‘Nothing. But he knows. He doesn’t know it all but—’

‘So keep it that way.’ There are a few moments of silence, then he says, ‘You’re overreacting. We’ll say it was a fling, back at university.’

‘No. He knows it was more recent than that. That we were seeing each other when he was here.’

‘How? What did you say?’

‘I’m not sure.’

‘What did you tell him?’

‘I don’t remember,’ she shouts.

They both pause. Yvonne’s head feels as if it’s full of swirling liquid. ‘I wish it was just a fling,’ she says. ‘I wish it was some shitty one-night stand that I told Emma about. She would have laughed. She would have thought it was hilarious. I don’t even remember why I kept it a secret.’ She thinks about this often, how she sat across from Emma in the pub, drinking shitty beer and listening as she talked about how much she liked Sweetboy76. Yvonne kept quiet when what she should have said was, ‘I know him too and I slept with him last term.’ But instead, she stayed silent, for years. If only she had told her sooner, then Emma wouldn’t have been so upset, she wouldn’t have been so furious, she wouldn’t have run off to the car park that day.

‘She still would have gone to Kenya,’ Lewis says. ‘Whether you told her nineteen years ago or ten years ago. You can’t blame yourself for her being out there.’

‘But I do. And that’s why I wanted to make it up to Kiama so badly.’ She turns the receiver away so he doesn’t hear her sniff into the pillow.

‘Where is he now?’ Lewis asks.

‘He’s in his room. He doesn’t want to talk to me. But I need to talk to him, I need to explain.’

‘No, leave him. When he’s fired up, there’s no talking him down. Wait till the morning.’

‘And what am I meant to tell him in the morning?’

Lewis stays silent then says, ‘Tell him it was nothing.’

Nothing. But surely that’s another lie. Lying is what’s got them here.

Lewis sighs on the other end. ‘You sound a mess. Get some sleep.’

She’s woken by the sound of a hoover in the hallway outside. Through sticky eyes she sees the late hour and groans as her head pulses. Why didn’t he wake her? But then, she remembers.

Slowly she rises and finishes what’s left of the water by the bed. It’s time to put things right, to condense a huge old lie into something flippant and unworthy of even wasting effort talking about. She showers and dresses quickly, edging out of her room and wincing at the bright light of the hallway.

‘Good morning,’ the maid says as she gathers a bale of white towels from a trolley.