Liv works at a bar in the city, and as far as I can tell, between the customers and the hornbag staff, it’s a good place for finding hookups.

‘That’s the little underage pot calling the consenting adult kettle black, isn’t it, Tal?’

I narrow my eyes, but my traitorous mouth turns up at the corners. Liv tugs on my bunched-down school socks, tugs on the invisible strings between us. She’s good at reeling me in when she wants to.

‘I miss you, Tal,’ she says and there’s no way you can doubt her sincerity. ‘I want to know if you’re okay.’

I play it like a soap opera, tossing my hair about, because all the world’s a stage et cetera. I’ve been acting for my life ever since Yin was taken.

‘I take pity on you, my sister. I will stay home.’

After Liv has tortured me with me one of her favourite Japanese horror movies I torture her with episode six of Devil Creek. Even though I’m pretty sure I hate the show, I have secretly watched two more episodes on my own, breaking a sacred promise to only watch it with my friends.

We fall quiet as the opening credits start.

A beautiful pale redhead in a nightie runs through the bush barefoot; everything around her blurred and streaky. The soundtrack is composed of ragged breathing and a pulsing drumbeat.

‘Nope, no, no way, we’re not doing this.’ Liv tries to pause the computer and I grab her hand.

‘Don’t be silly, I’ve already watched half the season, it’s fine.’

Two detectives, a man and a woman, stand by their car in the early hours of the morning, eating sausage rolls. Senior Detective Hillary Burns wears a woollen jumper, a no-nonsense parka, and has unbrushed hair and no makeup. By contrast, Senior Detective Pokerface McUptight is in an immaculate grey suit. He crumples his sausage roll packet and wipes his mouth.

‘You’ve got sauce on your face,’ he tells the woman, but she gives no fucks because all she cares about are the victims and she’s crushing patriarchal standards on a daily basis.

Together they cross the car park and head up the stairs of the huge glass-and-concrete building. McUptight, real name McManus—way too close to anus—tries to wave her through the door first but Burns won’t have a bar of it.

You’d think that the makers of Devil Creek would run out of reasons to show Emily Blake’s corpse, but you would be wrong. They keep sliding her out of her drawer in the morgue to do different things to her body or pan the camera over it one more time. When they’re not showing the body, the police detectives are flapping the crime scene photos of her wounded, half-naked corpse in front of every single person they interview, trying to shock them into a reaction.