‘Yes, I loved spending time with you. But you weren’t mine, were you? I didn’t have to deal with you waking up through the night, though I often had to deal with your mum calling me the next morning and complaining about it. I didn’t have to buy you school shoes and worry about you getting sick or falling behind in school.’

‘Neither did Mum.’ He laughs, because that’s definitely the one thing he does remember, that Mum wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t just that she’d kick off when he mashed up a pair of school shoes, she’d also get angry when he simply grew out of them, like he was doing it on purpose. The homework thing is another clear memory, not the doing of it, but the arguments around not doing it. Even once Mum handed it back to his teacher at the classroom door and moaned that it was too difficult for kids his age. It was embarrassing. But he holds onto these memories as tightly as all the others because they show she was a whole person, not just the perfect, beautiful angel everyone refers to her as.

‘Look, I’m a modern man,’ he says. ‘I don’t believe every woman should be spawning.’

‘What a beautiful word.’

‘But I’ve always wanted to be a dad, can’t wait for it.’

‘For your five kids?’

‘Exactly. So for me it’s hard to understand why someone wouldn’t want kids. Male or female. Especially someone like you; you’re from a big family and I see how you are with the kids here. You seem pretty maternal.’

‘I was never one of those women who knew for sure they wanted kids. The fact that it’s not happened for me is okay.’

‘But what about if you met someone? And they wanted kids. Would you?’

‘No. I’m too old to start with all that.’

‘Shame. I think you’d be a good mum.’

Peter runs towards them. ‘Playtime is over, come and help us do our maths homework.’

Kiama checks Jenga’s shorts are pulled over to cover the patch of ringworm on his thighs before lifting him onto his shoulders and walking back to the house. By the time they reach the door Jenga is asleep in Kiama’s hair and Yvonne has to help take him down.

Zipporah, again in the wedding dress, brings through the floral flask and pours cups of Milo for the adults.

‘Ki-Yama,’ Purity says. ‘You like it here?’

‘Yeah.’ But it’s not strictly true. He doesn’t feel the same happiness being here he felt yesterday, he feels sort of sad today, noticing how thin the kids are, how quickly they tire, how dirty the place is.

‘It must be hard work,’ he says, ‘looking after so many kids.’