Jane woke up. her mind pulled itself together as she lay staring at the strange ceiling. She had clearly drunk more last night than was healthy. But she had achieved the night's goal. She had won a roof over her head. She had been evicted from her flat the day before, and had been shamefully unprepared. Yes she had packed what little she owned up, but she hadn't done the crucial task of finding somewhere else. It was something which had remained on her ‘to do' list for the past month, since she had been warned of it. Unfortunately, like everything else on the ‘to do' list, Jane found that it never got done.

Her first instinct had been to ask for a friend to provide shelter until she could find a new place. This idea, however, had been debunked because it would involve letting her friends know that she had lost her job. She wasn't yet up to that disgrace. She had hired some temporary storage to hold all her nick-nacks and clothes and then found herself at a loss for the rest of the day. Logically she should have gone flat hunting. Procrastination is a terrible thing, though.

When it hit eleven and she hadn't even come close to trying to find somewhere to stay, Jane did what she always did when things were looking desperate. She drank. Going to Murphy's, a disgusting pub which she had been going to since money stopped coming in. The drinks were disgusting, but cheap. The clients were disgusting, but with no redeeming features. After a couple of drinks she had seen him; clearly not a regular because he was revolted by everything around him. He wasn't especially attractive, but he was a few sips away from being irresistible. She knew it would be wrong to claim already that the night's sleeping arrangements were sorted, but she might as well face it, he was far too drunk already to say no to any woman who approached him.

After that her memory faded, but no matter; she'd been able to sleep in a bed that night. Today she could go out and find a flat. Or even a job. She wasn't fussy which. Though, until her semi-willing host threw her out, she was going to enjoy the warmth of the indoors.

Having reconstructed the previous day in her mind as best she could, Jane went downstairs to see what entertainments he had to offer. And what food. To her distaste, in both cases it was "none". The conversation he offered was banal. Not that he seemed to want to be interesting, if anything he was trying desperately to get rid of her. Jane wasn't going to be defeated by an uninteresting guy. She was going to fight the outside with all she had. It was only when he was forced into blatant lying about having a job that she accepted that the hospitality was dying on her.

A few questions to delay the inevitable and she was back outside. She should be working at pulling a life back together. She started walking the streets of the city randomly. That night she found herself sleeping on the sofa at her friend Craig's house. Defeat was not something Jane would happily admit, but when offered the choice between that and doing something difficult, she found herself sleeping on friends' sofas. Who wants a normal life anyway?