‘OK.’ He didn’t sound convinced.

‘Wanna try it?’ she asked hopefully.

‘OK.’

Maisie raided the press and fridge, then sat the boys around the table. She explained the rules and waited for a reaction.

‘Sounds pretty simple,’ Mitch said.

‘OK, then, Mitch, you go first.’ Maisie said.

‘Grand.’

‘When I press this timer, you start. Eat as many crackers as you can in a minute.’ She pressed the buzzer and Mitch took off like a champion. The first two went down fairly easily, but after that he was coughing and spluttering yet he kept shoving them in. The boys were laughing as he choked.

‘… five, six, seven …’

‘Water!’ he gasped. The lads counted as he valiantly struggled on, their excitement growing and their voices louder.

‘… eight, nine, ten …’

‘No water,’ she said, and the lads clapped.

‘Ah, man.’ He nearly choked, sending the lads into fits of giggles.

‘… eleven, twelve …’

He kept going, the lads shouting him on, his mouth so full he couldn’t close it.

‘Thirteen!’

He was trying his very best to jam in the fourteenth when the buzzer went.

‘Stop!’ Maisie called, as referee.

The lads cheered and Rave whistled. Bridie gave Mitch a glass of water.

‘Good work, son,’ she said, as he spat the guts of fourteen crackers into the sink.

Rave managed eleven, Jeremy nine and Jonno didn’t get past five. Dave got to twelve just as the buzzer went. He was gutted. Mitch celebrated by punching himself in the gut. ‘Bring it on!’ He did a victory lap of the kitchen table. ‘Next!’ he shouted.

The raw-egg challenge made Jonno and Jeremy gag so much their lips didn’t even touch the glass. The more they gagged the louder the lads laughed. Dave managed to drink three raw eggs before he threw in the towel. ‘I can’t. I just can’t.’ Mitch drank four, then brought up the lot. The lads loved that. Rave managed five without breaking a sweat and won hands down.

The final challenge was the one that Maisie really built up. She put on her Marigold gloves for effect and held up a Scotch Bonnet chilli. ‘This chilli could burn the eye out of a tiger. It’s so hot it could stop an elephant’s heart. This chilli could change your lives, boys, and not for the better.’

‘Jesus!’ Jonno whispered.

‘Cool,’ Mitch said.

‘Are you ready to do this?’

They nodded.

‘I can’t hear you.’

‘Yes! Yes! Come on, yes!’ Mitch shouted. ‘Let’s do it.’

The lads laughed nervously.

She cut the chilli slowly, deliberately and with great flair. They all sat head to head around the table, focused on Maisie and her deadly chilli. Bridie leaned in with a fresh tray of muffins, filling the boys’ noses with the scent of chocolate.

‘I saw a man cry an ocean and jump into a lake after eatin’ one of those. He was a wild man after that,’ Bridie said.