Then he stopped being serious and the laugh reappeared in his voice. ‘I suppose a ride is out of the question?’

Insulted to the core and bitterly disappointed, I slammed the phone down.

I gibbered with outrage. Gibbered, so I did. ‘Can you belie…? Did you hear what he just said?’ I demanded from the room at large and my grown-up dress in particular.

‘The cheek of him; the cheek of him.’

I shook my head in disbelief. ‘If he thinks I’ll give him the time of day after that sort of behaviour, he has another think coming…’

I sighed in a more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger way and enjoyed another appalled shake of my head.

‘Honestly…’ I exhaled in disgust.

Six seconds later I found myself picking up the phone.

Of course a ride wasn’t out of the question.

45

Another weekend. Two days free from the fear of the questionnaire.

Despite that relief, my emotions were still in complete disarray.

Terrible sadness came and went, came and went. I was actually glad when I was angry or heartbroken about Luke, because at least I could identify the feeling.

Saturday morning kicked off with cookery, as always.

And, of course, we had the usual scuffle involving Eamonn and a foodstuff, this time a tin of cocoa powder, which culminated in Eamonn being led away, as he invariably was on a Saturday morning.

We all covertly watched Angela, wondering if – hoping, really – she’d do something similiar. But Angela was nothing like Eamonn, she’d behaved herself beautifully at the previous week’s session.

In fact, if it wasn’t for her breathtaking girth, you’d never know she had a problem with nosh because she never seemed to eat. I had overheard her telling Misty that she had terrible trouble with her glands and a criminally slow metabolism. Which could have been true.

Either that or she locked herself in the bathroom three times a day and secretly ate the contents of a medium-sized supermarket. One or the other. I suspected the latter. I would have said that a lot of hard, dedicated work went into maintaining an arse as big as hers.

I was surprised that Misty didn’t point that out, but Misty was very nice to her. Which made me wonder moodily why she couldn’t be nice to me. The little bitch.

It took a while for Betty to get everyone organized with flour and sugar and mixing-bowls and sieves and all the rest.

Clarence kept putting his hand up and saying ‘Teacher.’

And Betty kept saying ‘Call me Betty.’

And Clarence kept saying ‘OK, teacher.’

And then a peace descended on the room. Everyone was concentrating so hard, their brown jumpers covered with flour, that I became aware of a charged atmosphere in the room. A strange harmony that was spine-tingling. Almost as… almost as, as if we were in the presence of the divine, I was surprised to find myself thinking.

Then I was floored by massive embarrassment for thinking such new-age-wankology. Next I’d be reading The Celestine Prophecy, if I didn’t watch myself!

But shortly afterwards, I had another attack of acute sentimentality. When the men took their lopsided, misshapen, burnt, raw-in-the-middle, flopped cakes out of the oven, the pride they had in their creations made my eyes well up. Each of these cakes was a little miracle, I thought, as I shed a discreet tear. These men are alcoholics and some have done terrible things, but they have made a cake all by themselves…

Then I cringed.

I couldn’t believe what I’d just been thinking.

Thank Christ there’s no one here who can read minds, I reassured myself.

I found Saturday nights the hardest in the Cloisters. Humiliated that the whole world was getting dressed up and going out. Everyone except me. But worse than that, I was tormented with worry about Luke. Saturday night was when he was most likely to meet another girl. It did my head in.

I completely forgot I was angry with him. Instead I ached, longed for him, while feeling crazed with jealousy and fear of losing him. Even though it was obvious that I’d already lost him. But if he met someone else, then I really had lost him.

I tried to take my mind off him with the usual Saturday night games. I’d played them the previous week, but half-heartedly. I’d been embarrassed by them, constantly imagining what people like Helenka and other glamorous New York people would say if they could see me. I’d kept casting my eyes to Heaven and risking, just in case Helenka had psychic powers. So that she’d realize I was only doing it because I had to and that I certainly wasn’t enjoying myself. Games! My whole demeanour cried. How cringy!

But this week, I was surprised to discover just how much fun it was. First, we split up into teams and played Red Rover, running the length of the freezing sitting-room and breaking through the barriers of other people’s arms. It was alarmingly exhilarating.

Then someone produced a skipping rope.

I had a bad few minutes in the middle of the skipping, as everyone else was being ‘called in’ except me. Exactly the same thing had happened throughout my youth and I felt sulky and angry and left out.

I slunk over to the wall and threw myself down on a chair. Even if someone calls me in, I thought angrily. I’m not bloody going.

‘Are you enjoying yourself ?’ Chris appeared at my side.

The hairs stood up on my skin. God, I fancied him. Those eyes, those thighs… One day, I thought longingly. Maybe one day me and him will be in New York together, majorly in love… Then Misty was called in to the skipping and my envy blotted out all else.

‘They make me sick here,’ I said bitterly. ‘They really do. Making us remember our childhood like this.’

‘That’s not why we do this.’ Chris sounded astonished. ‘It’s because we enjoy it, we let off a bit of steam. Anyway, what’s wrong with remembering your childhood?’

I said nothing.

Chris looked concerned.

Vaguely, I could hear Misty, who was skipping like a dainty, little elf singing ‘… And I call Chri-is in…’

‘If you find it that awful to remember, you’d better tell them in group,’ Chris said.

‘Oh God, it’s my go!’ he exclaimed and leapt up into the middle of the rope with Misty.

John Joe was turning the rope with Nancy, the housewife who was addicted to Valium. Even though everyone was clumsy and falling round the room, Nancy and John Joe were just that little bit too uncoordinated. In fact, Nancy was barely able to stand.