Marley

Read by Ian McKay

Is singing her heart out to Gloria. In the shower:

“At first I was afraid, I was petrified
Thinking I could live without you by my side
And after spending nights
Thinking how you did me wrong
I grew strong
And I learned how to get along.”

She reaches for the Mancave shampoo.

“Doo, doo doo dooo

Now you're back
From outer space
And I find you here
With that sad look upon your face
I should've changed that stupid lock
Or made you leave your key-”

Crystal bangs on the bathroom door. “I’ll be back at six – just going to an AA meeting”

“What?” Marley turns off the water. “But you’re not an alcoholic.”

There’s a pause. Crystal’s voice comes from the bottom of the stairs.

“Just wanted to show my support.”

Mattie

Read by Fleur Hitchcock

Oh Christ! Not again.

Mattie misses the toilet bowl this time. She looks at the vomit on the floor and wonders if it was the second bottle of Rose – the one that tasted suspiciously sweet?

Or was it the two shots of vodka before she left home?

She grabs her phone hoping that the string of messages was a dream, but they’re still there.

Oh no.

Just the thought of it brings another heave.

She counts through one eye. There are nine messages. All from her.

And she’s been left on read.

Were they that bad?

She takes a peek.

I really loved you, you know.

I thought you were the one.

It was really sweet that time that you took me to Swindon Transport Museum. If a bit weird.

The Afternoon tea at the National Trust place, was even weirder.

Do you want me back?

Have you missed me?

There was a two hour gap. That was the second bottle with Gracie. Gracie, said he was boring. He was a nob. He just wanted to look at trains. He was a bit of a granddad.

Then she went home. A taxi? Or did she walk? No bloody idea.

Oh god, and then the texts started again.

When we were having sex, I used to imagine you were Robert Downey Junior. In Sherlock.

I saw a pug’s arse and it reminded me of you.

I just wanted you to know. I hated your mum.

Mattie throws up again.

Katya

Read by Ian McKay

Katya scans the room.

“You are the most important person. You can win at this,” she mutters to herself, echoing her mother.

She sees the empty box of Xanax. How many did she take?

What day actually is it?

She checks her phone. Last video only had 20k likes.

Crap.

She’d have to do better than that.

And double crap. She’s supposed to be promoting Harvey Nick’s new summer swimwear collection.

Deadline’s midday.

Her chest tightens.

Through her panic she recalls the day she was late for the swimming gala. She missed the warmup and came third. And her mother had said – “how did you do worse than Naomi?”

She could never verbalise to her mum that she was afraid of the water. Afraid of drowning.

It’s a shame really, because she would have looked so much better than everyone else in a swimsuit. If there was a competition for the most stunning bone structure. She would win.

Or would she?

She looks down at her stomach. It’s empty, concave, but she’s sure if she tried a little harder, she could lose a little more.

It could all have been so different. If her mum had only said, “You are the most important person. I love you and I want you to be happy.”

So different.

Lou

Read by Ruby Wright

Lou contemplated the interior of the fridge. There was tamarind, oyster sauce, and a jar of pickled beetroot. Behind the dying lemongrass two slices of pastrami. And in the vegetable drawer, asparagus and an untouched bag of baby potatoes.

Her husband, Giovanni, had flown to Rome to look after his mother for a week. They’d agreed that she would come home from work early every day, to be with the children. But now it was dawning on her, that she felt completely unprepared.

As a rule, Carlos cooked two meals every evening. One for them and one for the children and now, two extra children had come round for a playdate, and it turned out they were gluten free. Which ruled out pasta and tomato sauce, the only thing she could reliably cook. She wondered if puttanesca was difficult to make. That might work on potatoes – could she ask chat GBT? Is that what it was for?

Or would Alexa know?

No, she’d ring her mum.

“Darling – puttanesca’s easy, anchovies, olives, capers, parsley, olive oil, bung it in the blender – but do the children eat anchovies? They’re an acquired taste.”

Fuck

“What else can I put over potatoes? Could I do Patatas Bravas, but with boiled ones?”

Her mother left a little silence. “Why not grated cheese? Or Baked beans? Or Fish Fingers?”

As she disconnected the call, Isabella, Lou’s daughter came in. “Mummy – we’re getting hungry. What’s for supper?”

“Um…” In spite of being the secretary of state for education, she realised she was defeated.

“Mummeeee.” Isabella put her arms around her mother’s waist. “Why don’t we order Deliveroo…again.”

Ruby

Read by Ru McKay

Ruby winced as she tried to decode what Arron meant by:

…As deconstructed liberal feminists ask the public about perception and anthropology… extreme feminist propaganda in a state of paradigm shifts in the patriarchy…

She tried to work out whether he really believed there had been paradigm shifts in the patriarchy. She tried to work out if he believed anything at all.

Marking was doing her head in.

She leaned back and took a bite from her marmalade toast. The marmalade was January’s project, to take her mind off the dissertations. And she still bore the scars of both. The marmalade, delicious, but riddled with trauma. The dissertations barely forgotten. There was that one written entirely by someone’s parent, she could tell by the correct use of the gerundive.

Next to her, her phone alarm went off, and she reached over for her pills, swallowing them down with an Earl Grey.

She tried again with the essay. The impulse to delete the whole thing and write it again herself was almost unbearable.

Through muscle memory, she opened Candy Crush Saga.

She’d allow herself two levels.

Sensitivity read by Ashlyn Freeman

Jenny

Read by Fleur Hitchcock

Jenny has her pie. It’s a Charlie Bigham. And, although her sister might be appalled, she’s going to eat it, all of it, straight out of the charming little bamboo box. Not many vegetables, just one, actually, in the form of frozen peas. And fish pie, it’s got potatoes, hasn’t it?

She turns on the telly and switches over to Police Responders. It appears that someone’s stolen scrap metal from a back yard in Milton Keynes and triggered a high speed police chase. She realises this probably happened in 2013. And on the other side of the country. But it’s still the perfect backdrop for her to enjoy the newest novel from Jolyon Pepper-Smith, Death at the Village Fete.

Jenny pops on her reading glasses and peers at the palms of her hands, rugged and calloused. Hands that once designed and constructed sofas for Heals. Ran a design team of thirty people. Shook the hand of Lucienne Day.

But she doesn’t mind sitting on her Ercol sofa, eating pies-for-two out of the box.

Happiness lies in not giving a fuck.