I pull myself up onto the high seats in the front of the van. Me and Mickey are heading back to Narrabeen to score more smack. Through the windscreen, I see Lorna walking in the road towards us. She’s making a habit of hanging around my hotel. It was only this morning I saw her here last, but I don’t think she saw me then.

I consider ducking as I did this morning, but it’s too late, I’m sure she’s seen me. I don’t want her to interfere with me and Mickey being together. She told me to stay away from him. But who the hell does she think she is? She isn’t my only connection in Sydney anymore. She was good to me for the first few days but I’m angry and hurt that she told Mickey I was a hooker. He didn’t believe her, but that’s not the point. She had no right to tell him about my business. And I’m still pissed off with her for using the heroin I paid for at the party the other night.

Mickey starts the engine. There’s a knock on my window. Lorna looks terrible. Her long, blonde hair is wild like she slept in a hedge. Her black dress is ripped at the shoulder. I wind down my window. I realise it’s not her black dress. It’s my Moschino dress. The one I leant her to wear to the party in Dee Why. That’s one of my favourite dresses.

“What’s happened? Are you okay?” I ask. Though I’m keener to scold her for ruining my dress, she looks such a state, I’ll have to leave it for another time.

“Never mind me. What are you doing with him?”

“That’s none of your business. You’re not her keeper,” Mickey says.

“Shut up, chicken legs.” Lorna shakes her finger at Mickey. “I need to borrow money,” she tells me.

I don’t want to lend her any money. She’s ruined my dress. And she’s not wearing the Russian wedding ring I gave her the other night. I expect she’s sold it for heroin already. Reluctantly, I take fifty dollars from my purse and pass it to her out the window.

“That’s not enough,” she snaps, tucking the note under her grubby bra strap.

“That’s what she’s giving you. You’re lucky to get that.” Mickey turns the wheel, pulling away from the curb.

“Fuck you!” Lorna screams after us as we drive off.

“Chicken legs.” I giggle. “Why does she call you that?”

“Stupid thing from school.” He looks at me briefly then returns his attention to the road. “It’s not funny. She’s always got an angle. I told you.”

I light a cigarette. “It’s not like I can’t spare fifty dollars.”

“Your inheritance will run out if you give it away like that.”

My inheritance – I’m glad that’s come up in conversation. That means I must have told him the dead, rich aunt story when I was drunk and not that I was a hooker. He said he didn’t believe Lorna when she told him, and it seems he still doesn’t. It’s not going to stop me worrying though. Stix knows what I do for a living. He could tell Mickey at any time. There’s a part of me wants to come clean with it tonight, get it over with and out in the open. But there’s another part fighting to hold back.