The living room is a tip. I’m no neat freak but it’s starting to get to me. The whole place is a mess. I’ve not put any washing on this week because we’ve run out of washing powder. I had to get a shirt out of the laundry bin this morning. It was hard to choose which one smelled the best. Best is the wrong word to use. They all smelled bad but the one I put on didn’t make my eyes water. I sprayed it and me with the last of my deodorant and nobody recoiled although a dinner lady did say she thought she could smell toilet freshener.

I looked around the room. If she was here to see the state of it Mum would have had a blue hairy fit. That’s what she used to call my giant paddies I used to have. I can’t think what I had to get cross about back then. I picked up the empty beer cans and carried them to the recycling bin in the kitchen but that was overflowing. He’d not put the bins out. I moved some paper off the counter and dropped the armful of cans with a clatter.

The kitchen was probably in a worse state than the living room. I didn’t want to clear it up but it was that or a row with Dad about it. Not great choices. I emptied the kitchen bin and the recycling crate into the already full wheelie bins outside. We’d missed bin day this week. I put a reminder on my phone to put them out next time even though it wasn’t my job. With the cans gone things looked a little better. It wasn’t much but it was a start.

I decided I’d have a snack and then I’d clean up a bit. The fridge was empty again. Dad came into the kitchen looking a lot like one of the undead. ‘When are you going shopping?’ I asked.

‘Don’t start,’ he said, switching on the kettle. He smelled like my shirt before the deodorant assault.

‘I’m not having a go. I’m just saying we need stuff. Do you want me to go?’ I hoped he’d say no because it was a long walk and those carrier bags really dig into my fingers.

He scratched his head. ‘Need to wait until Friday when I get paid.’

‘You have to be joking. We literally have nothing to eat.’

He blinked a few times. ‘What’s in the freezer?’

I opened it. It was slightly more inhabited than the fridge. Two sausages that were completely encased in ice like they had been in there a while. A large box of fish fingers but there was only one left in there. And half a bag of mixed veg.