I stared off into the distance, feeling sorry for Dad. I knew exactly what he was talking about with the stereotypes and how he might want to try to move away from them. And what Dad had said had helped me make sense of his life, and how Mum was kind of like his worst nightmare. He’d worked really hard to create the life that he’d wanted. And staring at Caitlin, I knew exactly how she was part of that picture. She was caring, responsible and looked after herself, and Dad and me too.

I looked back at Dad and said, ‘I don’t know what you want me to do with this stuff you’re telling me, Dad. It’s not me who drinks, it’s Mum.’

He nodded. ‘Yeah, I know, but I do want you to think about it and to know that we need to try to find some ways to fix it.’

I didn’t know how in hell Mum was going to stop drinking after everything that had happened. I mean, there’d been so many things that had happened when Mum was drunk that I thought would definitely make her stop drinking, but they never did.

While Caitlin packed up the gas stove and pot and things from lunch, Dad asked, ‘Do you want to push on or go back to camp?’

‘Let’s keep walking,’ I said, deciding that I wanted to see other parts of the ranges that I hadn’t seen before and avoid discussion about Mum and her drinking.

We spent the next couple of days walking through the ranges, checking the water quality in the waterholes and helping Dad to jot down notes about the state of health of Country so that he could work with the park rangers to bring back to life sick parts of Country.

I felt good being out on Country, but I knew that the same old shit like dealing with Mum, and being stressed to the point that I couldn’t concentrate, would be awaiting me in the city.

I slept for most of the trip back to Adelaide and woke as we hit the freeway south of the city. Caitlin and Dad were talking about plans for the rest of the week, boring things like what food shopping needed to be done and their appointments. And then out of the blue, Dad asked, ‘Phoebe, to make things easier for you and Cait and me, how do you feel about not seeing Mum for a while?’

Irritable from car sleep and Dad’s question, I barked, ‘What do you mean, not see Mum for a while?’