‘You didn’t look too good after you tipped over, so I put that under your head.’ He points his bottle at the ground behind me and I see a grubby cushion with the stuffing poking out of it, and what looks like spots of fresh blood.

‘When I—?’ I put my hand to my forehead and feel grit and warmth, and when I take my fingers away, they’re streaked red.

‘You’re all right, girl, just a graze, I reckon.’ I stare at my hand. It starts to shake slightly and a wave of nausea washes over me. The thought of this guy leaning over me to lift my head and place the cushion isn’t as terrifying as the realisation I have no memory of it. I open my mouth to try to speak, tell him to back off, stay away, I’m armed, dangerous, anything. But the more I look at him, and the more he looks back, the less afraid I feel. I stand up, though, because that much I can do now.

The moth man takes a step backwards and peels the blanket from his shoulders. It looks like he’s got about five layers of clothes on, but all his shirts are tucked neatly into his trousers and secured with a belt. He’s wearing a floppy felt hat that looks like something a cool girl’s lost at Glastonbury. I search for the words Lou would use to describe him if he showed up at her office. Street suave, maybe.

He holds the blanket out to me. ‘Wrap this around you, love, you’ve got the wobbles on.’ My face must give me away because he laughs. ‘Don’t worry, princess, it’s clean enough. They let me do my laundry out the back at the food bank.’ He puts his face into it and sniffs deeply. ‘Fresh as a daisy.’

I’m embarrassed that I hesitated, and I bite the bullet and reach for the blanket. I wrap it around me and he’s right. It smells of washing power and wine, and it’s perfect for someone with the wobbles on. We stand and watch each other while the duck swims in circles.

‘Feel better now?’

I don’t want to play my hand too early because I don’t know how long he’s been there, what he knows, so I say I’m fine and thanks for asking.

‘What are you doing down here anyway? This is no place for a kid.’

‘I’m not a kid, I’m fifteen.’ I realise, even as I say it, that I’m giving him a gift and he doesn’t miss a trick.

‘Ah, my mistake.’ He lifts his hat and bows. ‘You’re practically a pensioner.’ Then he’s out and out laughing at me, but I don’t care because it was a gift, and because when he laughs, all the wrinkles in the world land on his face and it looks amazing.

‘What’s your name, girlie?’

‘Wolfie.’

He looks like he’s mulling it over. ‘Funny name.’

‘It’s after a singer in a band my mother used to like,’ I say. ‘And it’s not that funny. Anyhow, what’s yours?’