‘I could have given you a St Christopher’s medal for your test,’ Mum had protested.

‘But I didn’t need it, I passed anyway.’

‘I could have taken you out to practise in my car,’ Dad had said wistfully. ‘I see Maurice Kilfeather takes Angela out.’

‘We could have waved you off from the test centre,’ Claire had pointed out.

Which was precisely the kind of thing I’d wanted to avoid. Doing my driving test was just something I’d wanted to do on my own. I didn’t think it was anyone else’s business. And if I was being brutally honest, I’d have to acknowledge the issue of failure – if I’d failed my test I’d never have been let forget about it.

Finally Dad spoke. ‘How’s work?’

4

I was dreading the first night away from Garv (and all the subsequent nights, but first things first). I was sure I wouldn’t sleep, because wasn’t that what happened to people in distress? But I needn’t have worried: I slept like I was dead and woke up in a bed and a room that I didn’t recognize. Where’s this? For a moment my curiosity was almost pleasant, then reality tumbled down on to me.

That day was one of the most dislocated of my life. With no job to show up at, my time was spent mostly in my bedroom, keeping out of Mum’s way. Even though she was very vocal about how this was just a phase I was going through and that I’d be back with Garv in no time, my popularity with her was enjoying an all-time low.

Helen, on the other hand, was treating me like a visiting freak show and dropped by to torment me before she went to work. Anna came too, in an attempt to protect me.

‘God, you’re still here,’ Helen marvelled, marching into the room. ‘So you’ve really left him? But this is all wrong, Maggie, you don’t do this sort of thing.’

I was reminded of a conversation I’d had with my sisters the previous Christmas – we were trapped in the house without even a Harrison Ford film to take our minds off things and were driven to wondering what each of us would be if we were food instead of people. It was decided that Claire would be a green curry because they were both fiery, then Helen decreed that Rachel would be a jelly baby, which pleased Rachel no end.

‘Because I’m sweet?’

‘Because I like to bite your head off.’

Anna – ‘this is nearly too easy,’ Helen had said – was a Flake. And I was ‘plain yoghurt at room temperature’.

OK, so I knew I’d never been in with a shout of being, say, an After Eight (‘thin and sophisticated’), or a Ginger Nut biscuit (‘hard and interesting’). But I saw nothing wrong with me being a trifle (‘has hidden depths’). Instead, I was the dullest thing, the most flavourless thing anyone could think of – plain yoghurt at room temperature. It cut me deep, and even when Claire said that Helen was a human durian fruit because she was offensive and banned in several countries, it wasn’t enough to lift my spirits.

Back in the present, Helen continued jibing me. ‘You’re just not the type to leave her husband.’

‘No, having a broken marriage isn’t the sort of thing that plain yoghurt at room temperature does, does it?’

‘What?’ Helen sounded confused.

‘I said, having a broken marriage isn’t the sort of thing that plain yoghurt at room temperature does, does it?’

She gave me a funny look, muttered something about bridesmaids who looked like the elephant man and what was she supposed to do about it, then finally left.

Anna got into bed beside me and linked her arm through mine. ‘Plain yoghurt can be delicious,’ she said quietly. ‘It’s perfect with curry. And…’ After a long, searching pause, she added, ‘And they say it’s very good for thrush.’

*

I languished in the house, with no real idea of what I was doing there. I let telly programmes wash over me: ‘Smokin’ crack ain’t so all that’; ‘Girlfrien’, your butt is bigger than my car’. Whenever they finished, I’d find myself looking around, confused to find myself no longer in the Chicago projects, but in a flowery-curtained, befigurine’d, suburban Dublin house. And not just any flowery-curtained, befigurine’d, suburban Dublin house. How have I ended up back here? What happened?

I felt like such a failure that I was afraid to leave the house. And I thought about Garv and the girl – a lot. So much that I had to go back to using my much-hated steroid cream on my unbearably itchy arm. I was tormented by her identity. Who was she, anyway? How long had it been going on? And – God forbid – was it serious? The questions scurried incessantly; even as I watched two obese girls punching each other and Jerry Springer pretending to be appalled, another part of my brain was panning over the past few months with a magnifying glass, searching for clues and discovering nothing.

But I felt I’d no right to mind about the girl and that it didn’t make any difference anyway. With or without her, the game was up.

I’d been back at my parents’ about twenty-four hours when the reaction set in. As I listlessly watched telly, my temperature abruptly plummeted. Though the room was warm (far too warm), the skin on my arms had contracted like cling-wrap before heat, and the hairs were standing to attention from goosepimpled follicles. I blinked, only to discover that my eyes hurt. Then I noticed that my head was packed tight with cotton wool and my bones ached, and I was unable to find enough energy even to pick up the remote control. Muzzy and spaced, I watched Animal Hospital, wishing I could do something to make it stop. What was wrong with me?

‘What’s wrong with you?’ Mum had come into the room. ‘Lord above! What are they doing to that poor Alsatian?’

‘He’s got piles.’ My tongue belonged to someone else, someone with a much bigger mouth. ‘And I think I’ve got the flu.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I’m cold and everything hurts.’ Me, hardy Maggie, who never got sick.

‘I didn’t know dogs could even get piles.’ She was still glued to the screen.

‘Maybe he sat on a cold step. I think I’ve got the flu,’ I repeated, slightly louder this time.

Finally I had her attention. ‘You don’t look the best,’ she agreed. She looked concerned. Almost as concerned as she had been about the aller. She placed her hand on my forehead. ‘I wonder if you’ve a temperature.’