First thing the next day, I downloaded the Whack-A-Mullah app. The government hatespokespersons claim that the game is only a harmless bit of fun. They insist that the app isn’t tracked, but I was careful to play it repeatedly every day while I waited. It could be a tiny thing in my favour if I were caught helping Bram.

In the period that followed, I woke every night at three. Just before that an old acquaintance from school would show up. He chased me along an endless narrow space – an alley? a corridor? a trench? – crying, ‘See you! See you!’ On waking I’d creep downstairs, not bothering with the staircase light. Looking back, I wonder if I secretly wanted to fall and injure myself so that nothing could be expected of me. In the kitchen I’d make coffee and settle down in the home-entertainment zone to self-soothe with Retroflix. A documentary about the Rajneesh movement engrossed me. Towards the end Osho, their leader, fled their Oregon compound by plane. Among the belongings hauled on board was Osho’s throne. What was strange was that the throne seemed to be a shabby armchair covered in scratchy-looking fabric. Had banknotes or precious stones been sewn into the upholstery?

Perhaps I’m remembering the throne incorrectly. That night, I’d just reached the turn of the stairs when Ivy came out of her room off the hall. She didn’t see me but went blundering about, her hands outstretched as if searching for something. She must have woken needing the bathroom and, muddled by sleep, was wandering towards the front door instead. Her hair was undone. It fell about her shoulders in thin white strands. The loose hair, the short summer nightdress and Ivy’s hesitant, stumbling gait put me in mind of a child. The child seemed in need of protection. Later, contemplating the notion while watching Osho board his private plane, I saw that it was laughable.

Back then, Sydney was studying marine biology at Melbourne University. He was living in a share house and he’d started sending us a photograph every day. I remember a photo that showed the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and another of deforestation in the Amazon. Chanel and I were thankful that Sydney observed the prohibition on publishing or sharing Australian pictures of that kind and sent only photos of other parts of the world. When we asked him why he was sending them to us, he replied that he hoped to drive home the wickedness of Australia’s climate no-policy. He seemed to think that our government was behind starving polar bears and industrial pollution in China! As for what he called ‘personal responsibility’, we reminded him that we filled up our recycling bin every fortnight and took our ColesWorth-generated soft plastics back to the supermarket to be turned into new stuff.