We were all quiet at first, until I felt the food bring me back to life, warmth returning to stiff muscles under the sun’s slow heat.

‘Yum!’ Ceci seemed to have woken properly now too, dolloping more ketchup all over her second sandwich with lavish abandon.

‘You’re joking, right?’ Zach looked disgusted. ‘Last night you were puking your guts out, and now—’

‘But you can’t beat an egg butty,’ I told him.

‘A butty!’ Cecilia grinned. ‘Ha, funny! And anyway, that was last night.’ She bit into the thick white bread without restraint. ‘I’m starving now. Live in the moment, Zach!’

I’d watched Zach like a hawk since we’d got up, but he seemed his normal self again, and relief washed over me. Now, they reminded me of large cubs, keen and solid and just relishing being.

‘Ces’ – Melissa dug some Sweetex out of her bag – ‘I was just thinking…’

‘Did it hurt?’ Cecilia made her eyes big over her egg.

‘Very funny. It’s just, me and Ruby were both wondering…’ Pause. ‘About last night.’

‘What?’ The girl’s face began to close.

‘Hey!’ Zach pointed at a silver flash in the London-bound fast lane. ‘That’s that dude that lives in that mad big house.’

‘Bill, isn’t it?’ Melissa looked down the carriageway, but the car was already a memory. ‘How can you tell it’s him?’

‘Recognised the number plate. Told you he’d have a Lambo!’

‘They’re ruining the planet,’ Ceci sniffed. ‘All that carbon monoxide.’

‘You’re ruining the planet with your hairspray and your glitter,’ Zach scoffed, and she grinned at him over her sandwich.

‘I don’t use hairspray, stupid. Or glitter.’

‘Ces,’ Melissa began again, ‘did you know what you’d eaten last night?’

The girl stiffened. ‘What do you mean?’

‘That those – the brownies, they were full of hash. I think that’s what made you so sick.’

‘Hash?’ Cecilia looked nonplussed. ‘What’s hash?’

‘You know, like edibles.’ Zach jabbed at her cheek. ‘You’ve got ketchup there.’

She ducked her head. ‘Gerroff!’

‘So – did you know?’ Melissa pushed lightly.

‘No, of course not.’ Cecilia wiped her face on her sleeve, last night’s muddy warpaint still faintly visible on her cheekbones. ‘Willow just found them in the picnic bags at the tent – and we were hungry, so we ate some.’

‘Zach?’ I asked.

He frowned. ‘What she said.’

‘You all thought they were normal cakes?’ I thought of Willow’s composure last night. ‘And you all ate some?’

‘Yeah. Have you seen this div?’ Zach had fished out his newly charged phone to show Cecilia. The two of them pressed close on the bench, giggling over some meme of a cat talking like the Prime Minister.

Melissa plopped more Sweetex into black tea and closed her eyes. Admitting defeat, I presumed.

‘What did you make of that new bloke?’ I licked egg yolk off my wrist.

‘Shit! What’s with this guy?’ Ceci was staring at Zach’s phone. ‘He’s not—’

‘Who?’

‘Willow’s little brother.’

‘What are you looking at?’ I sat up.