'Are they asleep?' Marcus whispered.

'They're asleep.'

'Halleluiah!' He almost forgot the need for quiet. 'Now I can have my wicked way with you.' He stepped into the hall, grabbed her and, both of them giggling and bumping against the coat-stand, he began to remove her clothes.

'Come into the front-room,' she invited.

'I want to do it here,' he said wickedly. 'On the Wellingtons and the schoolbags.'

'Tough, you can't!' She went into convulsions at his fake-sulky face. 'You look like Craig.'

He thrust his bottom lip out further and she laughed even more.

'But seriously,' she whispered, 'what if one of them gets out of bed to go to the bathroom and sees us in the throes on the hall floor? Go on, into the front-room with you!'

Obediently, he picked up his shirt and followed her in. 'It reminds me of being a teenager, all this sneaking around. Kinda sexy.'

Dylan had terrified Clodagh with his threats about custody, so she was determined that Molly and Craig wouldn't see her in bed with Marcus. But this week Marcus was very busy at work, so daytime sex was out. The only time they could hope to do it was when Molly and Craig were asleep. A daily period of approximately twenty minutes.

On the couch, they pulled the clothes from each other's bodies and, in a brief pause to stare into each other's eyes, Clodagh sighed up at him, 'I'm so happy to see you.'

The five days since Dylan had left had been a strange, nightmarish time. Guilt was ripping her asunder, especially because the children kept asking when Daddy was coming home. She was increasingly isolated: even her own mother was furious with her. And she felt frighteningly out of control appalled at the destruction that she had unleashed.

The only time the horror let up was when she was with Marcus. He was a diamond in the rubbish tip of her life. She'd read that phrase somewhere in the novel where the woman opens a second-hand designer-clothing shop and it had leapt out at her.

'Not as happy as I am to see you.' Marcus scanned her naked body, then placed his hands under her and turned her on her stomach. Before he entered her he waited a moment, almost reverently. It was nearly a week since they'd actually had sex. There hadn't been a hope of it on Saturday afternoon. After Craig had hit Marcus with the red truck, he wouldn't let him within three feet of Clodagh.

'Come on,' Clodagh implored, her voice muffled.

Marcus worked himself once, twice with his hand, then positioned himself accurately at her entrance. Nothing could beat the first thrust into her. Because their time together had always been short there was a fired-up violence to their sex: he liked to get all the way to the hilt on the first go, shoving through that semi-resistant yielding, straight into head-lifting ecstacy. And if he could elicit from Clodagh a stifled gasp that was midway between pleasure and pain, it spurred him even more.

But this time his long, perfect stroke was halted about halfway when Clodagh tensed, semi-sat up and hissed, 'Ssshh.' She turned her head to the ceiling and froze. 'I thought I heard... No,' she relaxed again. 'I must have been imagining it.'

He got all the way in on the second go, but couldn't help feeling he'd been deprived of something. After a short, furious shag, they had another slightly less frantic one with her on top.

Dipping with sweat she lay on him and murmured, 'You make me happy.'

'You make me happy too,' he replied. 'But do you know what would make me even happier? Going upstairs to bed. This couch is doing my back in.'

'We shouldn't really. What if they see you?'

'You could lock the bedroom door. Come on,' he grinned, 'I'm not finished with you yet tonight.'

'Yes, but... Oh, OK, but you can't stay the night. Deal?'

'Deal'

Dr McDevitt was alarmed by the woman marching into his surgery and demanding Prozac with menaces. 'And we're not leaving without it!'

'Mrs ' he consulted his appointment sheet, 'Ah, Kennedy, I can't just go handing out prescriptions...'

'Call me Monica, and it's not for me, it's for my daughter.' Monica directed his attention to Ashling.

'Oh Ashling, I didn't see you there. What's up?' He liked Ashling.

She shifted helplessly and, aided by her mother's elbow, eventually came up with the goods. 'I feel awful.'

'Her boyfriend left her for her best friend,' Monica elaborated when it became clear that Ashling wasn't going to.

Dr McDevitt sighed. Being jilted by a boyfriend, well, it's life, isn't it? But people wanted Prozac for everything-if everything-if they lost an earring, if they knelt on a piece of Lego. they lost an earring, if they knelt on a piece of Lego.

'It's not just the boyfriend.' Monica pressed Ashling's case. 'She's had family problems.'

Dr McDevitt could well believe it. Overbearing mother, perhaps?

'I suffered from depression for fifteen years. Been hospitalized several times '

'No need to boast,' he muttered.

' and Ashling's acting the way I did. Flung in the bed, refusing to eat, obsessed with homeless people.'

Dr McDevitt perked up. This was more like it. 'What about homeless people?'

Another prod and a hissed, 'Tell him!' 'Tell him!' from Monica before Ashling raised her pale, stiff face and mumbled, 'There's a homeless boy I know. I was always bothered about him, but now I'm sad about every single one of them. Even the ones I haven't met.' from Monica before Ashling raised her pale, stiff face and mumbled, 'There's a homeless boy I know. I was always bothered about him, but now I'm sad about every single one of them. Even the ones I haven't met.'

This was enough to convince Dr McDevitt.

'Why do I feel like this?' Ashling wondered. 'Am I going mad?'

'No, you're not, but, ehm, depression is a peculiar beast,' he dissembled. In other words, he hadn't much of a clue. 'But at a guess, it sounds from your, eh, mother's testimony that you could have inherited a tendency towards it and that the trauma of losing your earri-I mean boyfriend, triggered it.'

He gave her a prescription for the lowest dose, 'On the proviso,' he scribbled something on a pad, 'that you also go for counselling.'

He approved of counselling. If people wanted to be happy let them put their backs into it a bit.

Outside the surgery Ashling said, 'Can I go home now?'

Monica had only been able to inveigle her to the doctor by getting a taxi. 'Just walk to the chemist with me, then we'll go back.'

Disconsolately, Ashling let Monica link arms with her. She kept being made to do things she didn't want to and was too subdued to resist. The problem was that Monica had made Ashling's happiness her project, because she was so overjoyed to get an opportunity to make up for years of unavoidable neglect.

It was an early-autumn afternoon and, as they walked slowly through the benign sunshine, Ashling leant against her mother's elbow, thick and soft from layers of clothes.

After the chemist, Ashling found herself being walked through Stephen's Green, where she was forced to sit on a bench and watch the lake through slanting sunshine. Birds splish-splashed on the water and Ashling wondered when she could go home.

'Soon,' Monica promised.

'Soon? Good.' Then she recommenced watching the birds. 'Ducks,' she observed leadenly.

'That's right! Ducks!' Monica was as animated as if Ashling was two and a half. 'Getting ready to fly south for the winter... For the warmer weather,' she added.

'I know.'

'Packing their bikinis and sun-tan lotion.'

Silence resumed.

'Ordering their traveller's cheques,' Monica elaborated.

Ashling continued to stare straight ahead.

'Painting their toenails,' Monica suggested. 'Buying sunglasses and straw hats.'

It was the sun-glasses that did it. The image of a duck wearing shades and looking like a mafioso was comical enough to elicit a half-smile from Ashling. Only then was she allowed to go home.

On Saturday morning, when Liam picked Lisa up in his taxi to drive her to the airport, his admiration was blatant.

'God above, Lisa,' he exclaimed paternally. 'But you're looking fantastic!'

Scamtastic, actually. 'I should do, Liam. I've been preparing since seven.'

She had to admit that she'd pulled it off. Everything was perfect: her hair, skin, eyebrows, nails. And clothes. On Wednesday and Thursday couriers had delivered some of the most magnificent garments on the planet, she'd cherry-picked the choicest pieces and was now wearing them.

On the drive, Lisa explained a little of what was happening, which upset Liam.

'Getting divorced,' he muttered. 'Your man must be mad. And blind.'

To get near the door, Liam parked in a spot that was both illegal and dangerous. 'I'll be waiting here for you.'

Lisa was already breathless, even before she ran into the arrivals hall. Although the monitor said that Oliver's flight had landed there was no sign of him, so she stood at the meeting point, trained her eyes on the double glass doors and waited. Her heart was pounding and her tongue kept sticking to the roof of her cotton-wool mouth. She waited some more. People appeared in regular spurts, traipsing self-consciously through those who were waiting, but no sign of Oliver. After a while she jumpily rang home to check that he hadn't left a message saying he was delayed, but there was nothing.

She was almost convinced that he wasn't coming when finally she saw him moving gracefully towards the glass doors. Her head went light and the ground see-sawed slightly. He was all in black. A long-line black leather jacket over a black polo neck and lean black pants. Then he saw her and smiled his thousand-yard smile. The only man-made object they could see from space, she used to say to him in another life.

She rushed forward. 'I'd almost given up on you.'

'Sorry, babes,' his lips curved around his shockingly white teeth, 'but I was stopped by Immigration. Only person on the whole plane to be.' He put his hand on his hip and said with exaggerated curiosity, 'Now, I wonder why that that was.' was.'

'Bastards!'

'Yeah, just couldn't seem to convince them I was a British citizen. Despite having a British passport.'

She clucked with concern. 'Are you upset?'

'Nah, I'm used to it. The same thing happened the last time I visited here. You look great, babes.'

'So do you.'

Kathy was just finishing a mighty clean-up when Liam dropped them home. She tried to slip away discreetly but Lisa stopped her.

'Oliver, this is Kathy, she lives across the road. And Kathy, this is Oliver, my hus friend.'

'How do you do,' Kathy said, wondering what a husfriend was. Perhaps it was something like a gal pal.

When Kathy left, they lapsed into extra-nice, super-jovial awkwardness although they were well disposed to each other, there was no doubt but that this was a very strange situation with no clear code of behaviour. Oliver over-enthusiastically admired the house and Lisa grandiosely outlined her plans, with specific reference to a wooden blind.

Eventually they both calmed down and began behaving more normally. 'We should get started, babes,' Oliver said, and unloaded from his bag something that, for a heartbeat, she thought was a present for her, then realized was a box-file of documents: deeds, bank accounts, credit-card statements, mortgage bumpf. He put on a pair of silver-framed glasses and, though he looked deliciously professional, all her fluttery, nervy, girly anticipation abruptly vanished. What was she thinking of? This wasn't a date, this was a meeting about their divorce.

Her spirits suddenly slithered to the bottom of the pole. Heavily, she took a seat at the kitchen table and set about the severing of their two financial lives, in order to restore them, functioning and complete, to their single status. It was as delicate and complicated a process as separating Siamese twins.

Playing paperchase with bank accounts that went back five years, they tried to list all the different payments they'd both made on their flat. Between deposits and endowment policies and solicitor's fees, the two distinct strands were regularly obscured.

A couple of times it got jagged and ugly, as things often do over money. Lisa insisted quite forcibly that she'd paid all the solicitor's fees, but Oliver was certain that he too had contributed.

'Look here,' he rustled and located a stiff-paged invoice from their solicitor, 'a bill for five hundred and twelve pounds, sixteen pence. And here,' he jabbed at his bank statement, 'a cheque cheque for five hundred and twelve pounds, sixteen pence, issued three weeks later. A coincidence? I don't think so!' for five hundred and twelve pounds, sixteen pence, issued three weeks later. A coincidence? I don't think so!'

'Show me that!' She examined them both, then muttered, 'Sorry.'

The doorbell rang and Francine waltzed in. 'Hiya Leeeeesa. Er, hiya,' she nodded at Oliver, shyness eclipsing her confidence. She turned back to Lisa. 'We're having a slumber party tonight. Me and Chloe and Trudie and Phoebe. Will you come?'

'Thanks, but I've already got plans.'

'OK. Um, have you any spare face-packs we could use?'

Lisa bit back annoyance. 'Sorry Oliver, just a sec. Come into my bedroom, Francine.'

'Bless!' Oliver exclaimed, when Francine departed with a plastic bag full of face-packs, nail polishes, exfoliants and other slumber-party paraphernalia.

Lisa twitched irritably. 'She only called to get a look at you.'

They returned to the paperchase and kept stumbling over memories.

'What the hell did we buy at Aero that cost so much?'

'Our bed,' Oliver replied shortly.

Stillness descended, dense with unexpressed feelings.

'A cheque to Discovery Travel?' Lisa asked later.

'Cyprus.'

That one word hurled a bomb of emotions at her. Dazzling warmth, limbs tangled while late-afternoon sunshine slanted shadowy patterns across their sheets: she was intensely in love, on her first 'married' holiday, unable to imagine ever being without Oliver.

Look at them now, coming across the cheque as they prepared for their divorce. Wasn't life weird?