Those years of pain, of trying for a baby. Marking dates on the calendar app on my phone, reminders to have regimented sex. Killing the joy we once took in each other’s bodies. ‘We’ve been trying for a baby for years,’ I say. ‘I thought I could get pregnant, tell him it’s a miracle. I needed it,’ I say. ‘We needed it.’

He guffaws now. ‘You selfish bitch.’

‘I did it for him, I was doing it for us.’

‘Why do you need a baby?’

He’s watching me closely. I think about the question; is it because of the fraught relationship I had with my mother? Because some part of me wants to prove I am not her? Or is it simply some hardwired evolutionary trait, an atavistic need to procreate? Cain was the same, so much of his depression spawned from the lack of meaning he had after the war. He didn’t have any family anymore either. A child would give him purpose.

I give him the only answer I know is true. ‘It was an ache for both of us. I did it as much for him as me.’

‘How many times did you do it?’

‘Do what?’

‘Find men, cheat on your husband.’

‘You were the first. The only time. The guilt felt like it was going to kill me. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn –’

‘Shh. Enough.’

I stop talking.

I had rationalised it in my head. I’d convinced myself through some magical thinking it was for the best, that I was doing it for Cain. I’d planned it meticulously. It was going to work. The night with Daniel fell right in the window of my cycle.

‘And what about Cain? Poor cuckolded Cain was going to raise someone else’s kid.’

‘He would never know. It would be his. It might be his.’

‘Wouldn’t he think it odd if the kid didn’t look like him?’

‘I was careful,’ I say. ‘I was looking at people like him.’

‘Except I have green eyes.’

‘Cain’s dad had green eyes,’ I say. ‘You’ve got a similar nose, lips, height. You’re a Maori boy like him.’

He laughs again. This time he straightens his legs and the table moves an inch, sliding on the carpet. I see the keys jiggle but he doesn’t seem to notice or care.

‘And your mother, tell me about her, Lina? This is why you want the baby, right? To prove you’re not as much of a fuck-up as her?’

I look away this time. ‘I just want to be a mother. I want to raise a child with my husband. I never wanted to hurt anyone.’

‘But she died,’ he says now. It’s a blow right to the gut.

‘She did.’

‘In this lake. Drove her car through the barrier. Awful way to go.’

‘Don’t,’ I say. ‘Please.’