Typically, suburban homes don’t tend to collapse randomly, but that didn’t stop mine. It occurred to me, as dust settled on the heap of shattered timber and tiles, that the hippy I lived with might be trapped in the rubble. I began to frantically pick up timber fragments, screaming his name.

“Tommo? TOMMO? You under there, mate?”

No response; only rising panic. My house-mate of three whole days was likely dead. Surely there’d be a law against harbouring a squashed lodger. I was going to end up in the slammer with no home to sell for my legal defence.

“That was quick.”

I turned to see Tommo behind me, balancing a dented surfboard on his head. Relieved, I responded, “Oh thank God you’re okay. Went out for a pie. Came back. And this!”

“I suppose that’s that, then,” he mumbled casually, placing his board carefully down and opening his ruck-sack.

I fished out my phone and began entering insurance claim details.

“Pine. Goes quick, ” Tommo continued, surveying the disaster with indifference.

I glanced up from my phone and observed him sorting through foot-long splinters, bagging a few.

“It was treated pine, Tommo. Termites are suppose to hate the taste!”

He sniffed a scrap of timber, before biting into it.

“Yeah, well, termites don’t know a good thing.”

I watched in disbelief as he ate what was, only hours before, part of a load-bearing beam, pausing only to spit out a rusted nail.

“Well, I’m off. Surf’s up. King tide and all that, ” he said, shouldering his bag and rebalancing his board.

With dropped jaw, I watched him saunter towards the sandy track.

“Hey Tommo!” I called out. “You didn’t eat part of my house, did you?”

The squish-squish of cheap thongs ceased, and Tommo rummaged through his pocket with his non-board-balancing hand.

Worried he was reaching for a gun, I began a hasty retreat towards the wreckage, only to see him calmly thumbing a mobile phone.

Phew, I thought, he’s probably just checking the surf report. Then a shimmer of light preceded a feeling of being snap-frozen and flash-fried.

My phone rang as I watched a leg rope fall to the spot where my house-mate had been seconds prior. I took the call and answered the insurance questions as best I could. Apparently, houses don’t collapse randomly. A dozen eerily similar claims had been made so far that day. In my town alone.

I sat against the ruins of my home that would take another 27 years to pay off, and watched the largest moonrise in recorded history.