Dell nodded. It was a pretty great meeting, but Peggy and Greta had already been to two meetings and they were hungry and they’d found the money. Just before they left rehab, they’d been told to go to meetings, they all had. Peggy and Greta wanted to be sober more than anything, so they did what they were told. The meetings were weird. Peggy and Greta had no idea what was going on. They had been about to give up going to meetings when a woman called Diane came over to where they were waiting for their bus home. Diane had been coming to meetings for a long time. Diane hadn’t had a drink for a long time. She gave them her phone number, written on a small piece of paper in blue ballpoint. ‘We don’t know what to do,’ Peggy said as Diane was walking away, and Diane stopped and came back. ‘What do we do?’ Diane said she didn’t know what Peggy and Greta needed to do, but she could tell them what she did. Diane said that to begin with she went to daytime meetings on Sundays. Sundays were hard and Peggy and Greta often wanted a drink. Diane said maybe they could go to daytime meetings, and on Sunday nights they could get ready for Monday. Routine was good.

‘Will you get something to eat?’ Greta asked now. ‘You have to eat dinner.’

‘Oh yeah,’ said Dell. ‘There are some baked beans and I can make some toast.’ Now Peggy and Greta felt like they should stay and have baked beans on toast too. Should they save the eight dollars for buses and savings? What were they supposed to do? If they went out for tom yum would they drink again? If they stayed for baked beans would they drink again? Diane had told them not to overthink things. Carol was Dell and Heidi’s Diane. She seemed a lot more loving than Diane. Diane never picked them up for meetings. She told them to pick up ashtrays at the end of the meetings, to talk to newcomers, forget themselves. Carol told Dell and Heidi to treat themselves like their best friend.