Back in the kitchen they’re acting like nothing’s the matter. Mum puts a bowl in front of me but I push it away. They talk about nothing. Stupid stuff. The woman on the next street who fell and broke her hip. The fact that the milkman missed the extra pint off the order on Friday.

‘I don’t know if we’ll have enough for breakfast now,’ Mum says.

You should call the Evening Post, I think, they might change Monday’s headlines.

‘Are you not eating that?’ Dad says.

I shove the bowl over to his side of the table. I look at Mum. ‘I could’ve done my homework this morning if you hadn’t made me go to church.’

‘You could’ve done it on Saturday if you hadn’t been so busy watching rubbish on the television.’

I want to throw a pea down the front of her Sunday blouse or pull the tablecloth out from under all the plates like they do on the TV. She’s still talking but I’m not taking it in. All the plates and bowls smashing into pieces on the floor, the jug of custard tipped over into her lap.

‘You can’t blame everything on other people,’ she says, ‘sometimes you have to take responsibility for your own mistakes.’

*

I put the radio on but I can still hear them through the floor. The sound of the plates as she washes up, the cupboard doors shutting as he puts them away. I jump up and down a few times and the floor vibrates. They go quiet but no one comes up the stairs. And then their voices again. My homework’s still a blank page. This is a day of rest. Kick the book across the room and lie face down on the bed. Bury my head in the pillow, hold my breath and start to count. Like the woman who got battered to death on Corrie last year. The actress lying there pretending to be dead. Trying to look stiff and make her breathing invisible. Hold on until all the air is gone, until there’s nothing else but the need for it. They don’t understand that everything about this place is yesterday’s news.

I try to imagine what it must be like to have money. Like Claire’s sister, working on the cheese counter at Booths to save up for a trip round Europe.

‘That’s what it’s about,’ she said one night, coming into Claire’s bedroom in her long green skirt. She smelt of incense sticks. Her toenails were painted blue. ‘It isn’t about the money. You earn just enough to go and experience the world. The journey is the only thing that matters.’