‘You lost—?’

‘Don’t lecture me.’

‘Were you over the limit?’

She looks down at the grey swirl through the white marble floor and nods.

‘When was this?’

‘Six months ago. No one was hurt. But I wrote off the car.’

He is quiet until she looks at him. ‘You could have killed someone. Or yourself.’

‘I know, Scott. I’m so ashamed about it.’

‘I should hope you are.’

She feels his disgust. She doesn’t have the guts to hold his eye. She is grubby and useless in his bright, clean house.

‘I need to get to work,’ he says, climbing the stairs. ‘I can’t help you, Isla.’

‘You can’t or you won’t?’

‘Both,’ he says, without turning round.

‘Ask Mum!’ she shouts after him, standing at the foot of his staircase. ‘Ask Mum if she believes it.’

No reply. From the first-floor landing she hears a door close.

‘Thanks a bunch!’ She shouts it across the expanse of marble, into the domed cavity of the roof.

Sydney’s well-groomed business class is waking up. Isla walks through the streets as they leave their houses, back their sleek cars out of gravel drives and head for the city. They eye her curiously: a black-clad woman with outgrown hair, lace-up boots, nowhere to go. She glares at them, hot and angry, a misfit, a black sheep. She is lost, which is just as well. She’d be in a bottle shop if she knew where to find one.

Behind her a car sounds its horn. She ignores it. She passes under palm trees and thinks she’ll head for the coast. The houses are grander now, set back from the street. Sculpted lawns, pillars, ocean-facing balconies.

The horn sounds again and a car pulls up at the edge of the road. A metallic blue Ford Laser with its bumper bar hanging low on the passenger side. ‘Get in!’ Louisa shouts through the window. She leans across and opens the door. ‘Come on. I’ll take you to see Steve, if that’s what you want.’

Isla stands a moment on the footpath. She loves her mother’s car for being old and ugly, so incongruous in this suburb that she almost laughs.

‘Get in,’ Louisa says again, lifting magazines and carrier bags from the passenger seat. Isla catches a glimpse of her pyjama shirt, its silk collar visible under her jacket.

‘Are you sure?’

Louisa revs the engine. ‘For God’s sake, get in.’

Isla lowers herself into the car, ignoring the grit in the stitching of the seat. Something yields softly in the detritus beneath her feet and she kicks it aside. Louisa accelerates. She’s wearing a long green trench coat over her pyjamas. Isla has never in her life seen her mum leave the house looking so dishevelled.

‘I didn’t sleep last night,’ Louisa says.

‘Why not?’

She checks the mirror, changes gear, glances at Isla over her glasses. ‘Mandy didn’t withdraw that money.’

‘I know.’

She taps the steering wheel. ‘Why would Steve change his story like that?’