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room for ages so I hope she’ll make her feel better. Or if that’s not possible (and I’m afraid it might not be at the moment), at least make her leave her room and have a shower. And eat something. She didn’t come down for dinner; she just had more toast instead. Which means she’s had nothing but toast for twenty-four hours, and even Icouldn’t live on that. And I really do love toast.

Week 5

    Rachel didn’t want to go to school today, but Mum and Dad were very firm about it.
    ‘I know you’re upset, love,’ said Mum. ‘But you can’t hide away from everything.’
    ‘And you can’t afford to miss school,’ said Dad. ‘Not in your Leaving Cert year.’
    You’d think that this would be the one time when he could have avoided mentioning the L-word, but I suppose, at this stage, he and Mum are so used to mentioning our stupid exams every five seconds that they don’t know how to stop.
    ‘Just one day won’t make any difference,’ said Rachel, taking a bit of toast (her sole diet for the last few days). But my parents didn’t care and sent her off to school. I saw her at lunch – she was surrounded by her mates and I presume everyone is fussing over her. I hope that’s what she wants. Knowing Rachel she might prefer if people just left her alone for a while.
    Anyway, she got through the day okay without breaking down in floods of tears or running out of the classroom, sothat’s something, especially when I remember what she was like on Sunday morning. I don’t want to sound like my parents, but, to be honest, going to school probably was the best thing she could do. I mean, otherwise she’d just have been at home crying and listening to incredibly miserable music again. And at least she’s eating properly now. Mum made a particularly delicious roast chicken in a cunning ploy to make sure Rachel ate, and it worked – no one (apart from vegetarians, obviously) can resist my mum’s roast chicken. Every time I have considered vegetarianism, I have just thought of that chicken. And sausages. And rashers. I don’t think I would be a good vegetarian at all, really.

    Rachel is meeting Tom tomorrow. Apparently he agrees that they ‘have to see each other’. Maybe he has realised that he’s made a terrible mistake and will tell her he wants to go out with her again. People sometimes do stupid things and regret it afterwards. I mean, I once told Mrs Harrington that my mother was going to put her in a book. Obviously dumping your girlfriend is not the same as telling a pointless lie to ateacher, but surely it is possible to break up with someone and then regret it afterwards. Maybe he really was having some sort of life crisis about going to college next year, or something, and broke up with her in a moment of madness. I do hope that’s what it was. She is still so miserable.
    And my parents aren’t helping. It was, of course, their musical rehearsal tonight and they almost didn’t go because they were worried that if they left the house, and Rachel wasn’t under their constant supervision, she would, and I quote, ‘sit around moping’ instead of doing her homework.
    ‘We do understand how awful it is for you,’ said my mother, though I’m not so sure about that. ‘But you’ll actually feel better if you sit down and do some work.’
    ‘Moping’ is possibly my least favourite word ever, because when I was so miserable after Paperboy went to Canada I got accused (by my own best friends, among others) of moping all the time and I hated it. And if anyone actually has an excuse for doing some moping at the moment, it’s Rachel. Not that I would call it moping. I would call it ‘being heartbroken’.
    ‘She’s not moping, Mother!’ I said. ‘It’s not fair to accuse someone of moping when they have just been dumped by their boyfriend who they were going out with for years!’
    ‘Thanks for the reminder, Bex,’ said Rachel, but she didn’tsound angry. In fact, for a moment, she almost