I peer through the clefted melon of my bottom, through the looped curtains of my feet, and into the rock pool swims a face.

I see a moving forest of sea-lettuce and wrack; a garden where sea-anemones quiver in a bower of eel-grass, and something pinkish and soft caresses a sludge-brown mussel. Little stones hurtle stilly: blue-grey and mottled, terracotta and creamy-orange — incised with lines, pock-marked with scabs and iridescent sparkle, smooth as silk, crested with barnacles. And even as I look, a stone betrays me — the water ripples, a crab scuttles away.

There are days when it is wet, and I play heedless in the shallows; wander in a sea mist; sit in the shelter shed and pretend to sight mermaids. There are days when it is warm, and I bury myself in the cool sand; pose for a photograph in a seaweed boa; chase the shadow of the jutting cliff.

(And slowly the shadow crept over the beach. The sea unfurled itself like a length of silk; waves seamed and met in pleats that shirred to nothing. The dunes turned blue; the tawny patchwork fell from the rocks; the sun was a lemon, a slice of Jaffa orange, a golden hump, a wink — and was gone. Red insects were blotted, caves washed clean of sea-shell garlands. The night cut new initials on my limestone throne; strangers cradled the thorn-bush.)

When the morning comes I cannot find my rock pool, my mermaid, my seaweed boa. My white skin turns raw and freckled; the map I saw on others’ backs appears on mine.

(My first holiday was almost over.)

We go for a walk down a green lane — Nan and Reece, my mother and I (and dust hung over the grass, the pine-trees were ripped by wind, the lovely lady had sunburned arms). We come out by tennis-courts, and watch figures behind wire-netting leap for a ball that taunts them with ‘ping’. Then my mother and I buy our tickets at the depot — already I am late for school. Nan and Reece wave us away and I am sad.

When we dropped from the vineyards and the orchards to the sameness of the suburbs it was dark.

I held my mother’s hand. We walked from the tram stop with the suitcase that bumped my leg. I had my mother’s scarf on, patterned with masks and ribbons. It smelt of her body and her perfume and the single cigarette she smoked at night.

We clasped chips we bought from the Greek and followed the paw marks, frozen deep in the concrete, of a dog that was not there. They went past the hoardings by the side of Hook’s, and the wooden fence that said amgoorie, and stopped at the lane I feared. I thought I saw a white tail wag, and was scared as we scurried across the black gulf and into the light again.

The key would not open the door. My mother got in at the window like a robber. I felt more afraid than ever as I waited on the gravel. The roses were so pale, the lilies gleamed, the gravel hissed.