Gemma or Emma? Gemma or Emma? Gemma is always absolutely horrible to everyone. Emma is occasionally nice to me. However, I’m pretty sure I’m eating her bread. She catches me just before I return her decorated butter tub to the safety of the fridge.

‘Imogen, hi…oh. You’re eating my food again.’

She’s not angry, she’s just disappointed. Although previous experience suggests that disappointment is the warm-up act for the headliner, a hair metal rage set.

I swallow too quickly to taste the toast. What a waste. ‘I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. I’ll replace it. I just got in, and…yeah. Anyway, how are you? How was your day?’

Emma is briskly flicking through the pile of envelopes. She has never had cause to be frightened of her own post. ‘Fine, fine, the usual, really busy, brokers playing me up, lot of first time buyers at the moment. It’s amazing, you’d think that the banks being such cautious lenders would mean that demand really dropped off, especially now the minimum deposit is so much higher. You really need at least 20 per cent of the property price to get your mortgage approved.’

Whenever Emma tells me about her job, I feel a bit sick. Then I remember that she owns and rents out two flats in Birmingham, and she’s slumming it here, while she ‘saves up’ for another property for her portfolio, and I can feel the vomit rising in the back of my throat, lumpy and acrid.

You’d think she could spare a slice of fucking bread.

I wait for her to ask me about my day, and when I can wait no longer, I blurt it out. ‘I just heard that I got a job! I think I told you that Harri from Panache mentioned something just before Christmas? I’m going to be a staff writer on a new website.’

Emma looks blank. She doesn’t remember. ‘Ah, right, well done. Is it full time? You’ll have regular money coming in? You know rent day is next week?’

I do know, Emma. I know that if I don’t buy anything, or breathe out, and make some creative, less than moral meal choices, and buy my train tickets on my credit card, as long as I get paid for this week’s shifts on time I can just cover the cost of my windowless box room.