Over the same period of years, Anita had lurched between different hairstyles in desperate attempts to find herself or solve whatever personal mess she was in at the time by means of personal grooming. She’d worn her hair long, short with shaved sides, feathered, bobbed, layered, even permed during one especially misguided phase. She’d dyed it blonde, goth black, cartoonish blue, russet, peroxide-tipped and so on. Presently, she had reddish foils through her dark brown hair, but she was contemplating cutting it pixie short again. She envied Paula’s certitude about matters like hair.

As Paula kicked off her shoes, Anita followed her lead, both women undoing zips and buttons on the formal outfits they’d worn to the crematorium.

Once the police released the bodies, it had fallen to Anita and Paula to organise the funeral. By the time Stacey was four, her father had disappeared to New Zealand to construct a new life for himself with a second family. And by the time Stacey finished her teacher training, her mother had died. There was no other surviving family to speak of. The father did manage to fly in to Sydney to attend the funeral, but Matt’s parents chose to stay away, instead sending flowers with a loving message for their dead grandchildren.

Anita had delivered the eulogy, at Paula’s insistence. (‘You’re much better than me at words and speaking and all that.’) Paula organised the slideshow of photos and there was a video of kids from the school singing a song in honour of Cameron and Poppy. A celebrant conducted the whole thing with what felt like the right pitch of warmth and solemnity. (But what about this thing could ever be considered ‘right’?) They ensured there was no religious blah blah in the service because Stacey wouldn’t have been able to stomach any talk about God.

The crematorium chapel was full and many mourners had stayed for the afternoon tea in the function area—old friends as well as Stacey’s recent work colleagues and parents from the school.

After hours of well-meaning talk and the emotional workload of dealing with people at the funeral, Anita thought it would be a relief to retreat here, just the two of them. But in fact, without all those distractions, the more painful stuff, the impossible stuff, seeped into the room where the two of them were sitting.

Anita gave up on the claggy mini quiche she was trying to digest and filled her wineglass again.

‘Should we have known it might happen? Should we have done more to protect her?’ she asked.

Paula shrugged limply. ‘Everyone did all the right things. And there was no reason to think she wasn’t safe here.’