Bella’s calling me from the other side of the stream. She jumped it in one flying leap, clearing the fast-flowing water by a foot. I’m dithering. I always do—never quite finding the guts to make the jump, my stupid brain imagining me fudging it and falling face-first in the dirty water. Wouldn’t be so bad if we hadn’t had such a wet summer. If it had been dry the last few weeks, the stream would be nothing but a dank, stinking trickle I could step across.

I could walk farther upstream—there’s a fallen tree that acts as a bridge. But it’s a five-minute walk away and I can see the impatience on Bella’s face.

Just bloody do it, Tess. I take a few steps back, hold my breath, and go for it—a run and then a huge jump. My feet plant in the mud on the other side, water soaking into my sandals, and I can feel myself falling back. My arms fly out for balance but I know I’m going to fall—Tessie the Elephant splashing down—but then Bella’s hand grabs mine and she hauls me up the bank.

“I got you,” she says, laughing as I fall to my knees, muddying my jeans. She keeps hold of my hand as I clamber upright.

I’m sweating—that moment where I thought I was falling translated into great damp patches under my arms and down my back. I wipe my forehead with the back of my hand.

“It’s so bloody hot, maybe we should have jumped in the water rather than over it,” Bella says. She’s still laughing, but it’s not a cruel laugh. It’s her indulgent laugh for the clumsy kid sister who couldn’t tie her laces until she was ten and was forever falling over. I have a vivid memory of a smaller me, my big sister crouching down to tie my school shoes for me. It’s bright, that memory.

I squeeze Bella’s hand. “Thanks, big sis.”

“Anytime, baby sis,” she says, letting go of my hand to ruffle my curls. I push her hand away—isn’t my hair bad enough in this humidity? An insane mass of frizz.

“What do you want to do now?” she asks, sinking onto a log, stretching out her legs, brushing off the tiniest speck of mud.

It squeezes my heart watching her as her hair falls over her face. I get this a lot—this huge wave of love for my perfect sister, almost a pang, almost a pain.