‘Hello, Chloe’s friends.’ Natalia sounds and looks tired but at least she answered my call.

Liana calls out, ‘You’re so pretty!’

I bounce my way off the trampoline, heading for somewhere quieter, more private. I stand in the back corner of the garden, where moths gather around the security light.

‘Do you think you’ll be back at school this week?’

‘Not sure…How did I do yesterday?’

‘You did well. It was nice to hear more about Yin, from a different perspective. It was really sad, of course.’

I can see tiny hints of what looks to be Natalia’s bedroom, whenever she shifts about. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that I used to be friends with Yin.’

‘It’s fine,’ I say and it is. In the last week I’ve thought more about how hard things must have been for Natalia since Yin went missing, all the hanging on and waiting.

‘Why did you call me?’ she asks.

‘Just to say hi. And Katie and Liana wanted to meet you.’ I leave it at that. She looks even more shattered than I expected, so my new idea can wait until she comes back to school.

‘You’re so strange, Cardell,’ she says and I know her well enough by now to take it as a compliment.

NATALIA

DAY 73

The only time that Dad and I talk about anything real is in the car, I don’t know why, that’s just the way it is, the words come easier when you’re sitting side by side, when you can pretend the view is fascinating and you’re not talking about something earth-shattering.

‘How are you feeling?’ Dad taps his fingers against the steering wheel as he drives.

‘How do you think?’

About as good as if I was being boiled slowly in a giant metal cauldron over a slow-burning fire or if I was a little baby deer walking through the forest on my own and there were wolves nearby. And I’m wondering if the psychologist is going to make me lie down on a couch or if that’s just something they do in movies, only I can’t bring myself to ask Dad that so instead I say:

‘What was the deal with your nervous breakdown?’

Dad flinches for real, takes his eyes off the road, briefly. ‘I’m surprised you even remember. You were so young.’

From one answer-dodger to another I say, ‘I was young enough that no one told me what was going on and no one has talked about it since so that’s why I’m asking you now.’

Dad throws an exasperated hand up at the driver who has just overtaken us and then cut back in and then he can’t avoid answering any longer. He’s already sweating so much that he has to wipe his forehead with the back of his hand.