Her nineteen-year-old son, Dean, spent as little time at home with his mother as he could. He’d never met his father and resented his single mother. He spent most of his time hanging out with friends, getting into trouble, when he wasn’t working at KFC. It was obvious to those who knew them that Dean had as many aspirations as his mother.

The young man had already been in trouble with the police, on numerous occasions: twice for carrying drugs, once for joyriding – for which he received a suspended sentence – and once for ABH, after getting into a fight outside a pub.

Janet loved her son but had neither the will nor the desire to deal with him. He was disrespectful and occasionally she had wished that his father was on the scene. In truth though, Janet had not seen Dean’s father since she was a teenager. She’d got drunk at a party and one thing had led to another. Five months later she’d discovered she was pregnant, but it was too late to do anything about it. Her Catholic mother and father kicked her out for bringing shame on them and Janet had been alone in life ever since. It was one of the reasons she had such a love for reading. It filled her days and helped stop the feeling of loneliness – that was what had led her to start her online book blog. She ploughed many hours into reading and reviewing and soon began to gather a small following. It was as a result of her blog that she’d met Shirley, three years ago. When the women realised they were local to one another they arranged to meet for coffee, and had been good friends ever since.

As was always the case, by 11am the shop was beginning to get busy and Janet’s attention was drawn away from her Kindle.

She served the regulars and watched them leave empty-handed – with miserable faces as usual. When Pauline walked in, wearing dark glasses, Janet couldn’t hide her surprise. Pauline, when she noticed Janet standing behind the counter, looked equally shocked, and she contemplated turning around and walking out, pretending she hadn’t seen her book club companion. But, realising it was too late, she decided to brave it out.

‘What are you doing here?’ Janet whistled.

‘Oh, erm … I just …’ Pauline removed her glasses to reveal her eyes, which darted around, unwilling to meet Janet’s. ‘It’s for Roger.’ Roger was Pauline’s husband.

‘Oh. Didn’t know he was a gambler.’ Janet was not about to let Pauline off the hook so lightly. ‘What you betting on?’

Pauline looked over at the televisions on the wall and the digital table of odds, and her puffy eyes filled with tears.

‘You alright?’ Janet leant so far forward towards the glass that her breath appeared on it in a fog.