I let my pen hover over the page of my pad. ‘You blame yourself for what? The situation you and your sister are in or for losing your scholarship?’

‘They’ll take me back,’ he says. ‘That’s why I’m here, that’s why they organised our little meetings. That’s why I’m looking into those pretty brown eyes.’

I keep a neutral expression, brush the compliment aside. ‘We’re talking about you today, Cormac, not me.’

‘Of course. You get it all the time though, I’m sure.’

I push on. ‘You were talking about your scholarship and the position you and your sister are in.’

‘I was,’ he continues. ‘So I blame myself for the stuff with the university. But not for the position we are in. I know why we are here in Australia. I know why we’re not back in Dublin, why I’m flat broke with no hope of making anything of myself.’

‘And why is that?’

‘My father.’

Like that, a breakthrough. A suspended breakthrough – this needs unpacking – but it’s progress. I need to keep him talking.

‘Tell me about him.’

‘What do you want to know?’

‘I want to know why you blame him for your current economic struggles.’

‘Economic struggles?’ he says, bemused. ‘You ever worked in a kitchen?’

‘No,’ I say truthfully.

‘Who do you think is the lowest of the low in a kitchen? One guess.’

‘Who is it?’

‘It’s the kitchen hand, which is a fancy way of saying the guy that does the dishes.’

I eye the clock above the door. We have ten minutes left. ‘Was that you, Cormac?’

‘I scrubbed pots for seven hours. Chefs are all overworked, miserable pricks. They used to say stuff like “I need a clean pan stat” as if they were a doctor performing surgery and not just cooking someone else’s steak. I could work forty hours scrubbing pans or write one essay and make more money.’ This has to be an exaggeration; it didn’t sound as if he was making that much money from the essays. I’m still sticking with the self-sabotage theory.

‘So, let’s take a step back. Why do you blame your father?’

‘You know what my father did? You done your research?’

‘No,’ I say. ‘I don’t do research, Cormac, I let clients tell me. So I’m asking you, why do you blame him?’

‘Now you’re going Freudian on me, aren’t ya?’ Again that smile, his eyes half-closed. He cups his jaw, then slides his fore finger and thumb down over his stubble, pinching his chin. ‘You’re thinking I was competitive with him, somehow? I despise my father because I wanted to fuck my mum, right?’