them, eat the food I prepare, but no, they want to eat that monkey burger.’

Kiama laughs. Then they both turn as the gate clangs outside.

‘She’s back,’ Purity says, ‘your auntie. Go and greet her.’

From the doorway he can see Yvonne sitting on the step in a slice of sunshine. Her eyes are closed, her head tipped back. She looks blissed-out, but of course she does, there’s nothing at stake for her. It’s just a holiday where she can spend a bit of time reminiscing about an old friend.

She must feel his eyes as she turns before he can creep off back into the house.

‘Joe’s feeling better,’ she says. ‘He’s going to drive up here in the next hour. To be honest, I think he wanted a night in a hotel away from his babies.’

Kiama doesn’t move, what is she expecting? That he sit and joke around with her like nothing happened last night, like she didn’t make him feel worthless.

‘Please,’ she says, ‘come and sit with me for a minute. I need to talk to you.’

It feels good to have the sun touch his skin, especially after the lukewarm shower. He closes his eyes and allows himself to enjoy the feel of it along with the sound of Purity humming from inside. He opens one eye to find Yvonne staring at him.

‘You took your nose stud out?’ she says.

He sits forwards and touches the empty hole. ‘I think it fell out at some point last night.’

Two small birds land in the yard; they sit on the rim of a plastic bucket and tweet back and forth.

‘I had no right to judge you,’ she says. ‘I really had no right at all. I can’t throw things around like that because you don’t act how I expect you to.’

Is that what it is, that she expects him to be someone else? He prides himself on not being defined by having a dead mum, on not being completely messed up by what he experienced out here. But maybe it’s not true. Maybe there is something wrong with him coming all the way here and then spending his time getting drunk with some random girls in a bar.

‘Did you mean it?’ he asks. This is her chance to take it back, even if she did mean it, surely she realises that it would be better to lie here and spare him.