Was she asking about Fox or the toddler? Chloe kicked at the ground and he noticed her hair, a messy ponytail with lots of bumps on top, and a black hair band instead of the regulation red. Normally Chloe had perfectly neat hair. Her mother was the super-organised type who handed every note back on time, ensured library books were returned, helped out on excursions, the school picnic and at every social event. That was the useful side of the woman. She also wanted to meet with him every Tuesday to discuss Chloe’s reading progress, every Wednesday to discuss rough behaviour in the playground, every Thursday to discuss the maths program, and every Friday to complain about Fox disrupting the class learning environment.

‘We’re all worried about the missing girl.’ Brendan patted Chloe’s shoulder. ‘But I’m sure she’ll be okay. The police are out there looking for her right now.’

Parent–teacher interviews next Monday and Tuesday, then the last day of school on Friday. Brendan sighed and massaged the back of his neck; this would all be a distant memory. With rugby every Saturday, he’d only managed to get to the snow three times this term—and they’d all been quick trips. Now he’d have a whole week of shredding the back country and drinking schnapps. Sick! The perfect end to term three, which always seemed the longest.

Should he invite Jeff up to the snow as well? The other lads wouldn’t mind. This was only Brendan’s second year at Merrigang—and Jeff’s first. They’d clicked right from the day Jeff had bounded into the staffroom, dressed in his PE gear with Arsenal football socks. Rugby, soccer, league, Aussie Rules—they both loved it all. They played rugby but they weren’t like those other blokes who were passionate about one code and hated the rest. Over the years, Brendan had tried all of them and chosen his sport according to the social scene. At high school in Albury, the cool girls would come and watch AFL so he’d played that. At uni, he’d started with soccer then swapped to rugby. The rugby lads partied the hardest.

In Brendan’s last teaching job, on the other side of Canberra, the only other male teacher had been seven hundred and sixty-three years old. Well, maybe fifty-eight, but he treated the kids like they were in a Dickens novel. At the mention of alcohol or drugs or sex, the man’s face turned beetroot. In the staffroom, Brendan and the cute kindy teacher would stand next to him and talk about their gay friends going on dates, watching as he began to sweat. One time, they thought they’d pushed it too far. The ancient teacher started hyperventilating and had to lie down sideways across four chairs.

‘We just need to get him laid,’ the cute kindy teacher had suggested the next day.