‘You worked in here long?’ he asked.

‘Couple of weeks.’

‘Like it?’

Angel rolled her eyes at him. The manageress was standing right behind her, and there was a queue forming, she didn’t want her staff engaging in chat with their pals when there were customers waiting to be served.

Tommy got the message and moved along. But he was waiting outside when she knocked off work later that day. They strolled along together among the rush-hour gallop of pedestrians heading for the Tube.

‘So where are you working?’ she asked him. He looked good in a natty purple suit with a trendy wide collar and flared trousers. Too neat to be hauling bricks or anything like that.

‘Got a job in a club up west. Assistant Manager.’

That sounded good. Better than serving cakes all day, anyway. ‘Lucky you.’

‘What, don’t you like it then? Wearing that daft hat and dishing out scones?’

‘You guessed,’ said Angel.

They parted company at the Tube, and Angel went on home to the flat in Clacton. Dora was spark out on the couch, a half-empty bottle of vodka on the floor. Heaving a sigh, Angel kicked off her shoes, rolled up her sleeves and set to work washing up and tidying the place once again.

Donny came in at eight. Dora was still out for the count, and he looked at her with disgust.

‘Christ, the state of her,’ he muttered under his breath.

‘She’ll be all right in a while. When she’s slept it off a bit,’ said Angel, feeling compelled to come to her mother’s defence.

She didn’t like it when Donny bad-mouthed her mother. It upset her.

‘Got a do coming up soon,’ said Donny, his eyes fastening onto Angel. ‘Pre-Christmas dinner, me and a few mates on the force and their wives. We ought to go. You and me.’

Angel stared at him. What about Dora, though? What about his wife? What would all his workmates think when he turned up with a different woman in tow? And yet . . . she couldn’t help feeling a surge of excitement at his words. An actual ‘do’. She’d never been to anything like that in her entire life.

‘But what about Mum? She’d love to go.’

‘You can wear the pink dress. The silk one. You look great in that,’ he said as if she had hardly spoken, his eyes fastened on hers. He lowered his voice. ‘Better than great. You look sensational. Every bloke in the place will envy me when I walk in with you on my arm.’

‘But, Mum . . .’ said Angel weakly.

‘Oh for fuck’s sake!’ he burst out, and Angel flinched. Suddenly his face was set with anger, his eyes ice-cold. He grabbed her arm and nodded at Dora, spark out with the drink. ‘Look. There’s your mum, Angel. She’s a fucking drunk.’

Angel didn’t know what to say to that. She looked at her mother, laid out on the sofa and there it was again, that surge of crippling guilt.