They headed for Ivy’s house. Gumtree branches covered the street like a canopy, moving and pitching in the wind.

‘You should come in,’ said Shelby when they arrived.

Mackerel hadn’t unbuckled his seatbelt. ‘I might just wait here,’ he said, eyeing his childhood home.

‘Come on, Mack.’

‘I don’t want to go inside.’

She leaned across and unbuckled his seatbelt for him. ‘Don’t be a scaredy-cat.’

Taking deep breaths, he climbed out of the Jeep and followed Shelby inside. The outside of the house may have changed over the years, but the inside looked almost identical to what he remembered. The nautical artwork in the corridor, varnished timber struts, high ceilings with skylights. That smell . . . the smell of Ivy’s perfume and the wood and the cooking. His childhood.

He hated it. He wanted to leave.

‘Constable Linda?’ Shelby called into Ivy’s house. ‘Kane?’

Mackerel paused to study a wall of family photos. Weddings, school photos, baby photos of Kane and Forest. Really, he was looking for pictures of himself, and he was surprised to see his face in a few of the group shots, and in one solitary portrait from his high-school farewell dinner, chubby and goofy-looking.

So she hadn’t thrown all his portraits out, as she’d told him she had.

Kane appeared in the hallway. ‘Can we go home now?’

‘Have you spoken to Dad at all?’

‘No? Where is he?’ said Kane.

Constable Linda came up behind Kane. ‘Good kid you’ve got here, Shelby. Didn’t get a peep out of him.’

‘That’s only because Ivy has an Xbox,’ said Shelby. She planted a kiss on Kane’s head.

Kane rolled his eyes and strolled out to the car.

Perfect kids. Perfect mansion. Perfect life. Mackerel wondered what it must be like. Something inside of him was annoyed that Davey was evidently a good father. Where had he learned that? Their own father, Joel Dempsey, had been a shit dad.

Then the answer came to him: Ahab. Ahab had been more of a father to them than their own.

‘We’ll have officers patrolling your house tonight, Shelby,’ said Linda.

‘That’s okay, I thought Mack might come and stay with us tonight. Is that okay, Mack?’

His heart plummeted.

‘He won’t be able to stay, Shelby. This one’s got a curfew,’ explained Linda. ‘I’ll make sure the officers are there.’

‘I’m sure it won’t matter if Mack stays just for one night. It’d be good for him to be around family.’

Mackerel didn’t laugh, that would’ve been rude. Shelby had no sense what his life was like, but how would she? She had no way of knowing that some days he’d get home at 7.55 pm and the cops would be waiting for him, hoping to catch him even one minute late. Still, what she wanted was family, and it warmed him that she thought of him that way.