‘Well, the blokes have got a bigger range of lipsticks to choose from now! Nah, I reckon when there are no women on the base it’s a lot like a man drinking in a public bar, and then tidying himself up to drink in the lounge bar when there are women here. If there are women on the base then we have wine on the tables and the blokes will get dressed up and make a good appearance. It’s good. It’s more of a community than a men’s camp.’

Jim comes up to us. I tell him I’ll get him a drink. He says make it several. He says he’s going to miss me. I tell him yeah, I’ll miss him too. We don’t swap addresses.

Max and I talk late and urgently into the night in our narrow bed. We’re not sure if we’ll be able to replicate the intensity of our time together when we’re back in the real world, but we’re going to try. The past is secure and known, but we have no idea what lies ahead of us.

‘I want to quit my job, Fin. My heart’s telling me to. And that’s what Antarctica has taught me. To listen to my heart, and to take a few risks. I’m not sure what I’m going to do. I want to be less tentative about things. We’re all so bloody careful.’

I tell him I don’t want to leave this place. That I’ve got such a sense of energy and renewal from it. That it’s as though life itself has been bellowed into me, as though the wind has whipped through me and blown all the stress and the staleness from me. I tell him I feel ready to begin all over again, clean. Max says yeah, he feels that way too.

‘The trouble is, how to hold onto it.’

Max looks at me and says that he’s bad-tempered and cynical and that I mustn’t learn that from him. He says he’s always been racked with doubts and worries and he doesn’t want to poison me. He says there’s a joy and trust and innocence in me and he never, ever wants to hurt that.

I want to have his children. I can’t tell him that. My mother always tells me to play it cool. I don’t want him to feel trapped. I don’t even know if he wants children. He’s thirty-eight and he’s never been married. So much I don’t know.

I’ve forgotten stars in Antarctica. Light has pushed out the darkness for most of the time. There’s a vivid lingering sunset from nine at night until one in the morning, then a short stretch of never black night that lasts just two hours and softens into a sunrise at three. I’ve slept sparsely during my time in Antarctica and on my last night I sleep deeply for only an hour. I’ve become used to grabbing at sleep in snatches.