Penny

Female | 30s | under 3 minutes
Starts on page 36

EXTRACT: Look .... I didn't drop round to practise my ikebana. I 've got some news and I want to try it on you first because I haven't got a c l u e how to tell Carl , and maybe you'll have a suggestion .... You know him better than I do ....It's not bad. It's good. I think. We're pregnant.... "We" as in "me". Well , not "we" as in "me" exactly. We, as in Terry and me. She's going to be the mother mother, and I 'm going to be the other mother .... You're lost for words.

Julie

Female | 30s | under 3 minutes
Starts on page 46

EXTRACT: He hit me again. He threw the book on the table and said he was going for a run .... He left the house. I was so cold. Freezing. When I stopped crying I put a coat on. Then I looked for my keys. I looked for them everywhere. But I couldn't find them. He'd taken them with him.

Penny

Female | 30s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 70

EXTRACT: The lights are on in a timer in the animal room. Simulated day follows simulated night with the occasional variation for scientific purposes. We go in and the lights are on. Cages stacked on cages, and the doors lolling open just as I left them, and the animals, all the rats and fucking frogs and rabbits , sitting there just as I left them, blinking at me sadly through the bars . None of them budged eh? Except that one bold little frog. Freedom a movement away and the rest of them still waiting in the animal room.