‘Too radical. Too much. Nobody wants to hear my ideas about why there’s no such thing as a mother.’ She wants it to sound casual, joking, but there’s thinness in her voice that Bea doesn’t miss.

‘They should.’ Bea offers Leonie a Marlboro, takes one from the pack herself, and lights them both with an old Zippo that might have belonged to Fen, originally. Those were happy days. Fen was a good woman, too. She’s abroad now – South America, maybe – working in a jungle. Or something. She didn’t last long in publishing; it was too tame for her. Leonie should pay more attention.

Leonie inhales. It’s been three years since she smoked. Ursula made her give up when she told her about the baby; she tried to make her lay off the wine too. The taste of the smoke in her mouth is as warm as the words of a half-forgotten song. ‘I know.’

They stand in silence for a minute, looking back at the camp. Bea gives the finger to three men in a passing car; there doesn’t seem to be any reason for the gesture. Seeing Leonie notice, she says, ‘I’m trying out the male experience. See something, react to it however I like, assume I’ll get away with it.’ She stubs out her cigarette, and adds, ‘I’m setting up a women’s studies degree. You interested?’

‘I might be.’ If there’s one thing Leonie’s learned this morning – apart from the fact that she was right to give the baby away – it’s that she’s a bit out of the action. And though she has no desire to sleep next to a campfire or dig a hole to shit in, she needs to find a way to keep being part of the movement. It’s made the shape of her adult life.

‘You’re a great teacher, Leonie.’

At the edge of the camp there’s a circle of sitting children, a woman leading them in a song about counting. ‘My mother wanted me to be a teacher,’ she says, nodding towards the woman, ‘that sort.’ By the time Erica was born, Leonie and Ursula’s mother had barely a finger’s grip on reality, so accepted a granddaughter without question or thought, calling Erica by the names of either of her daughters.

‘Well, come and subvert her expectations,’ Bea says. ‘Call me.’ She kisses Leonie and walks back towards the camp, something darkly floral in her wake.

10 April 2018

10 April 2018

Erica