Carry You. Beth Thomas

dustbin lids.

      I dunk my Jaffa Cake into my hot chocolate as I work hard on suspending my disbelief for a bit longer. It’s an effort but so worthwhile. The disbelief thing, I mean. Not the dunking; that’s no effort at all. Dunking these delightful spongy confections in hot chocolate is one of God’s best and yet simplest ideas. If you get it right, the cakey bit soaks up hot chocolate without falling apart, and the chocolate and orange bit on the top goes all warm and soft, so they just melt in your mouth. Too long in the heat, though, and it’s gooey mush at the bottom of the mug. Timing is everything; it’s a lot like life. Ooh, that sounds good.

       Daisy Mack

      is dunking Jaffa Cakes in hot chocolate. The timing is everything: it’s a lot like life.

      My laptop makes an electronic popping sound, and I glance down. It’s an instant message from my best friend Abby.

      Abby Marcus Hey, what you doing?

      Oh God. Quickly I grab my mobile phone on the sofa next to me and switch it off, dropping it back on the cushion. But I’m still not safe. I reach up to the landline on the wall next to me and break through the dust and cobwebs on the handset. Abby is the only actual human dogged enough to ring it, and she will when she finds my mobile switched off. I press the ‘Call’ button so the dialling tone is audible. Colin lays Hugh out on the road with one good punch. Colin and Hugh really aren’t very good names for two drop-dead-gorgeous, Hollywood A-list actors, are they? They sound more like a pair of nerdy IT geeks in specs. It’s not exactly Brad and Matt.

      My laptop pops again.

      Abby Marcus Just tried to ring you but mobile on voicemail and landline engaged. Are you actually talking to another human being???????

      Daisy Mack Hey! Yeah, on phone. Speak later x

      Abby Marcus No, speak now. Wanna go out?

      Daisy Mack Can’t. Am tucked up in PJs, and on phone. X

      The landline phone is starting to make that multi-tonal alarm noise that lets you know when you’ve accidentally left it off the hook. I’ve heard it so many times these past few weeks, nee-nawing away in the background like an emergency siren, it’s become the sound track to my life. I end the ‘call’, then start another one immediately. Better actually make a call now, I suppose; guilt is encroaching. I press 4 on the memory list and it connects me through to Oxfam, where I make a ten-pound donation. Immediately I feel better. I genuinely am in my PJs, and on the phone, so I have not lied to my best friend; and now I’ve made a donation to charity. I’m a saint.

      Pop.

      Abby Marcus It’s half past two in the afternoon.

      I love Abby. I do. She doesn’t take any crap. Sometimes I wish she would. Just once or twice. Actually, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being in your PJs on a Sunday afternoon, enjoying a film with a Jaffa Cake or two. And if I stare hard enough at the telly and maintain the suspension of my disbelief – and move my head so the armchair is blocking the view – I can’t even see the three empty McVitie’s boxes on the floor. If no one saw me eat them, no one will ever know.

      Abby Marcus Are you eating Jaffa Cakes?

      Daisy Mack Just a couple. Watching a film. See you tomorrow. X

      Abby Marcus No, now. Come on, come out for a walk.

      Oh God. A walk. I so don’t want to go out for a walk. It’s bloody miserable weather today, which is exactly why I’m bundled up on my sofa with Col and Hugh, and the world’s best ever dressing gown, instead of tramping the streets in freezing fog.

      Daisy Mack Too cold. X

      I, on the other hand, am toasty warm, and very snuggly. I’m staying put.

      Abby Marcus Get your arse off your sofa and look out the window.

      Daisy Mack OK, OK, I’m up.

      Abby Marcus No you’re not you’re still typing. Come on Daze, do it.

      Abby really is a fantastic friend. She’s the best. So caring, so thoughtful. So … tenacious. Bridget is embarrassing herself at a party now. Not so keen on this bit.

      Daisy Mack OK, horrid winter’s afternoon. Definitely not walking weather. What’s your point?

      Abby Marcus It’s the 11th of April.

      Oh, God, yes, of course it is. How did I forget that? I was still stuck in November for some reason. Well, not for some reason. I know the reason. Everything stopped for me in November, and I often forget that for other people time has carried on ticking, events have kept occurring, and everyone else has continued to experience things.

      I suppose I’d better actually look out of the window then. She’ll never shut up otherwise. She does love to talk, Abby. She’s a driving instructor and her life is one long hilarious series of adventures, with dual control pedals. They should make a film about it. It could be called, I don’t know, Driving Games, or Driving Down, or, no, no, wait: Drive Hard. Brilliant.

      I move the laptop off my lap and put it carefully down on the sofa next to my mobile phone, then push the duvet back, pull my feet up and roll unsteadily sideways onto my knees. I let my face drop into the fabric of the back of the sofa. Feel a bit dizzy suddenly. I grip the back of the sofa for a few seconds until I’m steady, then turn myself round slowly so my back is to the telly and I am facing the closed curtains behind the sofa. I wonder why Abby is so desperate to get me to look outside. I reach out and pull the curtain back a crack and am instantly blinded by the bright sunshine streaming in. My pupils practically scream out in agony and immediately shrink to the size of single atoms, which is still not small enough to stop the searing white-hot rays from burning into my retinas, leaving a trail of blackened, scorched tissue and permanent damage. I squint a bit and shield my eyes with my hand. That’s better.

      ‘Open the bloody door, you numpty!’ a cheerful voice shouts, and I make out at last that it’s Abby herself, waving on the lawn.

      ‘Oh my God, Daisy, look at the state of this place!’ she says as she strides purposefully in a few seconds later. She glances quickly around, then throws me a sidelong look. ‘Daze, it’s very smelly in here.’ I’m retreating to the comfort of the sofa and my duvet, while Abby moves around my darkened living room, scooping up the McVitie’s boxes, as well as one or two Twix wrappers, dirty coffee cups, tissues and, embarrassingly, a half-eaten cheesecake with hardened edges that I think was from yesterday.

      ‘One or two Jaffa Cakes you said,’ she’s muttering as she cleans. ‘God, have you been on that sofa all weekend? Have you actually had any nutrition at all since Friday lunch time?’

      I’m not answering. It’s all rhetorical anyway. She knows what I’m like. Plus at this moment Bridget is running through the streets in her underpants and cardigan, about to snog Colin. I snogged someone called Colin once. Not a very enjoyable experience. We both had braces at the time and some kind of unpleasant electromagnetic force was caused by the presence of all the steel.

      ‘Are you even listening to me?’ Abby’s voice breaks into my thoughts and I make my eyeballs rotate towards her blurry shape. She’s standing in the middle of the floor, hands on hips, frowning hard.

      ‘Oh, yeah, course I am. I’m sorry, Abs.’

      She cocks her head. ‘So what are you sorry for?’

      I shake my head and shrug. ‘You know. All this.’ I move my hand generally in the direction of the world. ‘I’m so hopeless.’

      A small beam of sunshine breaks through the thunder clouds on Abby’s face, and she moves over to where I’m huddled. ‘No, Daze, you’re not hopeless. You’re depressed, disorganised, lost, confused and … well, a bit malodorous.’ She sits down on the sofa by my feet, picks them both up by the socks and lays them gently in her own lap. ‘But you’re not hopeless. You have hope. We always have hope, don’t we?’ She rubs my shin affectionately. ‘And you’ve got me. I mean