‘Crikey,’ said Patrick, eventually, absorbing the new dusty twinge to the light, the stillness of the water. We were clocking up a lot of sunsets together.

‘Yeah,’ I agreed. ‘I think this might be the most peaceful I’ve ever been in my life.’

I wiggled my toes in the sand at the bottom of the huge throw we were lounging on. It was colder underneath, where it hadn’t been exposed to the sun. My skin was sunbaked, my hair wild around my shoulders, my smile involuntary but undoubtedly there.

‘I don’t want to go back to my real life as it was,’ I said. I don’t know where it came from – mostly that I didn’t think it was possible to feel this way once we left Australia, and I wanted to feel like this always. Suspended in time and cocooned by nature. I wanted to examine every cloud in the sky and each leaf of the trees so that I could commit it to memory.

‘Can I ask you something?’ he said.

I made a noise that signified he could.

‘Why aren’t you happy at home?’

‘Just a small question, then,’ I joked. ‘What’s the meaning of life? Are you happy? Why is the sky blue?’

‘Love. Yes. Science.’

I shook my head. ‘You’ve got an answer for everything.’

‘Only because I spend so much time asking questions.’

His body was close to mine. Was he leaning into it too? Maybe I was imagining it because of his kindness. Maybe I was hoping for something absurd.

No, this is real, a voice from inside me said. You’re safe to feel this.

‘Go on,’ he prompted. His voice was lowered, a priest pacifying me into revelation.

‘Why aren’t I happy at home?’

It was his turn to make murmurs of encouragement.

I continued. ‘Honestly? I feel like I’m too much. Or, no, not enough.’

I kept moving my toes in the sand.

My body angled towards him a little more, responding to him doing the same. More and more we inched in the other’s direction.

I wanted to believe he might have a crush too.

‘I was bullied at school. I didn’t come back to drama camp because … It was when I got back after that last summer there and went into year ten, suddenly the popular girls didn’t like that I’d done something. It was as if they decided to hate me because I was excited about this thing that I loved. And for a whole school year they tormented me, and when the school finally called my parents because they were worried that I’d become withdrawn and stopped participating, Dad was really nice about it but Mum … wasn’t.