Yes, this ties in with At the End of the Day headcanon, though it could stand alone. There are a couple of references to it, and a fair few to the show. I had about 70% of this planned by the time I wrote the Post Office Savings chapter of ATEOTD. It pretty much all created itself in my head after watching a scene from one of the later series of the show, and I shall put a transcript of that scene before I start the fic. Martina didn't actually reveal much, but yeah, this entire beast of backstory sprung up from about six lines of dialogue, which shows how wired my brain is :P The title also originated there.

Parts of this may be a little OOC in places, but I'm starting from when Martina was six, and she hasn't quite become the hard-faced, no-nonsense DHSS lady everyone knows, loves and I daresay fears in the show yet XD She's going to have to grow and develop into her, and it's not going to be a nice journey. I'm aiming to explain why Martina is how she is in the show (and ATEOTD), why she's so untrusting and why her outlook on life is so bleak, but why despite all that she does some unexpected things like let Shifty in time and time again. She'll work her way there, and her life will eventually end up like the quote, though it's not there yet.

Warnings: (and there are a lot)- some language (mild), inadvertent child abuse, neglect, gambling, underage drinking, hints at dysthymia, poisoning, stomach-pumping and some quite bad self-esteem issues. I'm a little bit concerned, to be honest that this should have an M-rating, but I'm not entirely sure so I'll leave it as T for the time being. Please tell me if I should rethink this.

Anyway, enjoy. If that's possible. Note to self: stop writing novel-length author's notes.

Forgive any inadvertent anachronisms. I researched everything as best I could but some things may have slipped me by...

'You're a very mechanical person, aren't you? I'll bet your family sit in the kitchen waiting for their number to come up. I bet they queue up outside the bathroom waiting for you to leap out of the bath shouting 'next!'

'I don't live with my family, Mister Boswell. I live alone.'

'Oh.'

'My mam lives in a council flat eleven floors up. She has a very close relationship with British airways. She shares it with me dad, and she goes out to work to pay his gambling debts and me brother's whiskey bill.'

'Oh. That's really sad, that is!'

'We don't have one car between us.'

-Conversation between Martina and Billy Boswell.

Leaping Out of the Bath (Shouting 'Next!')

Billy didn't know what he was talking about. Martina revealed very little.

Part One

1965-1972

The phrase Martina hears most during her childhood is get out of the way.

Get out of the way.

No matter what she does, what she says, where she goes, she's always under someone's feet. It doesn't matter whether she's trying to please, deliberately trying to infuriate or just trying desperately to get some attention for once, because, no matter which one of these is her motive on a given day, she's just being a nuisance in the eyes of her parents.

She did quite well at school. Get out of the way. She got into trouble off the teacher. Get out of the way, Martina, I'm busy. I don't have time for this. She needs a new pair of school shoes, because she's scuffed the ones she's got to oblivion. Not now, Martina, I've got enough on my mind and I can't afford to keep- oh, will you get out of the way, for goodness' sake?! There's not really any point in telling them anything- they're never interested. They have far more important things to be thinking of than their daughter, and as such they have little to do with her, other than to tell her not to do this or not to do that.

Martina, when she's old enough to realise that this isn't normal, that other children her age receive, on the whole, a lot more love and attention than the rare snatches she's getting, begins to wonder just what it is that she's done wrong. It doesn't make sense- is it something she has done, or something she hasn't? She tries doing things, she tries not doing things, testing which one will get more of a reaction, but the outcome is always the same.

Get out of the way.

And then, one day, it becomes blindingly clear why she always seems to be a roadblock in her parents' path.

Martina's six at the time, is tying her shoes on her own, is reading Enid Blyton, is struggling with arithmetic at school and saving what little pocket money she gets for something she'll know she wants when she sees it. Is as much of a normal child as anyone else, and as such, has as much of an inquisitive mind as any other six-year-old. And so, when she hears raised voices in the parlour, it's a natural move to stop what she's doing and go and have a stickybeak.

'Two thousand pounds! Two thousand bloody pounds! D'you honestly think we can afford that? You tell me how we're gonna settle a debt this size, Geoff- go on!'

Her mother's having hysterics, which is in no way normal. She's always quiet, preferring to attack by delivering well-timed, stinging comments, by staring with disapproval, but never by shouting.

'Oh, you think I asked for this to happen, did yer?' her Dad shouts back.

'I told you- didn't I tell you nothing good ever come o' gambling? I warned you dozens o' times not to waste our money on that…that sin- and still, you went ahead and did it! Well I'm telling you now, I am not going to waste my savings helping you out!'

'So you'd be happy to see your own husband go to prison?'

Martina presses herself up against the door, heart hammering as she listens. What does he mean, prison? What'll happen to her if her dad goes to gaol? What's gambling? She makes a note to ask her brother later.

'I don't know sometimes. Don't you think it's hard enough? We've got enough to pay out what with Roger's whiskey bills…'

'Well, if the lazy bastard got a job he could pay his own whiskey bills…'

'And who'd hire a chronic alcoholic? And there's Martina- she's still got to be fed for another ten years at least- Lord knows I needed another child to have to provide for…'

Martina starts at the sound of her name. Her ear's squashed as closely against the door as is humanly possible, but she tries to move a little closer all the same.

'You'll never forgive me for that, will you? You know I didn't intend for that to happen!'

'Well, you should have been more careful, shouldn't you? We could have avoided that accident!'

'We can't do anything about that now, can we? She's here now- we might as well try and make something useful out of her…'

'Fat lot of good that'll do. She's just about the stubbornest little thing I've ever met in my life.'

'Hah! And you wonder where she gets that from?'

The row goes on, more is said, but Martina's not listening anymore. The world has stopped turning.

Accident. An accident they could have avoided. That's what she is. Her parents have as good as owned up to the fact that they didn't want her, that they're not happy about her being here, that, maybe, they wish she'd never been born.

No wonder she's always in the way. She's unwanted, that's what she is.

Martina feels a pain in her chest, a singing, searing, burning pain, like someone's tossed a hot coal down her oesophagus and it's settled right over the top of her heart. She wants to cry, but she doesn't do it here. If she's too loud about it, her Mam and Dad will know she's been listening- and she could do without that added humiliation on top of all she's just found out.

She runs upstairs to her room and does it there instead, letting her pillow listen to the symphony of her woes and take the occasional bouts of abuse she decides to give it in an attempt to soothe her own pain.

She's discovered something today.

Not being wanted hurts.

It hurts a lot.

Roger finds her there an hour later, too tired to still be properly crying, just silently snivelling, lying on her stomach with her face in her pillow.

'What's all this then, pet?' He comes to sit down on the side of the bed, puts a hand on her back, and the warmth of his calloused palm spreads down her ribs, a comforting ointment for her burning pain.

Roger's always cared. He never makes her feel obsolete, unwanted, a mistake. He alone gives her the feeling that she's loved.

It's odd, this, given all Roger's problems, given the fact that Martina was born during the height of his struggles.

Roger was seventeen when Martina was born. She's not sure how old he is now, twenty-something, probably. She could work it out if she really tried, but arithmetic is a thorn in her side, and Martina hates it, so she doesn't bother. He's a grown-up and she's not, and that's enough to get by on for now.

Even before she'd come into the world, Roger had had problems with drink- she doesn't know what this means, exactly, but she's pieced enough together to know he can't stay away from whiskey, can barely function unless he has some, and will resort to any means he can to get it. He's been to gaol twice, just overnight both times, for rowdy behaviour in public, but even this made their parents furious beyond compare, and he's run up huge bills the likes of which require heirlooms to be sold to pay off.

And it was just when he'd landed himself in the largest of these debts- underage, too, more's the pity- that Martina's mother had found out she was pregnant.

Needless to say the prospect of another mouth to feed, another person to be looking after when Roger needed serious help, had not come as a pleasant surprise.

But oddly enough, while it becomes increasingly clear Martina's parents resent her messing up their already chaotic life, her brother never has. Indeed, Roger seems to see her as a blessing, something good coming to brighten a dark time in his life, and all the affection he can give he bestows on her gladly. He calls her 'pet', and the name is true in every sense- she's his little pet, and he adores her.

And she him. She reciprocates with every bone in her little body- how can she not? Roger's inescapably lovable, for all his problems.

And so when her brother comes into her room and asks what's wrong, she immediately climbs into his arms, lets herself be enveloped by them and the smell of stale Scotch that clings to him, and tells him everything. She chokes as she gets it all out- what she heard, what she now realises, the feeling eating away at her that she shouldn't be here, and that maybe now she wishes she never had been born, then everyone would've been better off.

'Don't talk like that, pet!' Roger scolds gently, cradling her closer. 'You were a good accident. A lucky accident.'

'That's not what Mam and Dad said,' she says flatly.

'Take no notice of them. They're a pair of old twats. They don't mean it.'

He tickles her lightly and Martina giggles in spite of herself. Roger reaches out with his thumb, brushing a tear from her eye.

'Gone red in the face, you 'ave, from all this cryin'. Don't listen to them, Martina. You were the best little accident that ever happened to me, you know. You are…' he pauses, and when he starts up again he's come over all poetic, 'a little ray of hope in my bleak life.'

'What's that mean?'

'It means that 'avin' a good little thing like you around makes me feel there's hope for me- to become less of a bad person, I mean.'

He wipes another stray tear away, takes both hands and brushes all her hair back from her face, smiling down at her. 'So don't think about it. I will always want you.'

Martina smiles back, the pain in her heart dulling a little, but still there. It won't go away- she doesn't think it can- but Roger can ease it.

Something occurs to her, though, and she frowns.

'But Rog,' she says, 'you're not a bad person.'

Her brother's laugh befuddles her. It sounds as if he doesn't believe what she's just told him, though she's certain of it herself. Someone who loves her so much can't possibly be a bad person. She doesn't realise, not now. She's far too young, far too wrapped up in the sense of peace and comfort to understand why Roger could possibly think of himself this way.

When she looks back on this evening in years to come, she'll realise just how true his words are. But she's young, so young, and he's giving her the attention she so desperately craves, and right now she just can't understand it.

She gives him a strange, quirky smile, fiddling with a stray lock of red hair that's hanging over his eyes. 'Rog?' she asks, twisting it into a knot, 'what's gambling?'

Roger studies her and then laughs again, but it's warmer this time, lacking the strange ironic edge of his chuckle over the 'bad person' comment.

'Heard that one from Dad, did you?'

Martina nods, tapping her foot against the bed post impatiently. 'Well, what is it?'

'It's basically,' Rog says slowly, tapping one foot, 'it's basically gettin' rid of all your money as fast as you can.'

She frowns. 'What for?'

A twinge of humour glints in Roger's eyes, and for a good half an hour or so Martina finds herself learning every last detail about gambling- about the different varieties of card games and table games and the appeal of each, and about making wagers in general, and a last-minute quick sentence on the fact that it apparently causes trouble, as if Roger feels obliged to tack something responsible onto the end of his lecture.

She comes out of the conversation with a good deal of new, strange knowledge and a furrowed brow, but a considerably brighter mood. Being unwanted still hurts, but it's vastly overshadowed by the feeling being with Roger gives her. She doesn't need her parents to pay attention to her. Rog will tell her anything she wants to know.

She's in enough of a good mood that when she comes downstairs at dinnertime, she gives her Dad a wry smile, asks if he prefers roulette or poker and which he's lost more money on, and gets sent straight back up to her room again without her supper.

She and Roger cackle about it for half an hour, Rog runs out and buys chips and they spend a very productive evening scoffing them and talking about her Dad's reaction, gambling and other inappropriate subjects.

Martina feels a little bit wicked, but it's a feeling she relishes. If her Mam and Dad don't want her, then she doesn't want them, either. She'll do quite well by doing the opposite of what they want.

It's a plan she sticks with for a long time, and will, in the distant future, end up regretting.

And so life goes on.

Martina goes to school in the daytime and comes home at night, just as anyone else would. She runs and plays and skips, sings occasionally, because all the other girls in her class do, though she hates the sound of her own voice compared to theirs. She reads whatever she can get her hands on, but arithmetic remains a thorn in her side, as does anything even vaguely mathematical, and she always uses her fingers to assist her when counting or adding. On most days, she'll say her best friend is Monica, who sits next to her and shares the sweets she keeps in her desk with her, on others she'll proclaim to the world that Monica is a cow and it's Caroline instead. Her favourite colour is pink, though she hates light purple with a vengeance, her favourite animal is a cat, and her favourite person in the whole wide world is her brother Roger, and she doesn't understand why people look at her so strangely when she tells them about him. She's as much a normal nearly-seven-year-old as anyone else in so many ways.

And yet in so many ways she isn't. She's set apart from the other children in her class- and not for the right reasons. She knows things they don't- she can't add to save her life but can seamlessly explain the difference between draw and stud poker and name five different brands of Scotch whiskey (her brother's favourites). She doesn't initiate friendships- she waits for people to come to her, and even then she'll take a while to decide whether or not she likes them. New people, she thinks, are bound to dislike her, and so she prefers not to risk it, chooses to isolate herself and let only a select few into her company and confidence. And, in turn, this reservedness unnerves many of the other children, leads them not to want to approach her, and so they don't, and thus her belief that she's unlikeable increases and she closes herself off even more. It's a vicious circle, one she doesn't seem to be able to break out of. People don't want her, hence people won't want her, hence she doesn't let them want her, hence they don't.

Not that she fully realises all this. It just tumbles along and over itself, and she goes along with it, sinking further into the quicksand of low self-esteem, barely noticing. There's enough misery in her life at home that she doesn't really notice a bit more of it at school, already it's becoming part of her, shaping who she is.

But all she has to do is let herself be folded in Roger's arms and she can forget all that. It doesn't matter how dull, how bleak, how self-destructive her life tends to be. It doesn't matter, so long as she has Roger.

At home, things remain constant. Money is tight, her parents are impatient, Martina gets in the way one too many times and gets told to go upstairs.

Go upstairs. That's the only thing her parents can be bothered to do with her, perhaps the only thing they can think of to do with her. Caroline's always telling Martina about all sorts of dreadful punishments she's been on the receiving end of, that she's so lucky they never happen to her, but Martina wonders about that, to be honest. Being told to go upstairs is tantamount to being told to get out of the way- she can't see any difference at all. And it's not as if she wants anything particularly dreadful to happen to her, it's just she's getting bored of hearing the same thing, of being pushed aside rather than paid attention to or dealt with. Some variety might be nice, occasionally.

She sits on the landing, bored out of her mind. Roger frequents the pub more and more these days, and so until he gets home, she has to make her own entertainment. She goes into her bedroom, finishes her homework, giving up on arithmetic and deciding she'll take the consequences tomorrow for not having done it, and staring for twenty minutes at a blank page at the top of which is written 'when I grow up' in her shaky handwriting. She's supposed to have finished this essay by tomorrow, but in all honesty, Martina doesn't know where to start. Her friends all have dreams, glittering aspirations of the sort all children have. They want to do great things, be significant, be famous, even if that might seem completely impossible. Martina has listened to each one, and then blurted a 'that's not gonna happen.' She's not particularly popular at the moment among her classmates for this, but that doesn't bother her.

She doesn't know anyone who's become a singer or an actress or some kind of rich royal. The people around her are holding down jobs that barely pay the rent. The people she knows are gambling or drinking to escape their troubles, and though her family are managing to stay above water, what with both her parents working, they'll never make enough to live really, really comfortably. Martina isn't sure exactly what she's expecting in her future, but it's not going to be the stuff of fairytales. And no-one's ever told her otherwise.

She's only seven, and already she's cynical beyond her years.

She stares at the paper for twenty minutes more, then picks up her pencil and writes a slow, careful sentence.

I don't know what I want to do.

'Heatin' bill's nearly doubled since last time,' Martina's dad grumbles, slapping a sheet of paper down on the table.

Martina slowly raises her head from her plate, chewing on a piece of carrot and wondering whether this is worth listening to or not.

Her mother rolls her eyes. 'Not at the dinner table, Geoffrey.'

'Why not? Don't know how many more bloody dinners we'll be able to afford, if things keep goin' like this. We'll all starve soon enough. Nearly doubled, it 'as!'

Martina drops her fork to her plate. What does he mean, they won't be able to afford to eat anymore? What does he mean, they'll all starve soon enough?

'I heard you, dear,' her Mam says in a bored tone. 'You've already played that one. And Martina, get that expression off yer face. He's overreactin', he is. We're not gonna starve.'

Martina wasn't aware she was wearing any sort of odd facial expression, let alone how to wipe whichever one she supposedly has off, so she settles for blinking a few times and returning to her dinner with ferocity. She keeps her eyes off her parents, sensing that if she continues to stare she'll probably be banished upstairs, but she keeps her ears open.

'Although if he's really that concerned about starvin', he'll stop throwin' away 'is money as soon as 'e earns it,' her Mam mutters, a remark clearly not intended for her ears but aimed at her father's.

'Oh, we're back ter that again, are we?' her Dad fairly shouts, slamming his cutlery down. 'How many times do I 'ave ter tell you, I'm not throwin' it all away! I made a couple o' bad investments-'

'Oh, yeah, makin' ridiculous wagers with people you know always beat you- that's an 'investment' if ever I 'eard o' one…'

'Well, it wouldn't matter if I made the odd bet with the odd mate if we brought more money into this 'ouse…and if the bills didn't keep goin' up.'

'Dare to dream, Geoff.'

'It's about time Roger got 'imself a bloody job- we wouldn't be strugglin' if we didn't 'ave to supply 'im with drink… '

Martina raises her eyes again, pursing her lips. Her fear has been replaced with anger- her Dad always seems to do this. He blames Roger whenever times get tough, and she can't stand to hear it. She's debating saying something when the front door bangs open on his hinges.

'Any dinner left?' a voice echoes through the house. Talk of the devil.

Roger catches Martina's eye as he wanders into the kitchen, and she does her utmost to warn him they've got it in for him, gesturing with her hands and hastily shoving them under the table when her mother's head turns in her direction.

'I won't bother to ask where you've been,' her Dad snaps. He's worked himself up into a temper now. 'Been drinkin' away the family's money as usual, 'ave you?'

Roger makes a face in Martina's direction. She pokes her tongue out at him in sympathy.

'Don't you look at 'er- ' her father growls at Roger, 'and Martina, I can see you over there!' He puts his face in his hands. 'Gonna ruin me, the pair o' you.'

Roger clenches his fists. 'What are you gettin' at 'er for?'

'You, her- her, you- you're thick as thieves, you two. She's livin' off your influence, you know- maybe if you got a job, stopped drainin' all our money, made somethin' useful of yerself there might be hope for 'er!'

Martina can't believe what she's hearing. Roger looks stung, as if he's been whacked in the face with a wooden plank.

She's not having this.

'What are you gettin' at 'im for?' she shouts, aware she's copying Roger's expression. 'Just because you can't pay the heat and throw your money away on bad wager-investments, you don't 'ave ter start bein' nasty ter my brother, and-'

'Martina, be quiet!' her Dad thunders. 'And shut your gob about things you don't understand.'

'I understand well enough, thank-' Martina begins, but some rather terrifying stares come her way and she does indeed shut her gob.

'You see what you've created? Where'd you think she gets this disrespect from?' Her father's turned on Roger again. 'If you weren't such a bad influence, fillin' 'er 'ead with all sorts o' rubbish and teachin' her to talk back to 'er parents, turnin' 'er into a right little terror…'

She knows she'll be in trouble, but she just can't have this. 'Roger's not a bad influence!'

'I told you to shut yer gob!'

'No! Not until you-'

'Just leave it, pet,' Roger says.

Her mouth falls open. She raises a finger, but Roger just stares at her sadly, and she meekly desists.

Her parents give Roger meaningful looks, and he nods slowly. 'I see. She takes notice o' me.'

'She does, yeah,' her mam says. 'Think on that.'

'I'll 'ave another look for a job in the morning,' Roger says, sitting down, his voice flat and quiet. 'I'm sorry. I'll be a better influence on 'er from now on.'

Martina grimaces into her dinner, hating the remorse in his voice. He shouldn't have to be sorry, she thinks. It's their fault, not his.

'Whatcha readin'?' Martina asks, coming to sit beside Roger and snatching the magazine from his hands. He blanches, trying to grab it back.

'I don't think Mam and Dad would like it if they saw me showin' you that…'

Martina studies the picture for about three seconds and frowns. 'Why isn't this woman dressed?' she demands.

Roger wrings his hands, bites his lip. 'She's…er, she's not supposed to be.'

Martina scowls. 'Why?'

'That's her appeal, you see,' Roger says. 'Blokes generally like to look at that sort of thing.'

'Oh,' says Martina, tossing the magazine back to him. She's lost interest in it fairly quickly. 'That's a bit stupid, if you ask me.'

She doesn't understand why, but Roger is intensely amused by this remark.

'Yeah,' he says, wiping his eyes to rid them of the tears of laughter, 'I suppose it is.'

Martina shakes her head and doesn't understand what's gotten into him.

'Is this one o' those 'bad influence' things?'

Roger laughs again, and Martina narrows her eyes, getting just a tiny bit annoyed that he's not taking any of this seriously.

'What?' she demands. 'Honestly, Rog, what?'

Roger just goes on chuckling, opening his arms to her. 'One o' those 'bad influence things,' he mimics, hugging her close and kissing the top of her head. 'Yeah, pet. Suppose it is.' He pauses, reconsiders. 'It definitely is.'

He shifts her in his lap, turning her around to face him and looking very seriously into her eyes, 'Martina, what you 'ave ter realise, sweetheart, is that…well,' he wrings his hands, 'you do know, don't you, that I 'ave problems- a lot o' problems, but especially problems with drink?'

She scoffs. 'Yeah.'

Martina holds his gaze. She's seen this with her parents- when her Mam and her Dad are having one of their not-so-rare arguments, her mother tends to stare very sternly at her husband until he backs down. It's quite a useful technique, she thinks, and she's tried it out on a couple of her friends at school when they've insisted on playing some game or other that she despises. And right now, the most wonderful thing in the world would be to hear Roger take it back and tell her that no, he's not really a 'bad influence'. She knows there's something not quite right about him, sometimes, that he's had problems in his life. She's heard that from her parents, she's heard that from Rog himself, she's overheard it being said by various family members and friends of the family. But what harm does that really do? Roger has never hurt anyone, has he? He's certainly never hurt her, anyway. He's always been there, talked to her, answered her questions. He cares, and like he said, he'll always want her.

So she doesn't want to hear any more.

Roger just takes her face in his hands. 'Don't do that, 'Tina. Makes you look like a right frosty-faced old woman. Now listen to me, okay?'

She sighs dramatically, taps her foot but sits back in his arms, reluctantly conceding to hear what he has to say.

'Well…it's just that…when you've got a problem with drink, it means…it means often you can't stop 'avin' it, and it makes you worse…and the worse you get, the more you want it, even when it's makin' you, er…worse…'

'I do know that,' Martina says. 'I do know some things, you know.' Her mam and dad may not talk to her a lot, but they have taught her the bare bones of a few things by this stage, and warning Martina not to go down the same path as Roger has been a frequent occurrence of late. Probably because they want to make her useful, or something along those lines, but Martina won't say that, because she doesn't want them to know she was listening that day.

'Well, it's just that someone like me…there's a school o' thought that says people like me shouldn't be havin' dealin's with children. They think you might- well, copy me, and then you'll get hurt.'

Martina hums and ponders this. He does bad things occasionally. He's never done anything bad to her. And anyway, she likes Roger. She loves Roger. That 'school of thought', whatever that is, probably stuffy professors or something, she thinks, because she doesn't understand the expression, can go away and never come back. She doesn't care.

'You're not all that bad,' she says.

He makes a face.

'Rog, make me a promise,' she says, building up the stern glare once again.

'Look, 'Tina…'

'Rog-er…'

He looks at her in disbelieving mirth. 'Go on then, mother. What d'you want me to promise?'

'That even if you're a bad lot- and you're not,' she says, pouting at him to stop him protesting, 'you still won't leave me.'

'Oh, Martina,' Roger hugs her tighter. 'I already promised you that, pet! I'll always want you, I told you that, didn't I? You are a little ray…'

'Of hope in yer bleak life, I know.' She shakes her head and hears Roger chuckle once again. 'What?'

'Oh, don't worry, pet. It's just the way you talk sometimes- you just sound like the ladies down the dole, that's all.'

Martina picks up on the new word immediately. 'What's the dole?' she asks, and settles down against him to hear another of his fascinating explanations.

It's cold and windy outside in the playground, and Martina's not running around like the others, preferring to try and get warm by sitting in a huddle against the wall of the building, coat and scarf wrapped as tightly as they'll go, head bent over her knees in a feeble attempt to protect her face from the whipping wind.

Monica comes up beside her, and Martina budges over so she can sit down.

'Aren't you joining in?'

'No,' Martina says, staring straight ahead.

Monica puts her hands on her hips. 'Why not?'

'Don't feel like it.'

'You never feel like it.'

She does have a point. Martina feels less and less inclined these days to join in anyone else's games. They all seem stupid and pathetic to her, full of all those dreams she doesn't have, and it bores her to have to pretend to be a princess or twirl a skipping-rope again and again. She'd rather not.

'You're so boring these days,' Monica says.

'Well, why don't you go and talk to someone who's not borin'?' Martina snaps. She's fed up with being criticised- nearly everyone in her class has had a go at her for something along the same lines lately, not to mention the usual comments she's been getting at home, and all this, in addition to being admonished for receiving some very bad exam results this term, has put her in a foul mood. She certainly doesn't need this from her best friend, too.

'Well, why don't you liven up?' Monica retorts.

Martina growls. 'Go away.' She elbows her friend sharply, shuffling away toward the far corner of the wall and her own little cave of solitude. She just wants to be alone- she's sick of being pestered.

'You're a cow,' says Monica. 'I don't like you- I don't want to be your friend anymore.'

'All right by me,' Martina says, hunching closer around her knees and glaring at her from behind her arms. 'I don't like you either. You're a stupid cow- and you're annoyin'.'

Monica just turns and stomps away, and Martina watches her go.

'And you're the one that's borin'!' she shouts after her. And good riddance, too.

But after a few more minutes of sitting on her own in the cold, Martina feels a small sadness descend on her.

They've had rows before, about anything and everything, and they've called each other all sorts of terrible names (well, terrible by a seven-year-old's standard, perhaps not in the eyes of the rest of the world), and Martina's rarely distressed by an insult or two, but something she said this time sticks with her and gnaws its way into her inside.

I don't like you. People don't normally say that to her, but they make the words quite plain in other ways, and all she can think is not another one. Well, if people don't like her, she's not going to like them. She folds her arms tighter and sulks, letting the sadness morph into anger.

It's silly and trivial- cut from the same cloth as the hundreds of fights between children that occur every day, sometimes several times a day, over the most petty of issues, but while the tendency is for these sorts of things to be patched up quite quickly, Martina holds onto her resentment. She's not going to forgive her friend for this.

She resolutely avoids looking at her, going so far as to attempt to angle her desk away, and being dressed down by her teacher for being 'so ridiculous.'

The days wear on, and she keeps to herself, occasionally turning to one of her few other friends, but mostly ignoring everyone around her.

Maybe this is just the way the world works. Maybe she's just not the sort of person people like.

But Roger likes her. Roger adores her.

Either he's wrong, or she's just trying to please the wrong people. She hasn't decided which yet.

She never really does, entirely.

Her parents are in the kitchen, rowing about something or other- no surprise there. Martina's lying on her stomach in front of the fire, staring at a large page of sums, willing them to go away with her glare, trying to put off having to attempt them for as long as possible. She squints at the first one, trying to remember what she's supposed to do, humming two choruses of a random song off the radio to try and procrastinate a bit further, and then she sighs, picks up her pencil and presses it so hard to the page that the lead immediately snaps.

The phone rings, and she fairly leaps up from the floor to get it. Saved.

'Hello?'

''Tina, is that you?'

'Rog?'

'Yeah, it's me, pet- listen, I need…'

'Are you at the pub?' Martina interjects. She doesn't know why he's phoned home- normally he doesn't bother, but if it can get her out of doing that ghastly homework for a while longer she won't question it, just take this golden opportunity and chat to him for as long as possible.

'No, I'm not- sweetheart, I need you to put Mam or Dad on for me.'

Oh. Martina's face falls. 'Why?'

' 'Tina, please just-'

'You could tell me and I could tell them later,' she says hopefully.

'Look, Martina, this is serious, please, just get Mam or Dad.' His voice is odd, and, confused and a little bit miffed, she puts the receiver to one side and psyches herself up to walk into the kitchen and into the battlefield.

The row has died down by now, but the atmosphere is incredibly unpleasant. Her mother's over by the stove, stirring something with a vengeance, her wooden spoon clicking against the side of the pan in a ferocious rhythm, and her Dad is just sitting there, shrouded in a silence and stillness that Martina finds even more dangerous. She stands in the middle of the room for a moment, eyes darting from one to the other, sizing each of them up and trying to decide which one she can annoy without landing herself in hot water.

'Are you just gonna gawk, or was there something in particular you wanted?' her father demands from his place at the table, and Martina jumps and finds her voice.

'Roger's on the phone.'

Her dad gets abruptly out of the chair and stalks out of the room to take the call.

The kitchen is silent, other than the sound of her mother stirring away- and the constant click-clicking is getting on Martina's nerves. With a deft glance in her direction, she crosses the floor and cranes her head round the door, trying to hear what's going on.

'Un-bloody-believable!' comes a shout from the other room. She flinches, and then leans in again, wondering just what Roger's done now.

'Martina, don't eavesdrop.'

She ignores her mother. Her dad is really giving Roger what-for over the telephone, mingling a lot of rather harsh-sounding words she's never heard the likes of before with refrains of and why should we 'elp you out?

'Martina Pamela Shirley McKenna, I mean it- I'll send you upstairs.'

Martina grumbles, but she moves an inch or two away from the door. The last thing she needs right now is to be banished up there- she wouldn't be able to hear a word. She trudges across and sits down at the table, straining her ears and shutting her eyes, because she's been taught at school that apparently you can hear better if you do so.

'Oh, well, that's it, that takes the bloody biscuit!' Not that she needs to. No sooner has she positioned herself than her father's storming back in, red in the face and fists clenched so tightly they're practically going purple.

'Geoff,' her mother mutters, jerking her head in Martina's direction.

'Oh, what does it matter? She's no doubt heard worse from that idiot son of ours- what d'you think he's done now, eh?'

'Well, you're obviously intent on tellin' me,' her mam replies, 'so what's the point in me guessin'?'

'I'll tell you what he's done,' her dad goes on, 'I'll bloody well tell you, love- 'e's gone and got 'imself slung in the nick!'

Martina freezes. Her mother, however, just sighs, not in the least bit surprised or shocked. 'Unruly behaviour again, was it?'

'If only. No, our son 'as graduated to a new low- he's been buyin' and sellin' bloody stolen record players now!'

'Well, you were the one 'oo said 'e needed ter start makin' a livin' fer 'imself…'

'I 'ad somethin' honest in mind!'

'Oh, yeah, because gamblin's an honest way o' tryin' ter get money, isn't it?'

'Oh, you're back ter that again, aren't you? You're back to that again!' he turns on her, breathing through his teeth. A few seconds pass in which they do nothing but glare, and Martina thinks she might say something, if she could think of something to say. She's still processing all this. Roger in gaol. Stolen record players. Roger wouldn't have known they were stolen, would he?

Her Dad breaks eye contact first, clasping his hands behind his back and pacing the width of the kitchen.

'e wants us ter bail 'im out- the nerve of 'im!'

She has no idea what that means, but Martina isn't liking this conversation one bit. She sits, rooted to her chair, biting her nails and hanging onto every word.

'Well, we're gonna have to, love.'

'Why not? It's 'is own fault- and serve 'im right! Leave 'im in gaol to rot!'

'You can't!' Martina screams, the words leaving her mouth before she knows she's going to say them, on her feet without realising she's gotten up.

Her mam just rolls her eyes. ' 'e's not goin' to, Martina. He's not goin' to.'

'And why should I 'elp 'im out?'

'Oh, I'll remember you sayin' this when you next 'ave a debt ter pay and you come grovellin' to me fer money.'

Her Dad's eyes flash ferociously, and then he growls, kicking one of the chairs. 'Fine, then. I'll go down the police station and bail the idiot out- but be it on your 'ead.'

He marches across the kitchen, aiming a filthy scowl at Martina's mother as he passes her.

Martina follows him, unsure why she's doing so, still unsure, as a matter of fact, just what's going on. All she can comprehend is that Roger is in gaol, that there's some bail thing that has to be done, that her dad has to do it or he might be stuck there for good.

She wants to ask him what's going to happen, but he brushes her aside as she comes close.

'Martina, get out of the way!' he snaps, snatching his coat up from the hook and flinging the back door open as he strides outside.

Roger arrives home to disapproving stares. He pushes past his parents, ignoring the lectures they try to throw up at him, and ascends the stairs, pausing to kiss the top of Martina's head as she comes onto the landing to greet him.

'Do you have to go back to prison?' she demands.

'No,' he says wearily, and turns to retreat into his bedroom. Martina's not letting him fob her off so easily. She follows him, tugs on his sleeve.

'So? What 'appened?'

' Dad bailed me out.'

'What's that mean, then?'

'It means…' Roger shrugs one shoulder, figuring out how to put it. 'It means they paid money to the police station so I could go home- at least until me court case.'

'Like a bribe?'

'No, no, not a bribe,' Roger says. 'You're allowed to do this-it's different.'

'But how exactly?'

'Oh, I don't know, pet. They offer it. You give a certain amount of money and you can go home instead of staying in prison- just until you go to court, that is. You still have to 'ave yer trial- you can still get sentenced, but you get to stay at home until then. If you've paid, that is.'

'Sounds like a bribe to me.'

Roger gives her a funny look. 'How'd you even know about bribes?'

'You told me about 'em,' she says pointedly.

'Oh, yeah. So I did.'

She pauses. 'You sold stolen record players, Dad said.'

'Yeah.'

'You didn't steal them, did you?'

He shakes his head, and she exhales with relief. Of course he wouldn't.

'Bought 'em off a bloke down the pub. He said I could get a good price for 'em- you know, buy 'em off him and sell 'em for double what I paid. You can make good money doin' that. I've got mates who've made it work.'

'Oh,' says Martina, not fully understanding. 'But you- you didn't know they were stolen, did you?'

He doesn't answer.

'Did you?' she says again.

Roger closes his eyes. 'Look, I might have suspected, pet…'

'Oh.'

Roger slumps against the wall, and she reaches out and tugs at his sleeve.

'You really are a bad lot, aren't you?' Martina asks solemnly.

Roger nods, a sad smile on his face. ' 'Fraid so, kid.'

Martina ponders this for a while.

'I don't care,' she announces at last.

Roger looks even sadder. 'You probably should.'

Martina's learned a new word. Sarcasm.

It took her a little while to get her head around it when she came across it in her book, a few attempts to spell when she wrote it down (though, no, she refused to simply copy it out her book- if something's worth doing she's going to do it properly) and she struggled a little through the dictionary definition, eventually slamming it shut, hurling it and going to ask Roger for a more practical explanation, but at last she's grasped the concept.

Sarcasm. She likes the way it sounds in her mouth. Sar-caz-um. She likes everything it connotes- it fairly screams her name. From what she's pieced together, people use it when they're trying to put others down, when said others say or do something particularly stupid, and the concept appeals to some twisted part of Martina's mind. Her first few attempts at it aren't particularly successful. It's hard to differentiate it from merely saying no to a question and sounding a little on the nasty side, but if she needs to see it in practice, all she has to do is watch her parents argue for a few minutes. Her mam, she realises, uses it frequently, generally when retaliating to something her father's said (oh, yeah, because gamblin's a brilliant way of makin' money, isn't it, love? No, love, I'm sayin' you should keep wastin' our money, because it's so lovely 'avin' ter struggle to pay every single bill…) and she repeats each example in her head, trying to rework and apply it to a situation in her own life.

When she does manage to use it successfully, though, it happens without her even realising what she's doing.

It's during a particularly difficult maths class, and Martina, rather than swallowing her pride and asking for help on the problem she's been stuck on for the last twenty minutes, just rubs her forehead and fumes, getting more and more worked up until in a fit of frustration she viciously scrunches the paper up in her hands.

'What do you think you're doing, young lady?' comes the shocked voice of her teacher, who's beside her desk in a matter of seconds and crossly taking the crumpled wad of paper from her. 'Do you have an issue with the set task, Miss McKenna?'

'No, sir, I did that because I was enjoyin' meself, o' course,' she says irritably, and gets thwacked with a ruler for her insolence.

Martina sits there with her lips pressed to her knuckles, mulling the incident over. She's astounded by how naturally the words spilled from her mouth when she wasn't thinking about it, and as she reflects on her success, she smirks into the back of her hand.

It comes easily to her after that.

'Eh,' Monica says one day, approaching her, as she usually does nowadays, to taunt her, 'is it true your brother got arrested the other week for flogging stolen gear?'

Martina smiles dangerously. 'Is it any o' your business?'

'You know,' Monica holds her gaze, 'if you weren't such a cow to me all the time, I might still have wanted ter be friends with you.'

Martina's eyes rotate in their sockets. 'I'm heartbroken.'

'I mean it. We could've been great mates- if you hadn't been so mean- and so borin' all the time…'

'Such a shame, love,' Martina says, 'such a shame.'

Monica screws up her nose, and then gives up. 'I'm gonna go away from you now.'

'I'll try not ter cry,' Martina says, and turns her back on her.

She might be overusing her newfound skill now, but it's a novelty, and, she's discovered, quite a good defence against those who try to make her feel useless.

And, all that aside, she's surprisingly good at it.

And so, with the concept of sarcasm under her belt, her life goes on.

When Martina is nine, she tastes whiskey for the first time. It is, of course, Roger's doing.

'Eh. 'Tina,' he whispers, and she gets up from where she's seated at the foot of the stairs, looks up and sees him crouched on the landing, beckoning to her. 'Want to see something good?'

As soon as the words leave his mouth she knows whatever he wants to show her is wrong, is inappropriate, is something her parents would tell her to avoid. But she's a child, and the idea of getting away with something with her big brother, with Roger, who's so bad and yet she hero-worships all the same, is enticing. It's all fuel for an inquisitive young mind, and so she immediately and without question follows him upstairs.

She's never been inside Roger's room before, has never been allowed, and the instant she steps over the threshold she's nearly knocked over backwards by the overpowering smell. It reminds her of when they walk past a pub, only much worse. Martina suddenly feels very dizzy.

Roger grins at her conspiratorially, and despite how she's feeling, she grins back, because this seems exciting and wonderfully naughty and she's glimpsing a world she's heard enough about but has never really been permitted to understand.

He reaches under the bed and pulls out a bottle in a paper bag.

'Grab me those glasses over there,' he instructs, and she fumbles around on the dresser until she finds what he means- two grimy shot-glasses, the remains of whatever was last in them stuck to the bottom. She examines them in mildly disgusted curiosity before handing them over.

'Are we gonna get drunk?'

'Of course not,' Roger says. 'I just thought you might want a little taste.'

Martina's a little bit disappointed, and at the same time a little bit relieved. She considers. Roger might be a bit of a bad lot, have some silly ideas sometimes, but he'd never hurt her. She trusts him.

'Okay.'

He pours out barely an eighth of an inch into the bottom of her glass, fills his to the brim and clinks them.

'There you go. Don't tell Mam and Dad, will you?'

'Of course not,' Martina says, looking at him like he's a total pillock, 'I don't tell them anything.'

Roger downs his in one big gulp. Martina gazes at her few drops of whiskey, shrugs and does the same.

It burns.

She yelps and splutters, drops the glass to the ground.

Well, that's certainly not what she was expecting. It always looks so golden and nice, does whiskey, and from the amount of it Roger consumes she'd imagined it must taste incredibly delicious (oh, she's not stupid, she knows alcohol's addictive, but nothing can be that addictive without some other good qualities as well, her nine-year-old mind reasons). It doesn't really taste of anything except perhaps wood pulp, not that she's really concentrating on the taste, because all she can register is the fire going down her throat and chest and into her belly.

'Rog,' she coughs, 'that's awful!' She shudders, shudders again and screws up her face. 'Why would you want ter be addicted to this?'

Roger laughs. 'It's not exactly somethin' I chose, pet- it just sort o' happened.'

She wipes her mouth against the back of her sleeve, shaking her head at him.

'Well, now you know what it's like,' Roger says, putting on that serious voice he sometimes attempts when he's lecturing her on something or other.

'Why did you let me…'

'I think, pet, that sometimes the best way to learn about things is to experience 'em first hand. You're gettin' old enough to start knowin' things, and…'

'Er, I thought I already knew things,' Martina interjects.

'Well, yeah, but…'

'You always tell me things…'

'Oh, stop it, you, I'm tryin' to make a point. Now listen,' he kneels beside her, straightening the collar on her blouse, smoothing back a strand of hair that's come loose from her plait, 'the thing is, I was never allowed any alcohol when I was young, and then the instant I came of age I went out and got absolutely bladdered.'

She stares at him quizzically.

'It means drunk,' he clarifies. 'And I mean badly drunk. See, not bein' allowed any made me want it more badly, and so I abused it when I had the chance, and I think that's what might've made me…'

'What you are today,' she finishes. So far he makes good sense.

'Exactly, pet. Exactly. And I just thought that maybe if you did have a little, if you didn't feel deprived, well, you wouldn't be tempted to do the same.'

'I see.' And she does. What he's saying works. And, to be honest, now she has had some, she doesn't feel like having any more. If that's what drinking's like, that disgusting, burning experience, then she's not keen to take it up as a habit. She can still taste that whiskey in her mouth, a bit. Ugh, it is nasty stuff.

Even so, as she watches her big brother pour himself another glass, she's overcome with the enticement to ask him something, just to see what his reaction is.

She gives him a wily smile. 'Can I have another glass, then?'

Roger hesitates.

'Er,' he says, tugging at a lock of his hair, 'pet, I don't think…I thought you said you didn't like it!'

Martina recognises at once that he's trying to change the subject, that he's terribly uncomfortable. She squints evilly at him.

'I thought you said it was better if I didn't feel deprived,' she teases.

The worry fades from Roger's features, and he laughs, mussing her hair. 'You are a wicked little thing sometimes.' He puts his glass to one side, kneels on the floor and rifles around under his bed again, retrieving two different bottles. 'Tell you what, we won't try any more today- enough is enough for one day- but I'll tell you about the different types, if you like.'

Well, that's fair enough, she supposes. She sits down on the floor beside him, and he takes her through a few brands, explaining what makes particular varieties popular or famous. He explains a bit about other types of alcohol, too- wine, beer, all the usual suspects, most of which she knows about, and tells her about the different alcoholic content in each one, about how some are more concentrated than others, and thus can't be drunk in such large quantities. And, though quite a bit of it goes over her head, Martina tries to take it in all the same.

They sit there for who knows how long, and Martina starts to get sleepy, even though it surely can't be later than six. She should probably get up and go now, she thinks- she still has homework to do, and she can't go another evening without working on it at all, much as she'd like to just go to bed now- but as she stands, something catches her eye.

'What's that?' she asks, pointing at a rather oddly-shaped black bottle in the corner of the room. Roger follows her gaze, and then frowns.

'Oh, that. That's home brew, that is. A mate o' mine tried to make his own Scotch.'

'Is that one any good?'

Roger shakes his head comically. 'Nooo, it's complete crap, that one. He 'ad no idea what 'e was doin'- it's not distilled properly, and its alcoholic content's about twice what it should be. That's an under-the-table one, pet, at the very least. Don't ever touch it.'

He says these last four words so sternly, so strictly that Martina doesn't know what to make of them. They're so unlike him, and so out-of-keeping with everything he just said about experiencing things first-hand to avoid excess in the future.

'Roger!' comes a call from downstairs, and she's prevented from asking any more on the subject. Both of them freeze. Martina can feel her heart thumping, wondering just what would happen if they got caught doing all this.

'Telephone for you!' their dad yells up, and both McKenna siblings let out identical sighs of relief. 'It's one of your bloody mates!'

'I'd better take this,' Rog says, making a grunting noise as he gets up off the floor, 'now you go and brush yer teeth so there's no Scotch on yer breath, all right? And don't tell anyone about this.'

'Oh, yeah, because this'd be a wonderful thing ter tell me teachers,' she says, slipping in her obligatory once-daily-or-more use of sarcasm just because she can. Roger just tuts, pats her on the back and heads out to answer the phone.

Martina groans, stretches and starts to pull herself onto her feet, but as she does, her gaze is dragged back to the corner, as if by a magnet, towards that forbidden bottle.

Roger's never told her no before. Her parents have. Her teachers have. But never Roger. And at nine, she's still just immature enough to take his order not to touch it as a challenge.

So naturally she touches it. Naturally she drinks some of it, just because Roger's Roger, and he isn't allowed to tell her no. It's against the rules. Roger doesn't forbid her to do things. She just wants a sip, that's all, but the bottle is heavy, and as she tilts the neck toward her lips it tilts, and it gushes into her mouth before she can stop it.

'Urrgh!' Martina gargles, spitting, but unable to stop a fair bit going down her throat. She leans against the dresser, her oesophagus on fire, reluctantly swallowing, because the only other alternative is to choke on it. Oh, that's awful. Horrible. How much did she just drink?

It's a few moments after she swallows a good deal of the substance that something starts to happen.

Martina can't really describe it- her balance just disappears, the room lurching around, and she whirls her head around, confused, wondering when Roger's bedroom suddenly turned into a boat. She can feel her cheeks heating up, and her breath's coming out her mouth in shallow pants. She drops the bottle to the ground and clutches at her throat with both hands, wondering why it feels so tight, wondering why, why can't she think straight, why is it that she so desperately wants to be sick but it isn't happening?

'Hey, pet, I was just gonna- Martina?!'

Roger's face turns to horror as he comes through the door and beholds her there- Heaven knows what she must look like.

'What did you do?'

'I feel sick.'

'What did you do?'

'Rog…' Martina says weakly, her vision blurring, and she sees the eyes of two Rogers widen as he pieces together what's happened.

'I told you not to!' he hollers, snatching the bottle off the floor from where she's dropped it, his voice amusingly high for a bloke of his age, only Martina's not alert enough to really notice. She's slipping away from consciousness, everything's spinning, it's nauseatingly awful and she wants to let go but at the same time, she's frightened- she wants to climb back out of whatever's trying to drag her down.

'You never tell me not to,' she protests weakly.

'Well maybe that might suggest to your thick little brain that when I do, I mean it!' He paces, and the whole room seems to tilt with him. She lets her eyes start to shut.

'No, 'Tina, don't,' he's shaking her, trying to hold her upright but his voice is becoming murky, sort of underwater-sounding, and he's got multiple heads blurring out of focus and then back into one again. Martina manages to throw up all over him before she passes out.

She wakes to bright light and strange noises.

Martina tries to sit up. Her throat hurts more than she can ever remember- and she's had some bad colds in her time. She feels empty- completely hollowed out, and yet she's got the most insistent urge to vomit, despite feeling like she's got nothing to vomit out.

She leans over the edge of the bed to give in to the urge and then shuts her eyes again.

She wakes again, this time with a disgusting burnt taste in her mouth, to nurses and her mother and father standing over her, the latter two looking more terrified than she would have thought possible. She raises her head from her pillow, coming to her senses and realising she's in hospital. That would explain the harsh light, the sort of antiseptic smell, the nurse standing on one side of her bed, glaring at her, her forehead tarnished with line after line after line.

Martina manages to push herself into a sitting position, wincing at the discomfort and nausea that accompany the movement.

'Martina,' her mother's voice comes out strange, sort of squeaky and husky at the same time, and she sits down by her side, putting one hand on her back. The gesture confuses her a little bit.

She opens her mouth, trying to drag words up past the hideous soreness- her throat could have been sandpapered for all she knows-and after a few attempts, manages to find her voice.

'What…' she begins, then changes her mind. 'Where…why…' she can't really think of something appropriate to say.

'You've 'ad yer stomach pumped,' her dad says, and she looks down at the starched blankets covering her lap, trying to register this and comprehend it somehow. Whatever was in that brew of Roger's mate's, it was pretty dangerous stuff. Whiskey seems like dangerous stuff- she's never going to touch it again, that's for certain. Perhaps Roger's little lesson, his attempt to stop her from becoming addicted like him, worked after all, she thinks. She almost laughs at the idea.

'Drink this,' instructs the nurse, handing her a paper cup full of absolutely vile-looking black liquid.

'What is it?'

'Just do it, Martina,' comes her mam's voice, but she's not going to have this filthy stuff foisted on her without an explanation.

'What is it?' she repeats.

The nurse looks annoyed at her impertinence. 'It's activated charcoal,' she says, pressing it more firmly into her hand and trying to force her to tip it up to her face, 'it'll absorb any poison still in your system.'

'Charcoal?' Martina wrinkles her nose. 'Why don't I just go and lick a fireplace?'

The nurse looks absolutely infuriated now, but her parents just exchange glances- they're used to her dry, disrespectful attitude.

'Martina,' her mam says quietly, 'just drink it.'

She's never felt particularly obliged to follow the few instructions her elders dish out, but her mother isn't instructing her, she seems to be pleading with her, and Martina decides that she's done enough disobeying for one day. That's what got her into this mess in the first place- if she'd just done what Roger said, she wouldn't have to be in here drinking the disgusting charcoal.

Apprehensively, she takes a sip, and immediately retches.

It's revolting- even worse than it looks, thick and chalky and muddy and just…ugh. She doesn't think she can possibly get any more down, but the nurse threatens to put a tube down her nose and give it to her that way if she doesn't take it like a good girl, and so, with that horrid woman and both her parents standing over her, she forces herself to swallow the entire cup, then another, then another. It's practically putting her in tears, having to endure mouthful after mouthful, and it sticks to her palate and her tongue, clags in between her teeth, but she endures it nonetheless, mulishly determined not to have that cow of a nurse come anywhere near her nose.

When at last she's satisfied that Martina's had enough, the aforementioned cow says a few curt words to her parents and clacks away, leaving her alone with them.

'I hope you've learned something from this,' says her dad. Martina nods. Not just something. Several things. She's exhausted now, though, and actually listing them would be far too much effort right now.

'Good,' says her father, reaching out and awkwardly rubbing her shoulder. 'I'll come back and check on you later- I've got ter get down the bettin' shop. There's a dead cert runnin' in the two thirty- and we need the money.'

Martina can practically feel her mother rolling her eyes at him as she leaves. She stares after him, trying to remember a time when she's ever heard him speak so softly to her, in such a friendly tone. She can't.

She supposes she can hardly talk about a normal situation, given that today (if it is still today and not tomorrow) she's drunk whiskey, had her stomach pumped and drunk charcoal from a cup, but that…that is just odd.

It gets odder, though.

The moment he's out the room, her mam wraps her arms around her, cradling her like she's never done before. Martina can only remember one incident in her life when she's been hugged by her mother- and she'd been in a strangely good mood that day. Most of the affection she receives in that department comes from her brother.

But now her mam's holding her like she's about to disappear.

'Don't you ever do that again, Martina, not ever, do you understand?'

'Are you angry?' Martina asks, her mouth buried in her shoulder, utterly befuddled.

'Not angry, Martina- just frightened. Just don't you ever…what was your brother thinkin'? What kind of…how anyone could even consider gettin' a nine-year-old girl drunk like that…'

'Wasn't his fault,' Martina tries to explain, but she's not allowed to get further than that.

'I just can't believe it…this is a nightmare- just you keep out of his room from now on, do you hear me? And just…just don't ever do this again!'

Her rant lasts for several minutes, is incredibly repetitive, and is quite welcomed by Martina, who just leans against her mam's shoulder and listens to it, pondering. These aren't the words of someone who doesn't want you- these sentiments, these expressions of fear of losing her, they aren't the sort of things you'd say to someone you wished didn't exist. And Martina considers that maybe she…no, that'd be a stretch. She's not going to leap to any conclusions she'll regret, isn't going to change her mind about her family so easily.

But it does give her a lot to think about.

'I am so, so sorry, kid,' Roger says the instant she's brought home, crushing her in one of the most uncomfortably tight embraces of her life. He's crying- something she's never even imagined of him, let alone seen before.

'I shouldn't have done that- I thought I was doin' the right thing, tryin' ter teach you about life, but I nearly killed you- oh, Martina, I'm so sorry…'

Martina's a little bit cross about the whole affair, about the being sick and about the hospital and having her stomach pumped and all, but all the attention she finds she rather liked. And though she's not going to get herself chucked in there again just to get fussed over (she's not that stupid) she thinks, all in all, it was a pretty interesting experience. She learned a few things.

For one, not to touch the stuff Roger has in his room.

But for another, perhaps more importantly, that when it seems like they might lose her, people all of a sudden start acting like they care, like she's worth enough to save, so maybe, she reasons, she's not that unwanted after all.

'That's all right,' she says after less than a second of deliberation, and hugs him back.

It's really very easy to forgive Roger. It shouldn't be.

But it is.

For two glorious weeks she's the centre of attention. Somehow, word gets out at school about her little escapade, and she suddenly gains a multitude of new friends, fascinated by what occurred, begging for her to tell the story. She's admired, even though what happened doesn't seem all that admirable to her.

Her teachers ask if she's all right, if she still feels too sick to do any work, and so she gets out of a whole day's worth of classes.

Her parents sit and chat to her every night, ask her about school, say proper cautionary things when she leaves the house, such as wear a scarf, it's cold outside and don't do anything we wouldn't do, (well, she's allowed to go into the betting shop, then), panic if she so much changes her breathing pattern, as if they're afraid something will happen to her again.

But something feels just a little bit off about it. Yes, she has people hanging around her, hanging on her words, but it doesn't feel right. She doesn't want to be liked just because she might have died, or at the very least been horribly sick. She despises the idea that she's playing off people's pity, because people feel sorry for her- or conversely that she's gained popularity because they think it's exciting that she was rebellious enough to drink her brother's booze. If people are going to like her, she'd rather it was because they liked her anyway, and so she begins to chase away her new admirers at school, alternating between telling them to get lost and just staring at them, glaring, until they get the hint that she wants to be left alone.

And another thing- not one bit of it was her fault, as far as the grown-ups are concerned, even though she's actually the one who drank the stuff. It's all the fault of 'that bad lot of a brother of hers', she hears them whispering, the one who's 'leading her astray'. She overhears her parents unleashing their fury on him for nights on end after she comes home from hospital, warning him that he's crossed the line, that if there's one more incident, even one more, he's out for good. She catches the phrase 'a terrible influence on young minds' more than once, from more than one different person. She hears talk of police or welfare workers or some other sorts of official people, the names of whom she doesn't catch, being called in to 'investigate' and it frightens her so much that she begins kneeling beside her bed praying desperately everyone will just forget about it, will let the whole incident drop. The thought that Roger might be taken from her is too much to bear- he's the only one that really loves her (really loves her, not this sudden love spawned from dutiful concern that she's not quite sure about yet) and if he's a bad lot, she thinks, well, who cares, anyway? She'd rather spend time with a bad lot who cares, in his own way, even if he does make a few mistakes, than all the 'good' people in the world who seem to only notice she exists when it's almost too late. How much of a 'good influence' can someone be if they're not even around to influence her most of the time?

And so it's a relief when things go back to normal, and she almost finds herself rejoicing when she hears the words get out of the way again.

If she wants attention, she's going to find a better way of getting it. No stupid stunts, and definitely no plays for pity. Until then, get out of the way is all well and good.

'Rog, what's…'

'Don't ask me, pet.'

Roger doesn't even look up at her, keeps his face resolutely hidden behind his newspaper, and Martina feels the sting of rejection. This won't do. She's not going to let him get away with this.

She snatches the paper from his hands, ripping it but unable to care less.

'Roger, look at me.'

' 'Tina, don't. I know what you're tryin' ter do- and I'm not gonna tell you any more things, okay, pet?'

She sits down beside him with a bump. 'Why?'

He raises his head. Well, she's gotten him to face her, anyway. 'Are you honestly tellin' me you can't work out why, pet?'

Oh, please, no.

'Are you honestly tellin' me just because o' the whiskey thing that you're not gonna…you're not…ever?'

Roger drops his paper into his lap, squares his shoulders, folds his hands. 'No, I've come to a serious decision, Martina. You could've died from alcohol poisoning the other day…'

'Oh, I could not…'

'And it was my fault- it was because I wasn't bein' responsible. No, never again, 'Tina. From now on, I'm gonna be a good influence, a bloody-er, a really good one. I'm never gonna let you get into that sort o' trouble again- I know I've made a lot o' mistakes, and I'm bloody well gonna- oh, bugger- oh-!' he claps a hand over his mouth, breathing slowly in and out for a while. 'I'm…certainly gonna make up for those mistakes now.'

Martina's rather amused at his feeble attempts not to swear in front of her, but she doesn't know what to think about the rest of his speech. She bites her lip.

It's the right thing, of course. He wants to be a better person- and even she can't deny that perhaps his interactions with her haven't exactly been age-appropriate, not after what's happened. But if he starts going over-the-top, starts refusing to have anything to do with her 'for her own good' then she will get very angry indeed.

She expresses all this to him, stomping her foot on his for emphasis.

Roger winces, sighs and then puts his arm round her shoulders. 'What do I always say to you, Martina? I'll never abandon you- ever. I promised you, didn't I?'

She nods.

'And I meant it, pet, I meant it.'

'Good.' She snuggles closer to him.

'But in order to do that, I've got ter straighten up and fly right, be a better role model. For your sake.'

'Yeah, all right,' Martina says. 'Just so long as you stay with me.'

'C'mere,' says Roger, opening his arms and hugging her with all his might. Martina relaxes into the warmth of his torso and the familiar stale smell of Scotch and shuts her eyes.

'But Rog,' she says after a time, 'I really do need to know-'

' 'Tina, please.'

'You could just tell me basically what things are,' Martina insists. 'Just so I know why they're dangerous.'

He sighs again. 'Oh, all right. One question- but I'm not gonna tell you anything you don't need to know at this age, all right?'

And as she asks her question and he carefully begins to answer, the thin end of the wedge is pushed in.

Martina comes home one afternoon to find her mother surrounded by an enormous pile of clothes, none of which belong to anyone in her family, pulling a needle and thread through a tear in the sleeve of a hideous green coat. She looks quizzically at her before flinging her bag down and squeezing onto what little space is left on the sofa.

'What are you doin'?'

Her mam pauses halfway through a stitch. 'I'm cookin', Martina.'

She ignores the sarcasm. She supposes she'd have said the same. It occurs to Martina that she and her mother are very alike. She'd quite possibly like her, sometimes, if she didn't always carry with her that memory, four years ago now, of her parents discussing just how unwanted she was- is. She can't let go of it- but oh, she wants to. She wonders if her parents have ever changed their minds about her. She hasn't given them much reason to, she has to be honest- her profound skill at holding a grudge has seeped through into nearly every interaction with them. But now, she can't even fathom why, she just has a sudden, unprecedented desire to see- just to see, mind, what would happen if she tried a different approach. She can't forget being unwanted, it's true, but neither can she forget that image of her mam, pale as a sheet, standing over her hospital bed, worried out of her mind. It's haunted her for nearly a year, and sometimes she wonders if maybe something might have changed…

It can't hurt to try, she decides. She's used to disappointment, if it doesn't work, if she's treated no differently, if she's shunned, it'll be nothing new.

'Would…' she begins, and pauses. It feels strange to be doing this, the words trying to hide in her throat, to not come out. She persists, though, because when she decides to do something, she's determined to see it through. 'Would…you like some 'elp?'

Her mam stares at her like she's grown an extra head. 'What did you just say?'

Martina turns her head away to roll her eyes, because to annoy her wouldn't be beneficial to her experiment. 'D'you need me to help?' she repeats.

'Yeah, I thought that's what you said…' her mother muses. 'That's not like you…' she clears her throat, and addresses her directly. 'You do know how to sew, don't you?'

She does, but it's not something she's ever excelled at. Still, she nods, lets herself be handed a needle and a shirt with a few stitches gone in the arms, and she makes the best of it. They sit in silence for a few minutes, but Martina can feel her mother's eyes on her, watching her with genuine curiosity.

She's not the only one who's puzzled. Martina can't help but ask the question on her mind.

'Why are we doin' this, exactly?'

Her mother's shoulders tense. 'I, er…I 'ad to take this sewing in, you see. We need the money.'

Ah. That makes sense. 'Has Dad been 'avin' more 'friendly games' with 'is mates?'

She doesn't have to see it to know that her mam's pursing her lips at this comment.

'Martina, go upstairs,' she grits out.

Martina goes upstairs.

She has a good mind to let that be that. Some things can't change. Maybe it's wrong to try.

But the next afternoon, she sits down again, takes up the shirt she had yesterday and picks up where she left off.

They don't speak. Martina doesn't want to tempt fate- it's too easy to pick up a cue and let a snidey comment fall from her mouth, and she just knows that if that happens she'll get sent upstairs again and this time, she won't be inclined to give it another go.

They work in silence until six o'clock, at which time her mother puts her needlework away and announces that it's high time she started making dinner. She hesitates for a moment, and gives Martina the smallest of smiles before retreating into the kitchen.

Martina sits there for a while, replaying that smile over and over in her mind, not daring to think that this might mean her plan is working.

She's managing to make the situation at home a bit more tolerable, that's all. It'd be fairly optimistic to think that perhaps she could suddenly build a relationship with one of her parents just by helping her out a little bit. It's going to take some work, and some patience on her part- which she's not happily anticipating. She doesn't like to have to wait long for anything.

But this is a start.

And if it does happen. If it does…

Martina has, for perhaps the first time in all her ten years, a slightly bright picture of the future. She generally tends not to dwell on it, lives in the present almost completely, with a few jaunts back to the past to reflect on some of her more unpleasant experiences, and she certainly doesn't tend to think about possible ways to be happy in the future. But she's thought of one now. She can see herself almost, just nearly, as happy as some of her friends seem to be. She can see herself nearly, almost being loved. And that might be worth trying for, she decides.

Martina's life begins to enter a new phase- calm and comfortable, and she likes it this way. Every aspect has its own little place, and there are no changes to have to deal with, no sudden upheavals or hospital admissions or anything else to have to fret about. Her brother still drinks, her father still gambles, her mother still takes in whatever extra work she can to pay off the debts they run up between them, and the rows keep on coming, but nothing too terrible shakes them up.

Roger, true to his word, is trying to remodel himself into a better man. He gets a job for the first time any of them can remember, causing cups to smash on the floor when he announces it, and though he gets sacked after a fortnight and yelled at for it, they're all three proud of him for having tried.

School is…alright, though Martina still doesn't know what she's bothering for. She talks to Caroline sometimes, a couple of other people she knows when she feels like it, keeps to herself when she's not in the mood to interact. It might not be the best social life, but it suffices quite well enough to keep her from feeling lonely, and that's all she'd really hoped for anyway.

And she and her Mam keep on sewing each night. Martina's not optimistic, doesn't want to decide once and for all that they've bonded, nothing like that, but she is pleased with the progress they've made. They talk while they're doing it, or rather her Mam usually just rants about the sordid state of the world and Martina either listens or tunes out, but occasionally her mother will turn to her and ask a question, and Martina will feel a little flicker of hope. And so she supplies her with what's going on in her life, when she's asked, tells what little there is to tell about her friendships (her mam comes over quite strange when she realises how very little Martina tends to interact with other children; Martina can't think why) and, as weeks turn into months, occasionally volunteers her feelings on a given day, her annoyances or grievances or rare gladness over a particularly pleasant incident.

She's not entirely convinced her mother's all that interested, and she still can't get past the accident-they-could-have-avoided memory entirely, but she's going to stubbornly see this through nonetheless, because something seems to be working, anyway.

'Shouldn't you be gettin' yer school report around this time of year?' her mam asks, out of the blue one night.

'Last week,' Martina mutters without taking her eyes off the book she's reading.

Her mother hums. 'Were you not thinkin' of showin' me at all?'

Martina nearly chokes. It's never occurred to her to show her parents her progress at school. The rest of her class do, she knows that, and there are always laments about what'll happen to them when such-and-such a bad score comes to light, but Martina's never felt either worried or pleased about hers. She never reveals her results to anyone, and no-one ever asks, and that's all there is to it.

Her mouth twists. 'I didn't think you'd want ter see it.'

Martina's mother gives her a strangely reproachful look. 'Martina, go and get it!'

So she does, puzzled out of her wits, and sits on the edge of the sofa, unsure what she should be thinking as she watches her go over it.

'What 'appened 'ere?'

Martina frowns and leans over. Yes, she's got her finger on Martina's mark for arithmetic- significantly lower than the rest of her results.

She looks away. 'I couldn't do it.'

'I see.' A pause. 'Why didn't you ask fer 'elp?'

Martina shrugs- it seems obvious enough to her. 'Why would anyone 'elp me?'

Her Mam just looks at her for a long time, a series of strange emotions passing over her face, the only one of which Martina can recognise is disbelief.

Martina turns her head away. This whole conversation is just doing her head in, completely scrambling the circuits of her brain. It doesn't make sense. This is…well, it's a normal sort of conversation, and they don't do normal, just a basic veneer of it for the benefit of outsiders.

'Well,' says her mother eventually, 'you're doin' well in most things, aren't yer? But I want you ter get that maths mark seen to.'

She tosses the report back into Martina's lap, picks up her needle and thread again.

'And I want you to show me your report from now on, all right?'

Martina nods, still dumbfounded. They go back to the needlework, not broaching the subject again, but Martina contemplates it all for a long time. Maybe she's been wrong, not giving her parents any opportunities to be involved in her life. Perhaps if she had, she could have made all this better a lot earlier on- has she been the one shutting them out, shutting off any possibilities of a relationship?

Well, yes, she concludes after weighing everything up- but she's had good reason to.

She thinks harder, playing back that incident, trying to remember their exact words. We might as well try and make something useful out of her, one of them had said- she can't remember which one now. Well, that would explain her mam's sudden interest with her school results. Perhaps they're going to make a start on shaping her into an asset now.

'D'you…' she tests the water, 'd'you think I could be…useful?' She chokes on the word, finding it a strain not to make it sound like an expletive.

'Of course you could, love,' her mam says, without so much as a glance in her direction, 'of course you could.'

The tone of her voice is reassuring, but it just confirms Martina's suspicions. She reaffirms her vow not to get too hopeful about the time they spend together.

But she does keep coming back.

Time passes.

Martina swallows her pride and asks her teacher for help in maths, and though she doesn't improve much, she does master the basics. Her exam results remain reasonably the same across all areas, though Martina's becoming bored of being told what to do (she's started first form this year, has simply heinous teachers who don't take to her at all, and are constantly putting her down), and so her disrespectful attitude increases twofold, and she no longer sees much point in doing what she's told.

Her dad gets a new set of mates, whom he claims are far more responsible blokes than the old set, but within a week there's a rowdy group of idiots round the kitchen table, passing money back and forth and weighing up odds on the most ridiculous of predictions, and Martina's mother has a fit.

Roger works, gets fired, works, gets fired, gives up and goes back on Social Security, much to their parent's disappointment and Martina's relief. She's getting sick of his perfect older brother act, but thankfully it seems to be dissolving now there haven't been any incidents for a while, and he lets himself slip up more and more frequently, until the old Roger, the old, constantly-drunk, bad-influence Roger is standing before her once more.

And she finds she doesn't mind. A few months after she turns twelve, she barges into his room unannounced and insists that she's old enough to make up her own mind about things and wants to try his not-being-deprived approach again.

And after some obligatory complaints on his part, and her insistence that she has learned something from her stomach pumping, you know, and that she's capable of telling for herself what's good for her, they proceed with caution.

Martina has decided, since her experiment with her Mam is going reasonably well, to take a few more risks, just to see what the outcomes will be, and so she has a go at making amends with Monica (that one's a losing battle), and enjoys herself getting up to no good with Rog. He teaches her to play poker after they've sat for an hour making fun of their dad and his latest losses, and she loses six weeks' worth of pocket money to him, deciding with finality that that's never going to be repeated again, but at least she's attempted it.

She tries whiskey again, this time in moderation, but decides on the whole she prefers wine more, and so she and her brother secretly work through a bottle of it over the course of a few weeks.

And she tells her mam more things, shares more experiences with her. It's all going quite well, her life. Well, considering. It's nothing special, not particularly exciting, and she still hasn't even an inkling where it's heading, or how it'll all turn out.

But it's all right, it really is. She's getting a tiny taste of parental guidance while simultaneously indulging in a few inappropriate pastimes with her brother- quite a well-rounded education, she thinks.

And it works the way it is. It's not perfect, not even by a long shot, but it's all right.

But there are still occasions when it just doesn't work, just won't hold together. She may be getting on better with her family overall, but she never lets the memory of them saying they don't want her slip her mind, and she makes less and less subtle references to it when she puts herself in a bad mood.

'Stop hangin' round your brother all the time,' Martina's mother says one day, looking up at her from the sewing she's taken in. She's got a great heap of it to get through- Dad must have weakened and played a few more rounds of poker recently for her to be needing that much money.

'Why?' Martina demands, not meeting her gaze. She's not sure whether she's questioning the instruction, which, of course, she has no intention of following, or why her mother's telling her to do so in the first place. It could be to do with the fact that she's been in deep trouble at school six times this week, and each time, Roger's laughed about it with her, while her parents try to shout at her over him and eventually give up. Or perhaps it could be because Roger's finally caved, finally lapsed and has been threatened with the police for non-payment of an enormous drinks tab. Either way, she's about to hear the 'bad influence' speech again, she knows it.

'He's a bad influence on you. He's leading you astray. You need more friends your own age- people who'll set a good example for you to follow.'

Oh, yes. She knew it. Martina gives her a defiant look. 'It's not as if you care. You just don't want it to reflect on you.'

Her mother's eyes are wide and furious. 'How dare you speak to me like that? Go upstairs.'

So she does, yelling 'well, it's true!' as she stomps up to her room.

Two days later Martina sits down on the sofa and her mother turns to her, puts down her sewing and looks her straight in the eye.

It's a bit uncomfortable, and Martina shifts away a little, unsure how she's supposed to react to this.

'Yes?'

'Don't speak to me like that.'

Martina raises her eyes upwards and then swivels them down to stare at the floor.

'Martina, I wanted to have a serious conversation with you.'

'Our Roger 'asn't done anythin',' she snaps, immediately on the defensive.

Her Mam just looks at her sadly, as if to remind her of the drinking incident, among many other things.

'Don't think I don't know what you're doin'.'

'What?'

'I said don't speak ter me like that. I know what you and Roger are doin'- he's leadin' you astray and you're lettin' 'im.'

She doesn't expect her mother to fly off at her- though she has been told off a fair bit more lately, as well as being sent upstairs, but her heart still pounds. She just hopes her Mam doesn't really know what she's doing, doesn't know about the drinking and whatnot.

'Roger's a good brother,' she says, her voice inadvertently climbing an octave or so. She gets far too emotional where her brother is concerned- he's her Achilles' heel.

Her Mam just looks at her again.

'He loves me,' Martina says pointedly, though she doesn't think her mother picks up on the snarkier hidden meaning to her words.

'I do know that, love, and I know he tries…in his own way…'

'Then what's the matter?'

'Look,' she squares her shoulders and Martina does likewise, 'you do realise why we warn you about our Roger, don't you? Now I know you love him, but I don't want you goin' down the same road as 'e did- he's gettin' imself into a lot o' danger with 'is drinkin' and spendin' 'abits…'

'I do know that, much as it goes,' Martina says. How many times does she have to hear this? Everyone seems to be playing the same old tune- and she is aware of just how consuming Rog's addictions are. She's not stupid. She's also aware that everyone who tries to warn her is a victim to some other vice, and she doesn't see why she should be taking advice from hypocrites.

So she won't. At least her brother is open about his problems- does admit there's something wrong with him. That makes him vastly better in her book.

Her mam goes on to point out that Roger gets in trouble with the police far too often, that he's damaging himself, that he's using up all their money (as if Dad isn't), and Martina only half-listens, letting her thoughts wander across to other things- the fact that she needs a haircut, the test she's got coming up that she hardly knows anything for, the three detentions she's yet to work off, that boy she saw across the park the other day and watched for half an hour just because he was unbearably gorgeous. She's almost completely tuned out by the time her mother concludes her lecture.

'Just watch yerself,' she says, 'or you're gonna get hurt.'

Is that a threat? Martina feels like asking, just to gauge the indignation a remark like that would undoubtedly cause, but no, she thinks. The fire's on down here, and it's freezing upstairs. She'd rather not be sent there just now.

So she deigns to mutter a yeah, yeah, and tries to put her mother's words out of her mind. They ring just a little too frighteningly true for her liking, and she doesn't want to think, even for a minute, about their ramifications, about the fact that, at some point in the future, she might end up suffering as a result of her choices, her continued dependence on her brother and no-one else. She doesn't want to have to consider ideas like that, not just now.

It's too difficult. Why should she be trying to change what she has? She may not have any friends who could be considered a good example, her brother may be a bad lot, but he does love her, and staying as she is now, where she knows she's wanted, well, it's…

…easy.

It's easy.

And she trusts him.

The beginning of the end- well, the first of many ends to come, anyhow- comes like a thief in the night, slipping by so subtly that Martina doesn't even notice it. Roger starts staying out later, longer, and more often. She doesn't think on it much. It's not, after all, particularly noticeable, not particularly worth thinking on. It's just Roger, being Roger, going out, probably to the pub or wherever else he goes, doing whatever he does, that's all, and other things are going on in her life, things with friends and school, and occasionally family, things which occupy more prominent spaces in her mind.

There have been incidents, of course. Roger's gotten into trouble several times with her parents, and Martina's gotten into trouble for siding with him, and for not minding her own business- but it's all the usual stuff.

And so she completely misses any little hints, any little foreshadowing that comes her way, anything that might suggest perhaps that a storm is brewing. Not deliberately, mind, but she misses it all the same, and that is about to take its toll.

Martina's thirteen years old, and about to be faced with the biggest upheaval of her life so far.

It's nine at night, the house has been empty and silent for several hours, and Martina's lying on her bed, reading, taking advantage of the rare moment of serenity when the front door slams. Her father's furious voice bellows through the whole house, reverberating off the walls.

'That's it! I've had it! I've 'ad enough! No more chances- you've overstepped the line this time!'

Martina shuts her eyes, wishing she had some way of drowning out the noise. She was having such a lovely, quiet evening up 'til now.

'I didn't think even you 'ad it in you ter go that far…'

'Look, I didn't plan for this to happen, okay?'

A second voice mingles with her father's shouts, and Martina sits up at once, heart pounding.

Roger.

An ominous feeling builds up inside her, a terrifying apprehension that something awful has happened.

It isn't as if Roger and her dad haven't argued before- it's a thrice weekly occurrence at least, usually being sparked by either Roger's refusal to get a job, his 'bad influence' over Martina or the enormous bills he dumps on his parents to take care of for him. She's head the you waste all our money on booze/well you waste all our money in wagers/ well you should be supporting yourself at your age back-and-forth so many times, but this seems different somehow.

She gets up inhumanly quickly, the jolt making her dizzy, and tiptoes across the landing, craning her neck to see down the stairs. From her position, she can just make out the top of Roger's head, and her Dad from the shoulders down.

'Oh, you never plan fer these things to 'appen, do you? It was the same last time- we had to shell out a fortune on bail because you decided ter steal those bloody stolen record players-'

'-I said I was sorry about that!'

'-which you never did pay us back for, did you?'

'And what was I supposed ter pay you back with?'

'What d'you mean, what were you supposed ter pay us back with- if you actually got a job and contributed, or at the very least stopped wastin' your dole money on Scotch-'

'Oh, it all comes back to that, doesn't it?'

'Well, of course it all comes back ter that- you've just this second run up a three thousand pound tab, been arrested for non-payment and I've 'ad ter bail you out again- and it's not even as if it's a one-off! You're constantly disgracin' us- I'm sick o' you tryin' ter ruin this family!'

'I've never tried to-'

'Oh, no? What about Martina, then? You've poisoned that girl!'

Martina flinches. What? No! She wants to yell out, but she finds she's lost her voice, lost the ability to move so much as an inch. She just crouches there, a statue with an erratic heartbeat.

'How many times do I 'ave ter…that was an accident!' Roger cries. 'I never intended to get her drunk!'

'I didn't necessarily mean literally- though you can't deny that either. You nearly killed 'er- and it doesn't matter what you intended- it's what happened that counts. No, I'm talkin' about the way you're corruptin' 'er!'

Corrupt? A barely audible squeak escapes Martina's mouth. Corrupt? I'm not corrupt! Am I?

'All I've ever tried ter do is take care of 'er!'

'Oh, yeah, and what a wonderful job you've done, too, Roger, givin' her whiskey, teachin' her to be sulky and downright disrespectful ter everyone she meets, deprivin' 'er of a normal childhood because you've dragged 'er into your world- into things she shouldn't know anythin' about at 'er age!'

'Oh, and what about y-' Roger starts to say, but her Dad isn't done yet.

'Well, that's it! I've been sayin' for years you should be turfed out- I should've done it when you first 'ospitalised that child- as a matter o' fact, I should've done it the first time you got yerself landed in the nick- well, I'm bloody well gonna do it now! No more chances- yer mother and I aren't gonna fight yer battles for you anymore, we're not gonna pay for your mistakes, and you're not gonna make Martina suffer for them anymore either. Get out.'

A brief silence descends as the words sink in.

Martina feels as if she's become detached from her body and gone falling into a deep chasm, while at the same time being rooted to this spot on the floor, never to move again. Her mind's playing tricks. It has to be. She's misheard. It's the only logical explanation.

'Get out, Roger!' her Dad repeats. 'I don't care where you go, just go- now. You can take the rap fer yer own mistakes from now on.'

No, she hasn't misheard. She's heard right.

But this can't be right. No! It's not right!

But it is. It is right, and now Roger's coming up the stairs, looking defeated.

He pauses on the landing, giving her a sad look before carrying on into his bedroom.

Martina just sits there on the floor, shivering though she's not cold, trying to make some sense of this. Nothing comes to her mind. It's totally empty, totally disbelieving.

Seconds tick by. As if being pulled along by marionette strings, Martina drags herself up off the floor and across the hall.

She stands in the doorway of Roger's room as he packs, gripping the doorframe for support, her knees shaking so violently she feels she'll keel over if she doesn't. This isn't happening. It can't be. This is the stuff of nightmares- the sort from which you wake up with a scream, covered in sweat, and have to turn the light on to convince yourself they aren't real. It's her worst fear come to life. Roger's not going to be around anymore.

Without him, what is she? How will she cope? How will she live?

Her vocal chords are tangled up somewhere in the messy knot of her throat, along with the lump that's risen and the bile that's clawing its way up.

'Roger,' she croaks.

He stops what he's doing, rises from the floor and comes over to her.

' 'Tina,' he murmurs, pressing his nose into her hair, his own, now long and lank, falling round her head, mingling with her tresses, ginger with brown. 'I'm sorry I'm such a bad lot. I've ruined everythin'.'

'No,' Martina says with feeling. 'No. You 'aven't. Don't go.'

'I don't get a say in this, pet.'

'Refuse to leave,' she insists, stubbornly clenching her fists. He pulls back to look at her, laughs ruefully at what he sees. Martina can't for the life of her see what there is to laugh about.

'That'll just make things worse.'

'I'll go with you, then.'

Roger runs a hand across his brow. 'Oh, 'Tina, 'Tina, don't do this…' he takes hold of her by the arms, lowering his face to her level, 'listen. Nothing's gonna change between you and me, I promise you. I won't be living in this house, that's all. I'm not leavin' the country, I'm not leavin' town, even. I'm just leavin' this house. And as soon as I find somewhere to live, I'll send you the address and the telephone number. We can write, we can talk, we'll see each other all the time- I give you me word.'

Writing, phoning and visiting- if she's lucky. If that's even possible. It's not enough. Roger's supposed to be there all the time, easily accessible. But what can she do? She's got no option but to keep a stiff upper lip, nod and say 'okay'.

'That's me brave girl.' Roger hugs her and she hugs back as tightly as she can, determined to make it count. After all, who knows how long it'll be before the next one?

It takes Roger all of ten minutes to get his stuff together, leaving behind, Martina can't help smiling as she notices, in spite of all this horror, all the rubbish in his room for his parents to sort out. He pulls his coat on, picks up his one small case, ruffles her hair before heading out of the room and toward the stairs.

Martina stays where she is. She doesn't follow him down- to hear the front door open and shut, knowing it's bearing her brother away, is bad enough, without having that image burnt onto her retinas as well.

She tries to think of something that'll make his going more bearable, making a tremendous effort to concentrate on the negatives, on how bad an influence he's always been, how he told her about things some people her age still don't know about when she was six, when he let her have whiskey at nine and she ended up having her stomach pumped, but none of these things seem to matter in the slightest. All that matters is that he loves her, and she's being deprived of him.

She gives up on putting a lid on her agony and succumbs to a bout of throat-cutting, wrist-slashing, tablet-swallowing, stick-my-finger-in-an-electric socket despair.

It's certainly not the last time she'll feel like this.

Martina manages to pull herself together after about an hour, brushes tears from her face and walks slowly across the landing to her parents' room. She'd heard the front door slam a second time about twenty minutes ago, signalling her dad's exeunt- probably off to see his mates and lay down a few bets- and now, she thinks, she has a chance to get her mother alone.

And she'd better use it.

Her mam's sitting on the edge of the bed, holding her sewing up to the dim lamplight, a few stray tears of her own scattered across her face. The sight of them makes Martina hesitate, struggle to pull her unconcerned mask back up before she proceeds, and in the end she finds she can't. She goes as she is, creaking her way across the floor and seating herself next to her Mam.

'Martina,' she doesn't look at her, 'it's late.'

'Why didn't you stop him, Mam?' her voice trembles, and she realises as her mother's head snaps around towards her that she's startled her. She's never shown this much emotion in front of her- not for a very long time, anyway- despite the closer relationship they seemed to be starting to achieve. Matters of her heart were always put on layaway for Rog, her pains and joys shared with him alone. But for the first time in an aeon, Martina's incapable of acting detached. She's been insecure all her life, as far back as she can remember, but so long as Roger was around to fall back on, she's been able to rise above everything, to act like she's not afraid with the knowledge that she's got some protection, some care. But now Roger's been dynamited out of her life, and though he's promised to keep seeing her, she's still unsure how that'll pan out. She can't hold onto herself anymore; she lets her fears consume her and her walls come down in front of one of her parents.

'He's got a mind of 'is own, Martina,' her mother says softly, 'there's nothin' any of us could've done. He'd 'ave gone and done somethin' similar later, even if I had talked 'im out of it this time around- and the same thing would've happened in the end. You know Roger, 'e can't seem to help being…' she pauses, sighs, puts her hands on Martina's shoulders.

Martina flinches at the contact. She's not used to physical displays of affection- not from her anyway.

'I mean, the thing you 'ave ter understand is that…even before you were born, Roger…well, he was getting' up to all sorts o'…'

'Not Rog,' Martina cuts in, 'not 'im! Dad!'

Her mother falls silent.

'Why couldn't you 'ave stopped 'im kickin' Roger out? Couldn't you 'ave said somethin'…anythin' ter make 'im change 'is mind?'

There's another long pause. Martina can feel herself breathing heavily, tensed in anticipation of some sort of answer,.

'I don't know if there was anythin' I could 'ave said, love- yer Dad 'ad 'is mind made up, and maybe…' she trails off.

'What?' Martina demands. 'Maybe what?'

'Well, p'raps….p'raps it's for the best.'

Martina had thought it only happened in cliché novels, but now she actually sees everything flash red momentarily before her eyes.

She didn't just say that. She did not just say that. Martina desperately hopes she heard wrong.

'What?' she hisses.

'Look, I know you and Roger were close, Martina, but…you've got to understand, your brother is…well, he's reckless, isn't 'e? He's gotten us into a lot o' hot water lately, and we just can't afford to keep payin' for 'is mistakes. We're barely staying afloat as it is, and Roger's more than old enough to have to face up to responsibility- to pay his own debts…'

Of course it all makes sense. It's logical. It's practical. Martina can see that. It may even be reasonable- if it wasn't her Roger her Mam was talking about. But it's her Roger, her brother, and her bias clouds her mind, and her stubbornness consumes her, and her grief is such that the truth of the statement just makes her angrier.

'How can you sit there talkin' about reckless?' she snaps, the tears coming whether she wants them to or not. 'How can you say Dad's doin' the right thing when every other week 'e piles up gamblin' debts! He's the one gettin' us into hot water! Get rid o' him if you 'ave ter get rid o' someone!'

'Martina,' her mother warns.

'He's the one who's reckless!' Martina repeats, crying hysterically now. 'Not Roger. Him!'

Her Mam gets abruptly to her feet, attempting to assume a sterner parental role by towering over her. 'How can you speak about your father like that?'

Martina's having none of it. She's on her feet too, the instant her Mam shows signs of getting up. 'How can you speak about your son like that?'

'You're a child, you don't know what you're talking about. One day you'll come to understand, Martina, that-'

'Oh, understand, will I? What'll I understand? Why me mother won't stand up for her own son, just because 'e 'appens to slip up now and then, but she'll defend to the death that heartless bastard-'

'Martina!'

'-who wastes more o' our money than Rog ever did, and why she works all the hours God sends and even takes in extra bloody work-'

'Don't you dare swear at me, young l-'

'-to make sure 'e doesn't have to face up to his own responsibility and get 'imself out o' trouble, but'll let him turn around and chuck someone else out for doin' the same sort o' thing, like the bloody hypocrite he is-'

'Martina, just stop it!' her mother shrieks, losing it for the first time in who knows how long. 'Don't you think this is hard enough for me as it is, without you throwin' a tantrum about it?'

Throwing a tantrum. That's all she thinks she's doing. She just doesn't get it. She's the one who doesn't understand- doesn't understand that she and Dad have effectively sentenced Martina's one and only shred of happiness, of comfort, of security to death.

Doesn't understand the immense, intense pain that's ripping through Martina even as they speak. All the respect she's been developing towards her mother- the almost-closeness and semi-bond they've been working towards- vanishes at once in a puff of smoke. Martina will never forgive her for this, she thinks. Not ever. Never. Not in a million years.

She just glares and fumes, unable to process another word, her fury swirling so fast it's disorienting her.

'Martina, go away.'

Now there's an idea. She leaves the room, slamming the door. Oh, she'll go away. She'd go all the way away, if she could, if she were old enough, if she knew what to do. She'd keep going away until she'd gone right out the door and to wherever Roger may be. But she's got to stay- the fact remains that she wouldn't know the first thing about what to do if she tried to leave home, and anyhow, Roger's given her his word he'll send her his new address and telephone number, once he's got a new address and number to send. She can't just run off, or they'd never reach her, and then she may never see Rog again.

She settles for storming down the stairs instead, heading into the kitchen with the intent of making herself a cuppa and slamming mugs around in the process.

She runs into her dad at the bottom of the staircase, home incredibly early for him. She blocks his path for a few moments, just staring at him with seething hatred.

'What do you want?'

She says nothing.

'Martina, get out of the way.' He pushes her to one side, heads up the steps.

Martina goes into the kitchen, makes herself her promised cup of tea and cries into it rather than drinking it.

Poor little Martina. I just want to shake her sometimes, she's so obtuse. She doesn't see what's right in front of her face. I know this is from her point of view, but I've tried to leave enough evidence in there to suggest that what Martina sees isn't necessarily what's actually going on.

Yeah this first part doesn't have much of her DHSS-ness in it, but as we go she'll be working towards getting that job, possibly meeting people from the show, to her life resembling that above excerpt, et cetera.

Stay tuned. And keep an eye on the cover- it will change every chapter. I've found some pics that look exactly how I imagine Martina to look at different ages.