There had been a run of messages on the Tamagotchi phone since the data breach. Sometimes when she looked back at the notebook she wondered if perhaps she’d not copied something down years ago. That maybe it was missing the most important message of all – the Rosetta Stone. But she’d never know. She didn’t tell anyone about any of it. It was okay to have one secret – two if you counted the data breach and the app. But no one said that. Not in the meetings. In the meetings, she heard, ‘Your secrets will keep you sick.’ In the meetings, she heard, ‘The truth will set you free.’ But she justified it. In the meetings, she heard, ‘Anything you’re justifying is probably not true.’ She knew that what she heard in meetings was probably what she needed to hear. She agreed with all of it, felt in her gut that it was probably right. Whenever she met with Heidi, the phone, the notebook and the spreadsheet stood between them like a mountain. When she went to meetings, she sometimes felt different. Different was probably the most dangerous thing she could feel. Her ego would kill her. Her ego wanted her to be apart – better or worse than everyone else, but always apart. It was her ego that had got her into this. She didn’t want anyone telling her how stupid it was to keep the Tamagotchi phone and the spreadsheet recording its messages. So she didn’t tell anyone, and the secret kept a large back door to drinking open – swinging wildly in a gale.

She’d got away with the data breach and then the Tamagotchi phone had got busy. She felt like all she had were things she was keeping to herself. It made her think about the coffee the other night and Carola and Lotte. Since the coffee the other night, everything made her think about Carola and Lotte. Everything that had gone wrong, everything stopping her from coming clean, felt like their fault. Everything missing felt like it was missing because Carola and Lotte had taken it from her. She played the coffee night over and over, and she was sure they’d been looking at her. Seeing straight through her. Judging her for keeping a secret. Sure, she was keeping a secret, but they were responsible for the circumstances that led to her having to keep secrets. She tried to not think about them. That’s how Diane suggested she deal with it. If she was honest with herself, Margaret knew she was resentful. Blowing it out of all proportion in her head. Thinking they were doing things to her when they were just doing things.

Diane said to her, ‘What does it affect in you?’

‘It affects my security,’ Margaret said. ‘And my self-esteem. And my relationship with them and with other people.’

‘What part do you play in it?’