I close my eyes to try and conjour up the memory of Daisy stamping on the gecko, but the images in my mind are blurred by my hangover and lack of sleep. If she couldn’t focus on me without her contact lenses in, and I was sitting across from her on the bench, how could she even have seen it? I’m misremembering what happened. I have to be. There’s no way she deliberately stamped on a living creature, not after the accusations her mum levelled at her when her sister died.

Al snorts with laugher beside me, and I open my eyes.

“I don’t suppose you got a photo of that gecko, did you?” she says. “I just remembered I was supposed to get my camera, but I was so obsessed with finding more booze I completely forgot about it.”

“No.” I shake my head. “No, I didn’t.”

“No worries.” She shrugs. “I’m sure we’ll see loads more.”

Thankfully, we arrive at the Maoist station within minutes. Their desk is on a platform at the end of the rickety bridge that connects the café at the base of the mountain with the start of the trail. None of us are shocked to see them there – you’re warned about the “tourist tax” in all good guidebooks – but the guns they clutch to their sides take us all by surprise. Shankar, our trek guide, nods for us to approach. I try to read his expression. While many Nepalese people support the Maoists, others are fearful of them. But Shankar’s eyes give away nothing of his thoughts.

Daisy approaches the desk first, her shoulders back, chin high. She runs a hand through her hair and smiles at the man behind the desk as she hands him her passport, trek visa and 150 rupees, but he doesn’t acknowledge her. His expression doesn’t change as he flips through the passport and then slides the money to the man at his left, who slips the notes into a money belt around his waist. Daisy reaches for her passport then jumps as the man slaps his hand on top of it.

“I tell you when to take,” says the man behind the desk. He stares at her for an unbearably long time then lowers his eyes to her visa on the desk in front of him. He flips the passport open again and compares the name on the visa with the name on the passport, then looks back up at Daisy.

“Why you here?”

“Um …” She clears her throat. “Just to trek up to the summit.”

Leanne has told us what to say. She seems to think the Maoists will charge us extra if they think we’re going to be staying in a Western establishment rather than one of the Nepalese-owned hostels.

“You sure about that?” He continues to stare at her.