And that was the last time Cathy had seen him, her little brother. Well, the last time until today, when he suddenly strode into the kitchen and pulled Hessel off her; today, when he strode powerfully back into her life, just in time to save it.

*

Basil was waiting for me out the front of the hospital. We hugged, standing in splashy puddles still lying on the road from the sudden onslaught of rain. ‘Hey,’ he said. ‘You okay?’

‘No,’ I said, sinking into his hug.

‘Still pregnant?’

‘Yup. And more pregnant than I thought, actually.’

‘Surely you’re either pregnant or you’re not: what’s this more or less?’

‘Longer,’ I said. ‘Further along.’

‘Right. Shit,’ he said. ‘Serious mindfuck.’

‘Yeah. Kinda,’ I said. ‘Not the only mindfuck at the moment, though.’

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘My mum has certainly filled me in on a few things. A few fucked-up things.’

‘Yeah, mine too.’ I stood back from him and looked at him. ‘So,’ I said. ‘Cousins.’

‘Yeah. Sorry, wasn’t allowed to tell you.’

‘You knew all along.’

‘Yep.’

‘I kissed you.’

‘Yeah, that was a bit strange for me actually.’

‘Fucking hell, Basil. That was pretty messed up.’

Basil shrugged. ‘Families always are,’ he said. ‘And it’s great – you got to experience The Baz before I became forbidden fruit.’

I punched him on the arm, but he only smiled wanly at me. I looked at him properly, took stock of my friend, my new cousin. And I could see that tears had been there recently – I could tell – and they were threatening to spill over again.

‘You alright?’

Basil nodded slowly. ‘Yes –’ and then he shook his head. ‘No. I fucked some things up pretty royally. Mum says it’s not my fault, but . . . yeah, I dunno.’

‘You seemed pretty upset back at the house. I saw you in the car with your mum.’

‘I think I’ve pretty much ruined everything. For Dad, I mean. Sure, there were things I didn’t know – but that’s actually just bullshit, that shouldn’t have mattered. I was being an idiot impulsive fuck-up.’ I reached for his arm again but Basil turned suddenly away from me. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Mum’s over at the police station with Dad. They should be finishing up soon.’

At the station we took our seats on the plastic waiting chairs by the police clerk’s desk, and Basil leaned forward, his head in his hands.

‘You’re not a fuck-up, Basil. You’re –’

‘I didn’t trust Mum. I should have. But she should have told me. She should have told me what Hessel did, not feed me the same bullshit accident story as everyone else.’ He shook his head. ‘But she reckons that the cops gave her such a hard time back then when she went to them.’ Basil threw his hand up on the word ‘cops’ as if slapping it away from himself. ‘They made out like she was the troublemaker, following her around and shit, so she just gave up on talking about it, and then I guess later on she wanted to make sure I was right out of it too. Pisses me off, Anna. Pisses me off that they did that to her. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised though, seems like the police have always been disgusting and corrupt.’ He stood up and raised his voice as he said that, trying to get the clerk to lift his head, but the clerk ignored him.