‘No. Ren and Matt went to their place to get more drugs, which they brought back to the girls’ place because McCrae had finally gone home. The girls were all dancing in the lounge room. Including Nicole.’ Miles hesitates. ‘They weren’t fighting anymore, but it all felt a bit off. There was still a lot of tension. The other girl, Evelyn’s friend, had gone by then, and I just sat on the couch with Tan and Roy pretending everything was fine. I tried to talk to Alex, but she told me to fuck off.’ Miles grips one hand in the other. ‘After a while, Tan and Roy left. Nicole and Evelyn were still dancing, and Alex was getting pretty messy, so I tried to get her to lie down on the couch with me.’

‘Did she?’ Oli asks.

‘Sort of. She sat down for a bit, but she wouldn’t really talk to me. And then Matt said he wanted to go to the shops for more cigarettes, and I said I’d go with him. I just wanted to get out of the house. I didn’t want to think about Evelyn going outside and finding Billy.’ He coughs. ‘I know that makes me sound like a total prick, but I knew she would lose it, and I didn’t want to be there to see it.’

Oli pictures a younger version of Miles on the stand, pulling on his tie as he told the court about the late-night hunt for cigarettes. ‘At the trial you said you went to the shops with Matt and Ren, and that you didn’t go back to number twenty-eight after that. Is that true?’

‘Yeah. We walked up to the 7-Eleven on Fitzroy Street and bought smokes and chips, then we dicked around outside for a bit. A guy was sitting on the street bench playing guitar, and Ren asked him if he could play. I texted Alex, but she never wrote back. Then we went to Matt and Ren’s place. We smoked more dope, and I passed out on the floor in front of the TV.’

Oli purses her lips as she considers her next question.

Miles rushes to add, ‘I think I blocked out what I saw in the yard. I didn’t want to have seen it.’ He runs his fingers through his hair like he’s still trying to comb the memory away. ‘And then the next morning, when we found out what happened, all I could think about was Alex and whether she really had killed Evelyn. I felt like I’d slipped into a parallel universe. My girlfriend was on trial for murder. It just,’ he looks between Oli and Cooper, ‘it was so surreal. I didn’t know what to do or what to think.’

‘Did you think Alex was guilty?’ Oli asks bluntly.