IF YOU’VE EVER been unexpectedly kicked in the shins, you’ll know that it’s one of the most painful places to be unexpectedly kicked. No flesh to cushion the impact, see? And Kasey is something of an expert in shin-kicking. That was, after all, exactly what she’d done to me the first time we met, but, I’ve got to say, I still wasn’t expecting it.

So, when I was done hopping around like a demented frog—I don’t even know if frogs have shins, but you know what I mean—I turned to Kasey. “What was that for, Moran?” I yelped.

“That’s for the man bun, doofus.” She pointed to the top of my head. “If that doesn’t deserve a kick in the shins, I don’t know what does. And there’s the sign too. Cobber? Who says ‘cobber’? It’s practically racist.”

“What’s wrong with my man bun?” I rubbed my shin and tried not to cry. “And I thought Australians called everyone ‘cobber’. Isn’t it friendly?”

Kasey threw her bag at c. “In 1885 maybe, and I shouldn’t have to explain the man bun. Now, show me the sights!”

“The sights?”

“Yeah, you know, the best parts of town. There’s got to be heaps of things you blokes are proud of round here.”

In Australia, I’d seen the Sydney Opera House gleaming white against a perfect blue sky, I’d gasped at shimmering pods of dolphins leaping out of crystal-clear water, I’d watched the sun rise over the vast red expanse of the Outback, and I’d discovered 40,000-year-old cave paintings by flickering torchlight.

I looked around at the Hills Village Bus Depot.

It was a concrete building that might have looked good around, say, 1972 and sat at the end of a strip mall featuring the Korean Nail Palace, a 7-Eleven, a boarded-up computer repair shop, KwikStop Dental, and a tanning salon. On the other side of the depot was the disused Hills Village train station and a second-hand auto dealership. I swallowed hard and tried to look optimistic.

“How about a coffee?” I said, steering Kasey toward Gudonya.