Why would I, when he is right there, sharing a house with me. Sharing a bed. A bathroom. A kitchen table. A remote control.

The awful thing about thoughts is there’s no getting away from them. They’re right there. Going around and around on a track in your head like a toy train.

An exit appears and I swerve towards it, jamming on the brake as I near the roundabout at the top. It feels good to climb down the gears.

“Where are we?” Iris looks around, blinking. Her voice is heavy. She must have been drowsing.

How could she be drowsing? At a time like this? “Lunch,” I say in my clearest voice. Like it’s not a suggestion. Or a possibility. It’s just a fact.

Lunch.

I’ve never felt less like eating.

The nearest town is six kilometers away, but feels longer due to my refusal to overtake an ancient tractor, pulling a trailer of what smells like silage. Eventually, we arrive at a picture-postcard French village, all cobbled, narrow streets, beautifully manicured gardens, a gleaming bronze statue of an imperious, massive-shouldered man on horseback—some army general I imagine—a slow-moving river spanned by a low, humpbacked stone bridge. The town center opens onto a magnificent square, one side of which is taken up by the town hall which lords over the other buildings and hosts an enormous clock.

“Here we are,” I proclaim, parking in the first spot I see.

I reef open the car door and scramble out.

“Your phone is ringing,” says Iris, eyeing me warily from the passenger seat.

“Is it?” I rummage inside my bag, pick out my mobile. It’s Brendan. I steer my finger towards the phone. As if I’m going to answer it. I presume I’m going to answer it. Instead, I reject the call.

I can’t even say that I rejected it by accident. I did it on purpose.

“Who was that?” asks Iris.

“Brendan,” I say. Iris nods, but doesn’t ask any questions, the way people don’t with an angry person.

I seem to be angry with everyone.

But Brendan and I haven’t even had an argument.

According to the town hall clock, it is six minutes past two. Dad says, “I could eat,” when I ask him if he is hungry, but he always says that, no matter what time of the night or day it is. I link my arm through his, and he smiles at me, a kind and trusting smile. It seems wrong to be angry in the face of a smile like that.

While there are plenty of cafés and restaurants, the staff look at us disbelievingly when we say we would like a table for three.

“It is after two o’clock,” they tell us, pointing at their watches and clocks. “Lunch is served between twelve thirty and two.” I make the tragic mistake of pointing out that it is only eight minutes past two, gesturing at the immutable clock gracing the facade of the town hall to bolster my schoolgirlish French and support my argument.