‘Nice,’ Heidi and Dell said. Heidi was like a single fish in the school of fishes that was her and Dell. Swimming out by herself, then slipping seamlessly back into the school so you couldn’t distinguish her. It was unnerving. There were no rules, but it wasn’t nice to be reminded of what they were. Everyone ignored it – the fact they’d been black-out drunk that night, that they’d been terrible people who had done despicable things. That the only ones who were two now were the worst of the women. There was no real hope of redemption because everyone pretended not to see it but saw it so clearly. No one wanted to see it and everyone was kidding themselves they couldn’t. But it was like Heidi was trying to remind everyone again and again. Like she was trying to break Peggy and Greta so they couldn’t walk out the door or eat or stay sober or stay alive. It was like Peggy and Greta would be all right if they worked together like one complete unit, but Heidi seemed hell-bent on explaining them back to themselves as two separate people.

‘We should go grocery shopping tonight,’ Dell said. ‘After work.’

‘That’s a good idea,’ Heidi said. ‘Shall we meet here at six?’

‘We were going to a meeting.’ Greta looked at Peggy then back at Heidi.

Heidi stopped for a moment and looked up, making a play of thinking. ‘If we go to Big Fresh we can go to the meeting down the road from there – it starts at eight.’

‘Okay,’ Peggy said, and she turned back to packing their lunches. There weren’t any carrots left. She’d chopped up broccoli into tiny little pieces and sprinkled it over some butter then squashed the other half of the bread on top.

‘Will that work?’ Greta said.

‘The meeting?’ Peggy asked.

‘The broccoli,’ Greta said, pointing vaguely in the direction of the sandwiches. Heidi had thrown everyone. They were annoying each other.

‘Won’t it?’ Peggy asked.

‘Smells like farts,’ Greta said.

‘It’ll taste like bean sprouts, won’t it?’ She was looking around now, almost desperately. There was a really old apple in the fruit bowl. That was about it. The half of the quiche was gone.

‘It’ll be okay,’ Greta said.

Peggy was still looking around. There was half a lemon on the bench. Greta and Peggy thought Heidi and Dell had left it there and Heidi and Dell thought Greta and Peggy had left it there. None of them wanted to throw it out in case the others wanted it.

‘There’s nothing else in the house,’ Greta said, then she sighed. ‘Lunch is all I look forward to.’

‘It’s not that bad,’ Peggy said.

‘It’s going yellow,’ Greta said about the broccoli. It was soft as well – there was no crunch left in it.