I saw the boyish woman walking towards me along Paisley Street. Each time I see her I think she might look at me, know me and speak to me, finally, after all these months I’ve watched her from the window in my study that overlooks the street, turned away from my desk, tired or bored, while below she paces from the mall to the bridge just about every day, howling obscenities, squatting and smoking, pulling her pants down to wee between parked cars.

She slammed the bedroom door shut, turning us both into silhouettes against the fading light filtering through the large open window. Barely in the room, she collapsed on the bed in front of me, said, “Smartphones are what cigarettes were for the great masses of people once addicted.” Reaching across her bed, she dipped her hand into the bottom drawer of her bedside cabinet and pulled out a single cigarette.

It is not the first time the thought occurs to her: that it might be days before anyone finds her, lying still on the linoleum. What prompts the thought this time is her bleeding thumb. Clumsily opening a can of baked beans she finds at the back of her kitchen cupboard yields such blood. Sofia drenches the handle of her mother’s old wooden spoon. The sauce, also a sickly red, is starting to bubble on the stove.

The next time we saw each other I would only remember the name Bastard, which was not his name but what his friends had called him, how they’d introduced him that first night, because it resembled the sound of his true surname. But I felt strange addressing him as that; even an unflattering nickname seemed to produce intimacy I didn’t care to feel. Instead, I didn’t call him anything.

The things I want to say aren’t the sort of things you’re allowed to say out loud. You’re not even meant to think the things I think. But sometimes I think them anyway and sometimes I want to say them, so badly, that my chest fills with this irredeemable rage and I don’t know which way to look.

I’m a quiet man. I don’t talk much. I like a quiet drink. Sometimes a bit more, sometimes too much. I have this quiet spot at the Royal pub. Just a little spot around from the bar near the corner. They always serve me a beer as soon as I walk in. A bit of a nod, a bit of a wink, and then I slide on to the stool and rest my elbow on the bar. This is what I do. I watch people. They think I’m looking straight into my beer glass. Well, I am, sort of. But most of the time I am looking at people.

Travel runs in the family. My matrilineal ancestors took the red ship from Hobart; the patrilineals rode Starlifters from Christchurch. Instead, I merely fly an aeroboat over Aotearoa, the three islands: the Fish, the Canoe and finally Te Punga, the anchor. That last island has different names, depending on time and conquest. Stewart called it after himself; then it became Rakiura.

She was forty-seven when it began. Her head is locked towards the timber casement windows. Beyond the glass, a lake spreads out. A breeze rattles the shutters. It could be morning. Or late afternoon.

Clothed, breathing can be difficult. It is hard to move out of the house, but when she does, she can see where she was. They say temperature has reached a hundred, gusts of forty miles per hour—descriptions relayed by telegram and phone to radio. It is useful to have the weather narrated in your own language or it would be easy to believe nothing was the matter at all. There is a radio-style voiceover that will become part of the news—it’s her father. He’s looking at a burning house.

The children are not sure they want to go, but the long morning shadows of their parents cheerfully say it is an adventure. There is turquoise sparkling at the earth’s fingertips, there are sausages to brown on a fire. Together they will walk the arm of land called peninsula.

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A faint scent of coffee. The warm seat by the window. The light rumbling of a train ready to depart. These sensations had a very soothing effect that helped me relax. It was a fine beginning to my three-day journey across the country.

There’s a memory I have of fricassee. This may sound like the start of a joke but I am deadly serious. If you don’t know what fricassee is, congratulations. Also, too bad. I’m not going to describe it to you. Talking about the memory is bad enough without going through the recipe.

The ginger cat has killed again. All that’s left is a small pinkish organ lying on the carpet—everything else has been eaten. The cat climbs into Faye Bedwell’s lap and urges itself at her, working its hindquarters and pushing its face at her neck, making her dream of a foxtrot on a purple carpet and the pink neck of a dance partner. Her mouth opens with a thrill.