Knowing Me Knowing You by Mandy Baggot

they told me that last night was going to be the start of something for you, ’ Hermione s aid with a sigh .
    ‘ Oh it was, it was the start of my investigation into whether or not the Lady Dragon wears a wig, ’ Kate said excitedly, a wicked smile crossing her face.
    ‘ What?! Oh tell all! ’ Hermione said , clapping her hands together in delight.

N ine
     
    Kate’s head was still thumping that evening when she put Bethan to bed. Although Philip had worn the children out at the park , Bethan had demanded game after game of h ide and s eek in the garden when they had got home. Trying not to die of boredom when her daughter hid in the same place was usually challenge enough , but it was infinitely worse when you felt like death.
    ‘ Mummy, ’ Bethan spoke, reaching up a hand and pulling at Kate’s hair.
    ‘ Time for sleep now Bethy . G ive Mr Crisps a cuddle, ’ Kate spoke, handing her daughter her favourite bear.
    Mr Crisps was so named because he was a limited edition bear from a crisp manufacturer. Just three tokens plus postage and packing. Bethan had been having a lot of bargain treats lately. Matthew had bought her a Steiff bear when she was born. It had been a show of wealth and he had told everybody and anybody about it. But the bear was sat on top of the wardrobe, still in its box, not played with. Kate thought it had an angry little face and she was terrified of Bethan swallowing the button from its ear.
    ‘ Teddy crisps, ’ Bethan said and hugged the bear into her.
    ‘ Night , night darling, ’ Kate said and stroked her daughter’s hair, watching her eyes flicker closed.
    Bethan laughed and smiled and Kate turned off the light and left the room. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before descending the stairs. She knew what was waiting for her.
    Her laptop was open on the table and next to it was a pile of urgent bills. There were almost a dozen. Electricity, water, gas, telephone, mobile phone, internet, council tax etc. etc. T here was a demand for almost everything.
    Kate bypassed the invoices, opened the fridge and took out a box. Tonight it was chilli con carne, ready in three minutes. She slipped off the sleeve, pierced the container and put it in the microwave. She set it to cook, opened the fridge and took out the bottle of wine she had bought on the way back from Hermione’s. Italian tonight, on a BOGOF, twelve percent but as she had two for the price of one she wouldn’t feel too guilty if she had to open the second bottle.
    She hurriedly opened it, poured herself a glass and drank half of it in one desperate gulp. The headache seemed to ease instantly.
    She sat down at the laptop and began to go through the bills. She clicked onto the internet and logged into her bank’s website to check her account. She knew she had saved two hundred pounds to cover the urgent bills plus there was the seventy five pounds Matthew paid into her account every Friday for Bethan . Hopefully it would be enough to pay everything that needed to be paid. If not she would be back to a diet of tinned soup and V alue bread for a week. 
    She clicked into her account information and the details came up. There was just the two hundred pounds in the account. Kate furrowed her brow and clicked into the statement of transactions. There had been nothing paid into her account from Matthew since the previous week. There was also a direct debit due to go out the next day.
    The microwave beeped to inform her it had finished cooking the chilli. Kate looked at the account, totted up some figures on the calculator and stared at the screen. She couldn’t afford to pay the bills. She could put some on her credit card but that was building up too , what with early evening trips to the wine section of the supermarket and paying for Elite Escorts. But that apart , why hadn’t Matthew’s standing order gone through?
    As she was reheating the chilli she telephoned the bank, hoping against hope that there was some technical