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Sounds good. How long can we stay in each place? How long in Australia? I’ve got a cousin there.

For the briefest moment, red sand smudges everything, stains the keyboard, a snake slithers across the kitchen floor, and footprints from bare, hot feet colour the carpet.

I shake my head. If I believed in coincidence, Australia pinging up like this might have meant something. But I don’t believe in coincidence, and I don’t want to see you again. A life ruined once is enough. Anyone would agree.

Hannah Davies:

There’re two of us. I’m travelling with my boyfriend, our first trip together. ?

I recommend side trips to Darwin, and yes, even Perth. I’ll get brownie points for upselling. As I wait for her response, I imagine what a first trip with a first boyfriend might be like—seeing Australia through untainted eyes. Could I ever have been a Hannah Davies, on a beach, drinking coffee without first checking if it had been drugged? My fingers hum against the keyboard.

[emailprotected]:

Have you thought about a tour? You could see more of the country that way. Honestly, it’s what I’d do if I could!

I’m such a liar. None of the tours we offer to the desert are any good, none of them go where we’ve been. I send her links, and sure enough Hannah Davies comes back straightaway:

Hannah Davies:

Wow, wicked!

[emailprotected]:

I know, right?! If I could go to Australia for the first time again, I’d be all over this. Romantic too, with the stars out there. No light pollution! ?

I’m good at making sales by being friendly with clients, and I’m always chattiest with the students. Sometimes it even feels like I’m their friend by the time they make their bookings. But this time there’s a strange, persistent part of me that wants to tell Hannah Davies everything. All about the real desert. About me. About you. I want to write your name in the chat box and press send. But I don’t. Hannah Davies won’t want toknow this story, or about my trip to Australia, or about me back then.