Greta had incinerated their striped thermals the week before. She’d hung them on a chair and put the chair too close to the heater to dry. They hadn’t washed the thermals much, possibly ever, and they only had one pair so they needed to dry them quickly. They didn’t have a dryer. No one did. Dryers were expensive and none of them had much money. Not now the credit cards had been cut up. Dell and Heidi were paid one wage between the two of them into their one bank account. They called it job-sharing. It was a rush now – for Dell – to get to the bank on pay-day lunch breaks to take as much of the money out as she could before Heidi did. Usually she was too late because Heidi had stopped turning up for work, so she had all the time in the world to wander into the bank and withdraw the money. Their boss didn’t mind who turned up – both of them, one of them – it made very little difference because they were rostered on as if they were one person. Dell was going to ask about getting paid in cash, but it sounded dodgy and she needed to approach it carefully. Probably their boss thought they were both still coming to work. Possibly Dell hadn’t done a lot to correct her. It was another thing Peggy and Greta talked about in the dark, in whispers, when they couldn’t sleep and they were trying to work out how honest was honest enough not to die drunk and naked in a river.

As Michael pulled the underwear out of his trousers he looked around and Peggy and Greta had to look away quickly. They looked at the counsellor and nodded their heads like they’d been listening the whole time. She was talking about being careful not to compare themselves to people who could leave half a glass of wine on a table at dinner. Everyone laughed. It was funny. It being funny was part of why Peggy and Greta needed to stop drinking. That and the sleeping on the streets and just about dying. There was lots to laugh about. When they laughed it meant they knew. When a room full of people trying to stay sober laughed while you were talking, it meant they understood. They’d done it. They knew.