“G’day mate,” said JP. “Welcome home.”
Home. Really? I looked around. This unfamiliar house could have been anywhere. “Hi. It’s good to be back.” The words were a formality. I wasn’t ‘back’ at all.
That night they held a barbecue and invited a few friends around. I felt strange to be sitting in conversation a few metres away from the grill. Part of me itched to be up grabbing my own slices of beef and octopus as they cooked. “Here you go, Murray. Guest of honour gets the first piece.”
I looked at the slab of steak on the plate JP held. It was an inch thick and bigger than the roast I’d cooked at Christmas for six people.
“Can I have a quarter of that?”
JP’s shoulder’s sagged. “But I thought that would be what you’d miss the most. We had a barbeque especially for you.” He continued to sulk as he replaced it with the smallest steak on the grill – still three times as much as I could eat – then added a hunk of chicken and some sausages.