‘Yup. You’ve missed your mum’s bake sale. She called me an hour ago when she couldn’t get hold of you for two days straight. I turned your mobile off, by the way.’

Faith pours me a glass of water – and puts the kettle on. Her tousled hair has that just-got-out-of-bed sexiness they tout on shampoo commercials. Her cleansed, toned and moisturised skin is clear and dewy-looking. She smells like rosewater and jojoba.

My hair feels like an oil slick and my mouth tastes like the bottom of a birdcage.

‘Oh dear...’

‘She also passed on the message that June Whitbury wants to evict you. It’s been a busy morning while you slept, darling. I was just about to wake you.’

I slump myself onto a kitchen stool.

In the cold light of day, I wrap my sober head around recent events. Jordan made Benny sick. Benny destroyed the flat. That pushed me to finally end things with my selfish twat of a boyfriend and I kicked him out. I attended the opening of a new club, in a ludicrous outfit, where I got drunk with Faith and Poppy and high with Harry’s half-sisters, sort of hit on Harry and then passed out. I’ve lost a day and a half sleeping it all off in Faith’s spare bedroom. This morning, I missed helping my mother with her bake sale at the charity shop. Now, June Whitbury is evicting me?

She must know about the carnage made in the flat she rents to me for a generously low sum, on the proviso I care for it as well as her dearly departed mother always had.

I imagine the state is far worse than when I left it Thursday morning. Putrid and festering, stinking of poo.

‘Yup,’ Faith repeats, as if reading my mind. ‘You told me Benny had a touch of the runs? June believes her place is completely destroyed.’

‘Why was June at my flat?’

June Whitbury doesn’t drive and she won’t take the trains, let alone the Tube. She hasn’t left Redhill in decades.

‘According to your mother, her solicitor attended to let in an electrician. Something about installing a fire alarm without delay for insurance purposes. You weren’t answering your phone, so he popped by with the key.’

Benny jumps onto the bench and sidles affectionately close to Faith, rubbing his mouth against her hand.

‘Apparently, he’ll be back at the flat at 5 p.m. today to give you a stern talking-to and your notice. So, let’s get dressed and get the place cleaned up before he arrives. Then we’ll see what we can do about this eviction.’

I take a moment to take it all in.

‘I can’t ask you to help me clean, Faith. It wasn’t Benny’s fault.’

Jordan, on the other hand, can go and do one.