After she'd tucked Hannah in and made her drink a whole glass of water, slowly, Shelly came back out to the sitting-room and joined Sacha on the sofa in front of the T.V.

Sacha didn't even know what it was that they were watching, she'd been too tired after work to do anything more than heat up some left-overs in the microwave and switch on the T.V. and take her chances on one of the new digital channels. It was Supernatural or Dexter or some trashy show like that that she didn't usually watch, but it passed the time.

When she'd heard the toilet flush shortly after she'd got home and Shelly had appeared Sacha hadn't been surprised, it was well beyond the point where she could feel surprised that Shelly was in the house, even with Hannah absent; and when Hannah eventually came home, Sacha was just thankful that Shelly was there to take care of her. To put her away, if Sacha was going to be completely honest: to hide her out of sight where she couldn't bother Sacha.

"I used to worry about her drinking" Sacha confessed to Shelly when Shelly sat down now. "I used to think maybe I should ought to do something. I used to think she had a problem."

"And now you've changed your mind?" Shelly asked. She wasn't any more interested in the T.V. than Sacha was.

"I just got tired of worrying about her" Sacha said. "It was like Sisyphus, only I had the option of leaving the rock behind."

"Uh-huh." Shelly wasn't entirely sure what Sacha was talking about.

"Which I guess is maybe a bit cowardly of me, morally speaking. But I didn't want to make a fuss, I mean I moved in here and I didn't want to make any waves."

"Sure."

"So I didn't."

"Okay."

"Pretty pissweak of me, really." Sacha adjusted the volume on the T.V., like an electronic shrug. "But I guess she's okay. I mean Christ this city practically runs on alcohol anyway. Alcohol and coffee."

"God, that's true."

"Plus she's got you" Sacha said, lowly and without looking at Shelly. Shelly could tell by now when she was embarrassed about something, when something was hard for her to say. "That's helped, a lot."

"Well, thanks, I'm glad to hear it" Shelly said. "What are we watching?"