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pin both of her wrists to the ground. She relaxed all her muscles and smiled at me. I stared into her eyes. ‘Am I gonna lay here like this all day, or are you going to kiss me?’ Sami asked.

The first few days, me and Sami just kissed and cuddled. The forth morning we started messing about, wrestling on the sleeping mat. We both got really horny and ended up having sex. I felt like climbing up the highest tree and shouting to the whole world that I’d lost my virginity to a hot African chic. I reconsidered when I remembered that the hot African chic’s Dad had an office with dried blood on the floor and a tendency to pull out people’s teeth.

To start with we were at it every half hour; but Sami was scared of getting pregnant. There wasn’t any contraception around, so we had to give up except for special occasions. We were always looking for excuses: a successful mission, a nice sunset, Sami bending over in front of me. What was the point being sensible? We could be dead in a few hours.

The rebels didn’t have the muscle to fight the army head on. Our job was to cut off supplies of fuel, food and weapons being sent to government troops on the front line further east. Most missions were ambushes. We walked fifteen or twenty kilometres, chopped down a few trees to block a road and waited. As soon as the truck drivers saw the blockade, they knew it was an ambush and tried to escape. You had to shoot out the back tyres to stop them reversing away. Once the tyres were gone, they usually tried to escape into the bushes. A few put up a fight, but they never got more than a couple of shots off before they died.

What happened next depended on who was in charge. Don and Jesus killed the soldiers even when they put their hands up to surrender. Desi and some of the others took their weapons and boots and let them go. If Sami was in charge, it depended on what mood she was in.

Killing was easy. When it’s pitch dark, steaming hot, your heart is banging in your ears and any second someone could waste you, whatever kind of morality you have goes out the window. I had a driver beg for his life on his knees in front of me. Maybe he was a nice guy. Maybe the money he sent home to the city was all that stopped his kids from starving. But all I could think about was that I’d be in a bit less danger if he was dead. So one tiny pull on the AK47 and a line of bullets blew him to pieces. I’ve watched him die a thousand times in my head. I can hear the little groan he made as his chest exploded. Sometimes I hate myself for doing it, but put me back there and I’d do it again.

Single truck ambushes were most common and easiest to handle. Convoys of two and three were OK. You threw a few grenades and made a big mess, then picked off as many soldiers as you could before burning out the trucks.

Big convoys were a nightmare: ten or more trucks, all with at least two men on board. You wanted to run away, but it was too good an opportunity to pass up. There were usually three or four of us on a raid. One would drop back and shoot at anyone who touched the roadblock. The rest ran through the bushes, throwing grenades into the back of the trucks. The trucks at the back didn’t know what the hold up was at the front, so they wouldn’t try and reverse out. The bad thing was, a big convoy was always guarded by mercenaries or a group of special guards. They were good shooters, fast runners and they were paid a special bounty if they caught one of us alive. If you got chased, you had to stay in the jungle for a couple of days in case you were being tracked.

Back at camp, you were too stressed to live a normal life. I took Becky swimming and went hunting a few times, but my heart wasn’t in it. All the fighters were the same. We’d wake up, often with a hangover, then sit about camp all day, spoiling for a row and bored off our heads. We were usually tired, but it was too hot to sleep.

The ultimate nightmare was having your rifle jam. I spent an hour every day, cleaning, lubricating and polishing off specks of rust. Guns were sacred objects. We each had our own ritual of checking and double checking for faults. There were as many opinions about guns as there were soldiers. Some reckoned new guns were best and got a fresh one whenever they could. Sami, used a decrepit Chinese AK47. She swore it hadn’t jammed in the five years she’d had it and wouldn’t give it up for anything. Don reckoned Chinese made AK47s were rubbish. He went around with two short stocked M16s in holsters, like a gunslinger. Desi reckoned short guns were stupid, because you couldn’t hold them to aim. I heard the same crap every day, but I always tuned in, hoping for the little gem of advice that might save my life.

Sometimes there was wood to chop or a building to repair, but it was never much. Mid-afternoon, Captain always called us into a circle for a briefing. He told us who was going where that night, what intelligence reports he’d had on where convoys were heading and which of the local bases had supplies worth stealing.

Unless it was more than twenty kilometres, we usually set off just after sundown. It was the peak time for mosquitoes and there was a sense of dread about the walk. My thighs and ankles never stopped hurting. Once my feet hardened off I stopped getting blisters, but they still ached the whole time. The back of my camouflage was permanently stained with blood where my pack scoured off my skin.

We walked four hours on average, followed by several hours waiting if it was an ambush. As you got closer, the adrenalin kicked in and time started to move slow. The raids themselves never lasted long. Ambushes were over in five minutes. If you raided an army base, you were rarely inside more than twenty. These flashes of excitement seemed like my whole life. The rest of the time was like being in suspended animation, wondering if you’d be alive this time the next day.

If you had to walk back to camp, it would be at least 3AM before you arrived. A lot of the time, it took a few beers to numb the pain in my shoulders and legs, and calm down enough to sleep. Half the time you’d keep waking up with nightmares. By 7AM the sun was blasting your hut. If you got five hours a night, you were lucky. . . .

Sami was laughing her head off. ‘I’m never gonna be able to do this,’ I moaned. ‘Calm down killer. Push down the clutch and turn the engine back on.’ The engine of the pickup choked a few times before it started to turn. A blue plume rose out of the

exhaust. I lifted the clutch as gently as I could and the Subaru started to roll. ‘That was excellent,’ Sami said. ‘Now, change up to second… Keep looking where you’re going, not

down at the gears.’ We started to get up a bit of speed. There were so many bumps, it was like I was doing ten rounds with

the steering wheel. ‘Put it into third gear.’ I flicked it neatly into third and finally started to feel I was getting the hang of driving. I had to squint to avoid the sun. The inside of the cab was about 50C and the air conditioning had a piece of tape over it saying
Do Not Use
. Every piece of trim rattled and you got the impression that the whole shebang would disintegrate on the next bump. ‘This is cool,’ I said. ‘So how come we can drive down here in daylight?’ ‘No road is totally safe, but the army always travels east to west, this is a dead end heading south. The

only way they’d ever come down here is if they’re lost, or hunting for the likes of us.’ ‘Turn left here,’ Sami said. ‘Start slowing down and drop into second gear.’ We pulled up at a village of abandoned wooden huts. They looked more solid than the makeshift affairs

we lived in, although the land was overgrown with weeds. We parked the Subaru out of sight of the road. ‘I remember when about a hundred people lived here,’ Sami said. ‘What happened to them?’ ‘Same as every other village. The men and boys either ran into the hills and joined the rebels, or got forced into the army. We stole all the food. When they got hungry, most of the women tried to go west towards the capital, but they had little kids and stuff. Not many of them made it. The only civilians left in these parts were a few old timers. Most of them are dead now.’ ‘Why did you steal their food?’ ‘We were too busy fighting to hunt. If we didn’t steal the food, the army burned it to stop us getting it. In the west, we burned food so the army couldn’t feed it’s troops. People think weapons are the most important thing in a war, but you’re nothing without a bit of food in your belly.’ ‘Some people must have starved.’ ‘Dad saw a newspaper,’ Sami said. ‘It claimed forty thousand people died fighting in the first year of the war, but over a million starved. Half of them were children.’ ‘Fucking hell.’ ‘Yeah, hell,’ Sami shrugged. ‘That’s where everyone in this country is heading.’ ‘You were only a kid,’ I said. ‘You can hardly blame yourself.’ ‘My very first raid, we went into a village like this one. Threatened everyone with guns and took their food. I was only eleven, but they needed an extra set of hands to carry everything away. All the women were crying and begging. A couple of them got slapped around.’ ‘I thought I was fighting for the good guys,’ I said. ‘It’s a war, Killer. There aren’t any good guys, just people doing what they can to stay alive.’ We wandered around the village, looking inside the huts. The villagers had only taken what they could carry. In one musty hut I picked a cockroach nibbled book off the floor. I opened the page to a cartoon of Noah’s ark, with penguins on the deck and two giraffes heads poking through the roof. I couldn’t read the text, it was all in French, but I could imagine a bunch of kids sitting under a tree listening to an old woman reading the bible stories. A postcard of the Eiffel tower slid out from between the pages. I showed it to Sami. ‘That’s where I’m taking you when this is over.’ ‘Yeah right,’ Sami laughed, ‘It’s in Paris isn’t it?’ ‘They say it’s the most romantic city on earth.’ ‘Have you been there?’ Sami asked. ‘Once. I thought it was really boring, but I was only a kid.’ ‘I’ll miss you if you go home, Jake.’ I’d realised I might have to choose between Sami and going home. It was something I tried not to think about, but Sami mentioning it choked me up. She looked a upset as well. We went outside and sat in the sun with our arms around each other’s backs.

Rebel groups met on neutral ground, so if the army caught you, you only knew the location of your own camp. Meetings between units were a complicated business. Everyone suspected everyone else, and was terrified of being ambushed by mercenaries or followed by spies.

We were in the village to meet two soldiers from Casino’s unit. His was supposed to be the largest and most active rebel group in our area, with sixty fighters and three separate camps; but nobody knew anything for sure. We had an envelope of written messages from Captain. The back of the pickup was full with grenades and flour, which we were exchanging for some lightweight pistols and ammunition.

Our contacts were over an hour late. Sami was getting nervous. If they’d been captured by the army and given our location away, we were in deep shit. ‘Ten minutes,’ Sami said, looking at my watch. ‘It’s dodgy to wait any longer.’ Right after she said it, we heard something on the road. We clicked our rifles onto automatic fire and hid in the bushes near the pickup. An army jeep pulled up on the other side of the village. Sami fired a single revolver shot into the air. One of the women in the jeep fired two shots back. If she’d returned a single shot, it would have been a signal to bail. ‘Showtime,killer.’

We climbed out of the bushes. The jeep drove between the huts and pulled up beside our pickup. The two women were nearly as tall as me, with giant arses bulking up their camouflage. They jumped down and started hugging Sami. ‘Hey Sami. How’s business up your way?’ Sami nodded, ‘Not bad. Plenty of supplies, but we’ve lost a few men lately.’ ‘Same for us,’ one or the women said. ‘According to Rebel Radio, we’re mounting a big push. We

might not be cut off from the east for much longer.’ ‘I miss the radio,’ Sami said. ‘Ours got broke the last time we moved camp.’ ‘And who is the handsome young stranger?’ Sami smiled, ‘We call him Killer. He fell out of the sky.’ ‘He’s lovely, can I give him a kiss?’ ‘Feel free,’ Sami giggled. One of the fat women smothered me and sucked my face. As she did it, she cupped her hand between

my legs and rubbed it against my balls. ‘What a lovely boy,’ she howled. Sami was killing herself laughing. ‘What he really likes,’ Sami said. ‘Is if you twist his nipple really hard, like this.’ I dived backwards, but Sami was too fast. I screamed in pain and the three women laughed for about ten minutes. I was steaming, but I knew I’d only make it worse if I got angry.

‘Stop sulking and grow up for god’s sake,’ Sami said. ‘It was only a bit of fun.’ Sami was driving. She went about twice as fast as me and made it look easy. ‘My nipple’s really sore. If you carry on twisting it, it’s gonna drop off.’ ‘If you say so, Killer.’

‘It’s not funny.’ She started laughing so bad you could hardly understand what she was saying. ‘The look on your face when she grabbed your balls. Your eyebrows went up so high, I thought they

were gonna shoot right off your head.’ I stared at my lap, sulking. ‘Tell you what, misery guts, lets do a quick detour.’ ‘Where?’ ‘We’re only a few kilometres from where me and Ben first found you. We could drive up there and see where your brother ended up.’

We stopped the car briefly at the exact spot where I was found. It seemed weird to think that the kid who’d been laying in the road was alive and the fit rebel who stepped out of the pickup was dead.

We drove a couple of kilometres, seeing nothing except trees. Sami kept it fairly slow, looking out for any buildings or turnings that Adam might have ventured into. I could imagine Adam, taking his little steps with his arms swinging, getting more and more desperate and probably sobbing for Mum. Maybe he crawled into the trees, curled himself in a ball and died. It was a sad thought, but it was almost comforting compared to some of the stuff I could imagine. The road went left and down a steep hill. ‘We’ll go another kilometre,’ Sami said. ‘We’ll have to turn back then.’ I looked out the window and tried not to get upset. ‘There,’ Sami shouted. She backed up and drove through an overgrown opening between the trees. There was a big house on two floors, built out of stone with a tin roof. It must have been the home of a wealthy European, back in colonial days. Half the roof was missing. The statues and windows were smashed and creepers covered the stone.

The front door wasn’t locked. I stepped through with my gun drawn. My boot crunched some broken glass and a dank smell hit my nose. The floor was covered in fruit skins and chocolate bar wrappers. ‘Adam?’ I shouted. I walked into the kitchen, half expecting to find his body. We checked all the rooms on the ground floor. As I turned to go up the stairs, I saw a skinny old woman with no teeth on the landing. Her hands were trembling. ‘Please don’t hurt me,’ she said softly. ‘I’ve been a good girl today.’ She started creeping down the stairs. ‘Did you bring me food?’ I reached out to grab her arm and help her walk, but she flinched and burst into tears. ‘Please don’t hit me any more.’ I put my arm on her shoulder. ‘Nobody is going to hurt you,’ I said, as gently as I could. ‘Don’t be frightened of us.’ I walked her to a table in the kitchen. Her whole body was shaking. She was so weak, I felt like my hand would go right through her. I helped her sit on the only unbroken chair at the dining table. Sami brought some fruit and cooked rice out of the pickup. The old lady smiled when she saw it. ‘This looks so nice,’ She said. She dug her grubby fingers in the rice and turned to Sami. ‘You’re a girl soldier. You don’t usually come here.’ Sami smiled at her, ‘I’ve never been here before. Do soldiers come here very often?’ ‘They hit me,’ the lady said. ‘And make me eat horrible food. It’s a big joke for them.’ ‘I’m looking for my brother,’ I said. ‘Did a little boy come in here? He was wearing a green shirt.’ The lady looked up brightly, ‘You mean Adam?’ I gasped with relief, ‘That’s right. I’m Adam’s brother, Jake.’ ‘He got water for you,’ the lady said brightly. ‘But he couldn’t find you when he went back. He was

crying. I hid him from the soldiers. Then the fish soldier took him.’ ‘Who’s the fish soldier?’ I asked. ‘He comes sometimes and brings me fish. He’s not horrible like the others.’ I heard a car engine. Sami ran to the window. A big Nissan 4x4 was rolling into the driveway. ‘Oh shit,’ Sami shouted. ‘Army. We’re so screwed.’ ‘Don’t let them hurt me,’ the old lady sobbed. ‘They push me around. It’s a big joke to them.’ Four soldiers piled out of the Nissan and started shouting. ‘Hey Grandma. I hear you’ve been a naughty girl today.’ ‘Time for some punishment,’ another one said. They were all laughing, right until they noticed the pickup. There was no way we could get back on the road, the Nissan was in our way. We ran out of the kitchen into the corridor, just as a soldier burst through the back door. He bundled the old lady off her seat and pointed his gun at her head. ‘Where’s your visitors Grandma?’ he shouted.

We were on the other side of a thin wall. Sami spun around the doorway and fired her AK47 at the soldier, practically cutting him in half. Two more soldiers burst through the front door. I blasted them before they even saw me. Outside, there was a massive explosion.

The last soldier had thrown a grenade inside our pickup. The back was full up with the pistols and ammunition. The bullets cracked off one after another, like a firework display. ‘Did you see where the last soldier went?’ Sami asked. I shook my head, ‘No.’ ‘Don’t let him get back to their car, Killer. We’re sixty kilometres from camp. I don’t know about you,

but I don’t fancy walking home.’ I ran out the front door, shielding my face from the heat off the burning pickup. There was no key in the ignition of the Nissan, and no sign of the soldier either. Me and Sami walked around the building in opposite directions, fingers on triggers, looking for him. The heat got so bad, the exposed roof timbers of the house started burning. Flames flashed across the whole roof in about thirty seconds. I sprinted into he hallway and searched the pockets of the two soldiers I killed for the ignition key.

The smoke was getting bad. The ceiling was starting to crack and looked like it could collapse on us any second. ‘Got the key,’ Sami screamed from the kitchen. I ran into the kitchen. Our eyes met over the old lady. She’d managed to crawl across the floor and

prop herself against one wall. I don’t think she’d even realised there was a fire. ‘Grab her legs,’ Sami said. We carried her out of the building. I opened the back door of the Nissan and we slung her across the seat. She can’t have weighed more than thirty kilos. Sami climbed in the drivers side and started the engine. A burst of automatic fire ripped off as we reversed onto the road. I fired back at nothing in particular. The roof timbers of the house collapsed, crashing through the first floor and sending clouds of dust out of every window.

The tyres screeched as Sami accelerated off down the road. The Nissan had a lot of grunt and the giant wheels gave a much smoother ride than the pickup. I leaned over the centre console and switched on the air conditioning. ‘This is a much better car,’ I said. Sami practically bit my head off. ‘Do you think this is good, you idiot?’ ‘We’re alive, that’s all I know.’ ‘For now, Killer. But everyone within twenty kilometres will have heard that blast. We could have army

coming towards us from all directions.’ ‘Oh,’ I said. Sami grimaced, ‘That’s all you’ve got to say? And we’ve lost the pick-up.’ ‘It was a piece of crap; and we lost the guns in the back, but there’s hundreds of guns in the store room

at camp.’ ‘Captain’s messages from Casino’s group.’ Sami said. ‘What about them?’ ‘Were they that important?’ I asked ‘You can ask Captain yourself, right before he gets Don to whip your arse.’ As soon as she mentioned Don, I started to get nervous. ‘It was intelligence,’ Sami said. ‘Details of who’s raiding what and where. Information about other parts

of the war and what supplies are coming through. And on top of all that, there’s Grandma in the back there.’ ‘What are we gonna do with her?’ I asked. ‘What we should do is chuck her out of the car and let the leopards eat her. But my conscience isn’t up

to it. Do you want to do it?’ ‘No,’ I said. ‘Besides, she might know more about what happened to my brother.’ ‘She might,’ Sami said. ‘But Captain isn’t exactly going to welcome her with open arms.’ ‘Can’t you sweet talk him? He is your Dad.’ ‘That counts for something,’ Sami said. ‘But it’s not gonna get us off the hook.’

Kids usually exaggerate:
I’m in so much trouble, my Dad is gonna kill me
, so I thought Sami was probably laying it on a bit. Was she hell.

As soon as he found out what happened, Captain made us sit in his office in the darkness. The sun had only just gone down. It felt like there was no air and the heat was unbearable. He made us sit dead still, with our backs straight, ankles crossed and our palms flat on the table in front of us. Don sat behind, breathing right in my ear. Captain placed a gas lamp on his desk. As he spoke, he heated a metal teaspoon over the flame. ‘The explosion must have been very loud,’ Captain said. ‘Are you sure nobody tracked you back here?’ ‘I drove really fast,’ Sami said. Captain pressed the hot spoon against the back of Sami’s hand. She gritted her teeth as her skin sizzled. ‘Daddy, please, let me explain.’ ‘Don’t you dare call me Daddy. When you take command of a mission, all our lives depend on you. When you make a mistake, I cannot allow my affection to get in the way. You must be treated the same as all the others or I will lose their respect. Do you understand?’ ‘Yes Captain.’ Sami sobbed. Captain looked at me, ‘You said the pickup was burned and that there was no way my documents

could survive.’ ‘Yes,’ I said. Captain moved the hot spoon over my hand, so I could feel the heat. I was shaking so bad I couldn’t

breathe. ‘Is there a chance that the papers were removed before the car was detonated?’ ‘I don’t think so.’ Captain pressed the spoon against my hand. I could have moved my hand away, but I’d have got

something even worse if I had. ‘Answer my question accurately. Could you see the pickup from the moment the soldiers arrived until

the vehicle exploded?’ I shook my head, ‘No.’ ‘So my documents could have fallen into enemy hands?’ ‘Yes, I suppose’ Captain looked at Sami, ‘Why didn’t you go back and try to kill the fourth soldier, when he might have

the documents?’ ‘I made a judgement,’ Sami said. ‘I don’t think he got the documents and we could have both been

killed if we’d gone hunting for him. I think it was the right decision under the circumstances.’ Captain nodded, ‘On balance, I agree. It seems unlikely the documents were stolen… Now Sami, I want you to think carefully and tell me everything you did wrong. ’

‘I should have obeyed your orders and driven straight back to camp,’ Sami said. ‘I should have taken your documents with me when I left the car. I shouldn’t have brought the old lady back with us. I should have gone into hiding overnight in case anyone was tracking us.’ Captain nodded, ‘Do you think you deserve to be punished for this?’ ‘Yes,’ Sami said quietly. ‘Of course I do.’ ‘What about you Jake?’ Captain asked. ‘What did you do wrong?’ I couldn’t think what to say. The end of the spoon was getting so hot the metal was turning orange. ‘Sami was in command,’ Captain said. ‘Did you disobey any of her orders?’ ‘No,’ I said. ‘Was it your idea to go and look for your brother?’ ‘Partly,’ I said. ‘It wasn’t,’ Sami said. ‘Jake didn’t even know we were near to where we found him.’ Captain quickly dabbed the back of my hand with the spoon. Don laughed in my ear as the smell of

my burned skin wafted upwards. ‘Never lie to me,’ Captain shouted. ‘Mistakes are understandable and will be punished lightly, but I

cannot tolerate liars.’ ‘No,’ I sniffled. ‘It was Sami’s idea.’ I felt really bad that all the blame was getting put on Sami. ‘So,’ Captain said, looking back at his daughter. ‘Am I correct in saying that Jake did nothing wrong

that wasn’t because of an order from you?’ ‘Yes,’ Sami said. Captain flicked me away with his hand. ‘In that case Jake, you’d better go.’ ‘It’s not fair for Sami to get all the blame,’ I said. ‘It’s at least partly my fault.’ Captain looked at me coldly, ‘It’s very noble of you to defend my daughter. But the matter is closed

and I want you to leave.’ I walked to Amo’s hut, to get the burns on my hands treated. Amo had washed and fed Grandma and dressed her in a set of clean camouflage that was way too big for her. She was sleeping in the back of the hut with Becky curled up beside her. ‘Did you get any beats?’ Beck asked. ‘No. Captain says it’s all Sami’s fault.’ Beck laughed, ‘I hope she gets whipped.’ I dived inside the hut and grabbed Beck by his t-shirt. ‘Do you want a punch in the mouth?’ Amo pulled me off him, ‘Cool it boys. Beck, that’s not a nice thing to say.’ Beck shrugged, ‘I got beaten when Edo died. Sami laughed.’ ‘Show me your hands,’ Amo said. She looked at the oval marks under her gas lamp. ‘It’s nothing much,’ Amo said. ‘It’ll sting for a couple of days. Stick your hands in cold water if it starts to hurt.’

Sami was in with Captain for another hour. I walked to the water barrel and listened at the office door. I couldn’t understand what was being said, but Sami was definitely crying. I went back to our hut and waited in the darkness.

When Sami came in she was all stiff shouldered. She sat on our sleeping mat and pulled off her boots, without saying a word.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘For what?’ I shrugged, ‘Everything.’ She unbuttoned her jacket, threw it on the floor and laid face down on the mat. Her back glistened

with blood. There were six deep welts where she’d been whipped. I reached for my gun. ‘I’ll kill him,’ I shouted. Sami grabbed my arm, ‘Don’t be a moron.’ ‘What kind of Father does that to his daughter?’ ‘Don’t you get it?’ Sami shouted. ‘He’s right. We broke orders and took a stupid risk. We could have been tracked back here. They could have killed everyone. Not just the fighters, but Amo and Beck and all the little kids as well.’ ‘But what good does whipping you do?’ ‘If you’re stupid, you get punished,’ Sami said. ‘It’s called discipline. The commander we had before Dad took over this unit would have smashed all our fingers for a stunt like that. If Dad wasn’t here, Don would run the unit. Do you think you would have walked out with a couple of little burns if he was in charge?

‘You’re right, I suppose. It just doesn’t seem fair. You tried to do something nice for me and you got punished.’

Sami smiled, ‘Don’t worry about it. I stopped expecting anything in life to be fair the day I came home from a piano lesson and found my Mum’s head cut off and stuffed in the kitchen sink.’

Sami kept sobbing from the pain. Neither of us could really sleep that night. ‘I’m not going without you,’ I said. Sami had been dozing off, ‘What?’ ‘You know earlier, in the village? You said you’d be sad if I left.’

‘Yes.’ ‘I’m going to find Adam. Then I’m going to find a way out of here and you’re coming with me.’ ‘OK,’ Sami said, but I could tell she didn’t believe me. ‘I swear on my life. I won’t go without you.’ Her hand glided gently over my thigh. ‘Maybe none of us will ever get out of here,’ Sami yawned. ‘Try and go to sleep. I’m sick of thinking about stuff.’