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“Um, I’m sorry, you probably don’t drink your coffee that way any more It’s a bit of an inside joke… I used towhen you were a kid, decaf of course, and I’d do them like that because obviously no three-year-old really likes coffee, you just wanted one like I wasfor your mum”

“I don’t reulp No as I going to ot to drink coffee ever Mu coffee in the house She acted like it was literal poison

“Loved doing it,” said Brad “I got in a load of fucking trouble if I had any myself, so nice to be able tofor the AFL draft back in those days, if you can believe it”

“I heard” I was trying hard not to look like I was on the edge of having a coffee orgas Then I started feeling wary Was Brad trying to build soh selected stories from a shared past I didn’t remember?

I needed to get onto addressing ere really here for I pushed the coffee back a little “Mum said you hit me when I was three years old That it was the reason she had to leave you”

“I know she told you that,” Brad said “She said she was going to do it She warned me”

“Well if—”

“It never fucking happened,” said Brad “I never laid a finger on you in anger Why would I do that?”

Surprise made me sassy “I don’t kno about you explain to me why she would lie?”

Brad gri to do this, aren’t I Explain to hter—Fuck” Two older ladies at a table near us were shooting us frequent hostile looks Brad offered the, and he quickly seemed to lose interest in them to mutter more curses to himself

I didn’t knohat to say or do I just sat as still as I could, waiting for hiet control over himself, and finally he shook his head a little and continued, his eyes looking a little less wild “Well, you’re going to find out soon enough anyway No keeping it from you Your sister, Jess She turned fourteen this year”

I just kept staring at hiether with some other information, but I was too wired at the moment to do it

“Fourteen, Tamara,” said Brad “Think about how old you are, how old you hen I last saw—”

Maths had never beenthe point

“Yourafter I found out ere having a kid I had an ultrasound picture she’d sent uess I looked at it one tooup I was so fucking happy to be a dad again, I ads I’ve always loved all of my kids, more than anyone can know…