Aunty Nic was red in the cheeks, her eyes streaming. ‘That was easy stuff, though. When things got really hard I couldn’t deal with it. I let you down.’

‘Yeah, you did.’ Tempting to leave it at that, leave her to feel the ache of it. But Lena. ‘Now we’ve got something else really hard to deal with and I need you to do better this time. Need you to be the Aunty Nic we worshipped as kids, okay?’

‘Will, please. Please don’t touch Lena’s room. The spare room. Please, it’ll be the end of me. You can’t.’

‘No, that’s—we can talk about that later. Right now, I need your help with a different hard thing. With Lena.’

She swiped at her eyes. ‘Your sister can look after herself.’

‘I don’t know if she can. She’s in trouble.’

Aunty Nic flicked her gaze at him, the rest of her stock-still. ‘Tell me.’

It was hard to know how, what language to use. He wasn’t sure if she knew about internet porn or file-sharing sites or any of it. But after a couple of awkward, euphemism-loaded sentences she interrupted with a firm hand in the air.

‘Enough. I get it. The turd taped them doing it and put it online for other turds to share.’

‘I don’t think you … It’s really bad. Like … I don’t know how to describe to you—’

‘You didn’t watch it, did you?’

‘I skipped through it. Fast. I needed to know what was on there so I could …’

‘So you could what?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.’

‘Does she know you know?’

‘If she’s checking her messages she does, but … God. I keep thinking about how glued to her phone she’s been this last week. Pissed me off how much she was staring and poking at the thing.’

‘Does your mum know?’

‘Nah. I mean, I’d have heard from her if she did. She can’t find out, Aunty Nic. That’s the one thing I’m sure about.’

‘It’s not up to you. It’s up to Lena.’

‘I don’t particularly trust her judgement right now, though. If it was any good she wouldn’t be in this situation.’

‘Bad judgement, you reckon?’ Too slow, too calm. Shit. ‘What, the decision to have sex with a boy she liked?’

‘Come on, Aunty Nic. She let herself get filmed. Not real smart, you have to admit.’

‘Tell me, Will. Last time you got busy, did you check the room for recording devices first?’

Will pressed his palms together, trying to find the right way to say it. ‘Girls need to be more careful about this stuff. I’m not saying it’s fair, but it’s reality. She should’ve known better.’