‘Fine,’ she said.

He didn’t look too convinced, so she promised him, ‘Really, I am. Go on, tell me more of what’s been going on.’

Dylan exhaled miserably. ‘It’s the children I’m really worried about. They’re so confused, it’s desperate. But they’re too young for the whole story. And I shouldn’t be turning them against their mother anyway, even if I hate her.’

‘You don’t hate her.’

‘Oh, believe me Ashling, I do.’

Ashling found his truculence pathetic. He only hated Clodagh because he loved her so much.

‘It might all blow over,’ Ashling said, with as much hope for herself as for Dylan.

‘Yeah. Let’s wait and see. Have you spoken to either of them?’

‘I saw Clodagh two weeks ago today on the… that Friday. But I haven’t been able to get hold of…’ She hesitated. Saying his name hurt. ‘… Marcus. I’ve tried ringing him, but he’s stopped answering his phone.’

‘You could call to his house.’

‘No.’

‘Good on you. Keep your dignity.’

Ashling shifted forlornly. It wasn’t really that. She simply hadn’t the heart.

When Oliver returned to London he didn’t ring Lisa, and she didn’t ring him either. There was nothing to say. They were both going to get approval from their solicitors over their financial situations, then the decree nisi was only a matter of months.

Lisa got through the week but, although she was functioning, she wasn’t anything like OK. She’d managed to put the October issue to bed, but it had been like pushing a ball of glue up a hill. Especially with Ashling going round like a zombie.

Robbie was good, though. Full of wild ideas for future issues. A lot of them too outré, but at least one – for a shoot styled like an S&M session – was pure genius.

When everything had gone to the printers on Friday evening, several people invited her for after-work drinks. Trix and Robbie and even Jack had suggested they go somewhere to celebrate ‘closure on October’. But she’d had enough of them all and she went straight home.

No sooner was she in than Kathy called to the door. Kathy seemed to be around a lot. Or if it wasn’t Kathy it was Francine. Or several others from the road.

‘Come over to us for your dinner this evening,’ Kathy invited.

Lisa almost laughed at the thought, then Kathy said, ‘We’re having roast chicken,’ and suddenly Lisa found herself agreeing. Why not? she thought, trying to justify it. She could start the Scarsdale diet, she hadn’t done it in ages and roast chicken would fit in perfectly.

Ten minutes later she walked into Kathy’s kitchen and was hit by steam and the noise of the telly and children fighting. Kathy looked frazzled. ‘We’re nearly ready. Stir the gravy, you useless eejit.’ This was directed at John, her benign lump of a husband. ‘Drink, Lisa?’

Lisa was about to ask for a glass of dry white wine when Kathy elaborated, ‘Ribena? Tea? Milk?’

‘Erm, oh, milk, I suppose.’

‘Get Lisa some milk.’ Kathy levelled a passing kick at Jessica, who was rolling on the floor with Francine. ‘In a good glass. Sit at the table, everyone.’

Lisa noticed that she was given about three times as much as anyone else. Kathy had heaped at least four roast potatoes on to her plate before she could protest that she didn’t eat them. She tried to pretend they weren’t there but they looked and smelt so delicious… She fought it a little harder, then yielded, and for the first time in ten years, a piece of roast potato crossed her lips. I’ll start the diet tomorrow.

‘Stop kicking the table leg!’ Kathy yelled at Lauren, the youngest. Lauren made a face, stopped and started again three seconds later.

‘You’re sticking your elbow into me,’ Francine complained to Lisa.

‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t say sorry,’ Francine was instantly contrite. ‘You should say that at least you don’t make noise when you eat.’

‘Right, got it.’

‘Or that you’re not a big fat greedy guts,’ Jessica offered helpfully.

‘Or that I’m not the one who keeps farting,’ Lisa said.

‘Yeah!’

Crammed around the small kitchen table, the telly blaring, milk moustaches on everyone, including herself probably, Lisa had a flash of déjà vu. Of what? What did this remind her of? And a dreadful realization lunged at her. It was just like her own home in Hemel Hempstead. The crampedness, the noise, the good-natured bickering, the whole feel was the same. How on earth did I end up back here?

‘Are you OK, Lisa?’ Kathy asked.

Lisa nodded. But she was fighting the desire to catapult vertically from her chair and run from the house. She was a working-class girl who’d spent her life trying to be something else. And despite years devoted to the gruelling treadmill of networking, sucking up, doing down, always paying attention, never relaxing, she’d been brought inexorably back to where she started.

It knocked the power of speech from her.

She’d never really considered what she was sacrificing as she’d rocket-launched herself away from her roots. The rewards had always seemed worth it. But sitting in Kathy’s kitchen, she could see no evidence of the glamorous life she’d constructed for herself. Instead she was walloped by what she’d forfeited – friends, family, worst of all Oliver, and for nothing.

60

It was midnight and Jack Devine was exhausted and dispirited. He’d been pacing the streets of Dublin for a couple of hours, looking for Boo and having no joy. He felt like a particularly bad gumshoe. Apart from checking the doorways in the streets around Ashling’s flat, he had no idea where to look. Where were good homeless haunts?

The street people he’d asked had denied all knowledge of Boo. Perhaps they really didn’t know him, but Jack suspected that it was more to do with protecting him. Should he have slipped them a tenner, blown smoke in their eyes and said, ‘Maybe this’ll help your memory’? Wasn’t that what happened in Raymond Chandler books?

Cursing his dearth of street smarts, he continued walking. Off the main streets, along dark laneways, into loading bays… maybe this was him! A fleshless bundle of limbs was huddled under a coat on a flattened cardboard box.