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effort for long enough, so you can’t say I’m not trying. And, who knows . . . if he’s good, I might just stretch it to two .’
    ‘Hey, hang on a minute!’ Julie laughed, coming out of the toilet with her skirt hoisted around her waist while she tugged her knickers up. ‘I know I said I wanted a good crack at my fella, but don’t you go committing me to a whole bleedin’ weekend of him. A shag’s one thing, but I’m not being bored to death having to look at the fat bastard in daylight, an’ all.’
    ‘Not even for a pair of Pradas?’
    ‘ No man’s worth that much sacrifice.’
    Laughing, Sue said, ‘You wouldn’t say that if you’d met my Terry.’ Pulling herself up short, she cursed under her breath, wondering why the hell he ’d come into her mind.
    Wondering pretty much the same thing, Julie said, ‘What you thinking about him for, you silly bitch?’
    ‘I wasn’t,’ Sue lied. ‘It just slipped out.’
    ‘Yeah, well, slip it right back in,’ Julie told her bluntly. ‘He’s getting on with his own thing, and you’re supposed to be getting on with yours.’
    Muttering that that was exactly what she’d been trying to do, Sue turned back to the mirror and fiddled with her hair, to hide the fact that thinking about Terry doing his own thing had just made her feel sick.
    He was probably having it off with the little slag right this very minute; kissing her, and touching her, and . . .
    ‘Oi!’ Julie prodded her sharply in the ribs. ‘If you ruin my birthday getting all miserable over that ex of yours, I swear to God I’ll swing for you!’
    Mumbling, ‘I’m not getting miserable,’ Sue took a deep breath. Then, turning round, she held out her hand, saying, ‘Right, give us your phone.’
    ‘Why? Who you gonna call?’
    ‘Well, not him , if that’s what you’re thinking. But I can’t just stay out all weekend without telling Nicky where I am, can I?’
    ‘By God, I think she means it,’ Julie snorted, reaching into her bag and handing the phone over. ‘But won’t she be in bed by now?’
    ‘Which is exactly why they invented that little thing called texting ,’ Sue told her sarcastically.
    ‘Yeah, well, hurry up,’ Julie said, glancing around and seeing that they were the only people left in the toilets. ‘If I get out there and he’s legged it before I get to see the inside of his suite, you’re dead.’
    Sticking two fingers up at her, Sue dialled Nicky’s number and left her message. Then, handing the phone back, she grinned.
    ‘Right, then. Let’s go and get this birthday party really started.’

4
    Jay Osborne was deep in thought when she reached the hospital. For a supposedly tight-knit community like that of the Fitton estate, where everybody dipped in and out of each others’ business like biscuits in tea, it amazed her that no one had been able to tell her where to find Sue or Terry Day. But they’d had plenty enough to say about them.
    Sue, despite the odd murmurings of sympathy, seemed to be looked upon as a ‘bit of a slag’ by most of her neighbours – and a terrible mother by them all. While Terry was classed as scum for abandoning his family the way he had – and a pervert, apparently, for taking up with a girl less than half his age. And the kids hadn’t escaped the venom, either, with Connor – now that the neighbours knew he wasn’t actually dead – being labelled mardy; while Nicky, despite them all saying how good she was to her brother, was seen as a weirdo for spending all her time indoors instead of running wild with her mates. And, yet if she had been that kind of girl, Jay had no doubt that they’d be calling her as much of a slag as they called her mother.
    Under the impression that she must be dealing with the family from hell, Jay had been surprised when she’d checked them out back at the station to find that they didn’t have any major convictions between them. Sue had been cautioned for assaulting Leanne Miller some