‘Kangaroos!’ Jaxon grins broadly. ‘I’d kill to see them in the wild. I’ve never met a real Australian. Say some Aussie stuff.’ He pronounces the word like ‘uh-zee’.

‘G’day, mate,’ my voice lilts. Jaxon bursts out laughing, a full-blown real guffaw, so over the top it makes me laugh too.

My father excuses himself to make some calls, and I wonder if I can ask Jaxon about his dad and where his mum is.

‘So,’ I say to fill up the silence.

‘Your dad’s pretty awesome, by the way.’ He turns his beanie over in his hands.

I smile. ‘Awesome’ sounds way better than ‘loser’.

‘Have you finished high school?’ I ask.

‘Yep, a few months ago. But I’ve been working at the Anchorage Visitor Bureau for the last couple of years, and then I got a job as a horseback guide over the summer in the Chugach Mountains to the east. Now I’m interning with a researcher at the national parks studying the wolf population close to town. There are about 7000 wolves in Alaska but in the south-east there are only a few hundred left; they’ve totally dropped in numbers.’

‘That’s so sad. Just like the orangutans in Borneo. My mum and I wanted to see them too. I’ll still go … one day.’

Now I feel sad. Who will I go with? I can’t help but hope it may be my father.

At that moment, he returns. ‘I thought I could find an alternative place for you to stay while we’re camping, bud, but no luck. I’d prefer not to leave you alone. Seriously, Jaxon, given the situation, it just wouldn’t sit right with me. Sky and I will go next week as planned I’m sure your dad will be back by then. If that’s okay with you, Sky?’

‘Sure.’

‘But you’ll miss the lights,’ Jaxon says. ‘That was the whole point of going snow camping, you told me yourself. If you stay back because of me, I’ll ruin it for both of you.’

I look at them, my mind whirring. Jaxon has pulled his sleeves over his hands. For a second, I feel his pain. I know what abandoned and scared looks like—it’s a different situation but kind of the same. For whatever reason, he’s by himself and trying not to freak out about his dad disappearing.

My father obviously feels stuck between his worry for Jaxon and trying to make a good impression on me.

‘If you come with us, you can show us the wolf dens, right?’ I ask Jaxon.

‘Yeah, but … I don’t want to get in your way or anything. You, like, came across the world to hang out with your dad.’

‘It’s all right,’ I say.

‘Sky, are you sure?’ my father asks.