Hamish didn’t speak for a few seconds. When he finally answered, his voice was very bland. ‘No, Robyn. That’s all right. You can clean your toilet.’ If he was laughing at me, he did a good job of hiding it.

I managed to stay calm that night. After changing the locks, calling Hamish, mopping the bathroom and stitching up some hems, I even got a bit of work done. But the next morning everything fell apart.

It started with a call I made to my landlord while I was getting dressed. He was furious that I’d touched his locks without permission. ‘It’s the law!’ he kept saying. ‘I could have you evicted!’ Stung, I brought up the leaky hot water system; we had a huge argument that ended only when I shoved my foot into a trainer and felt something wet.

Honey in my shoe.

I had to wear sandals to school because most of my closed footwear contained honey or tomato sauce. It was devastating. I didn’t know how some of the boots would ever be resurrected. Then, just before I reached my classroom, Dad called. He told me the police had dropped by, though he insisted they’d been very decent. ‘I’ve known Val Stavros for years—he was just going through the motions. Orders from on high, he told me. Wouldn’t even search the place, though I said he could.’ As I struggled to keep calm, Dad continued, ‘His daughter’s getting married. Remember Rachael? Maybe not. He asked after you. I told him you were doing very well, all things considered.’

But I wasn’t doing well. I could feel it. During my last few weeks with Troy, I’d developed certain symptoms: a throat-clearing tic, a loss of concentration, a needling pain in my gut as if a rodent was scratching away in there. When I found myself repeatedly clearing my throat during roll call, I realised how stressed I was.

Then Phoebe started playing up.

She’d marched in that morning with a letter of complaint about the healthy food lesson I’d given the day before. According to Kate Canning, there was more sugar in fruit than in some other damn thing…I can’t remember the details. Then Phoebe took it upon herself to scold Luke for wearing a shirt that wasn’t officially sanctioned. When I explained that he had only one school shirt, which still hadn’t dried after a hamburger accident, she became even more officious, telling the other kids where to sit, correcting their pronunciation and insisting that we should do ‘more mathematics’. ‘You’re not challenging us,’ she informed me—no doubt parroting her mother.

I dealt with it by focusing on the quieter kids. I ignored Phoebe while I was assigning leadership roles for our class activities, so she started whispering instructions to some of her classmates. They didn’t appreciate it. Kayla finally pinched her.