“ Georgia, must it be now?”

“Well… yes. If you don’t mind.”

“And if I do?”

“I’d still like it.”

“Oh all right. “Linda put the remote down, folded her arms, and looked at her. “What is it?”

“It’s… well, Linda, I’m finding it all so hard. The series, the rehearsals, all of it. Mostly Bryn Merrick. He just doesn’t like me, and that makes me nervous. You know I still feel… bad about the accident, and I’m still so aware of what they must think of me. And today I totally blew a scene, and everyone was so… so, like, hostile to me, and I cried all the way home. I wondered if you could help, have a word with Bryn or something, or even if I should just resign or something, let them get someone else for Rose…”

She had never seen Linda totally lose it. Which was what happened then. She put down her cup, stood up and folded her arms, and confronted her across the room.

“ Georgia, I’m finding something hard too, and I’ll tell you what it is. You. You and your self-obsessed, pathetic attitude. You get this part, this amazing opportunity, and ever since the very beginning you’ve whinged about it. I can tell you I wouldn’t like you either if I was on that production. It is of no interest to them whatsoever that you’ve had a traumatic time and you’re suffering from survivor blame or whatever it’s called; although I’m sure initially they were very sympathetic. You’re been hired to do a job. Grow up. Life’s tough. Get used to it. And find yourself somewhere to live in the process.”

And then she turned and walked out of the room and into her own and slammed the door shut.

Georgia didn’t go to bed at all that night. She sat in the big comfy chair in her room, fully clothed, in a state of shock. She kept hearing what Linda had said, replayed it over and over again in her head, trying to make sense of it, trying to believe that Linda could have been so horrible to her; but as the night wore on, a small, sneaky voice began to tell her that there might, actually, be at least something in what she had said. She still felt Linda had been totally out of order and she should have seen that it was support that Georgia needed, not a bollocking, but as long as she could get out of the flat and in somewhere else… Someone had suggested the YMCA, which Georgia had been horrified by at the time, but it would be better than hanging around crowding Linda’s space.

At six o’clock, she got up and packed, wrote a note telling Linda she wouldn’t be getting in her way any longer, and called a cab and went to the church hall where rehearsals took place. She knew the cleaners came at six, but she hadn’t bargained on Merlin being there.

“Heavy night?” he said sympathetically, and, “No,” she said, “not in that way,” and started to cry.

Merlin was wonderful; he found her a box of Kleenex and sat down beside her, put his arm round her, and asked her to tell him what the matter was.

Which, having recovered from the considerable shock of finding herself where she had dreamed for the past four weeks-in close physical contact with Merlin Gerard, which suddenly wasn’t particularly exciting, but just cosy and comforting-she did.

All of it.

He really was very sweet: he said he could imagine how terrible she must have felt about the crash, and he’d really felt for her… “so vile, the tabloids,” but he told her no one else had really taken it in at all.

“They all really like you, Georgia. Davina’s always saying what a sweetheart you are, and I know Bryn can be awkward, but he’s a perfectionist, and he’s not remotely regretting casting you. You’re doing really well. You’re very talented, you know; you should believe in yourself a bit more.”

Georgia sniffed. “I don’t feel very talented. I don’t feel talented at all.”

“Well, you are. Now, look, I really have to get on; I came in early to catch up on some stuff, and if Mo finds me sitting here having a goss with you she’ll get very sniffy. But… what are you doing this evening?”

“Nothing,” said Georgia, trying very hard to believe this was actually happening. “Probably trying to find a park bench.”

“Why? Oh, yeah, Linda’s thrown you out. I’m sure she didn’t mean it. But it would be nice to have somewhere of your own. Anyway, I think I can probably help. Hang around if you finish before me and then we’ll go for a drink and I’ll tell you about it.”

He gave her a quick kiss and disappeared into the kitchen; Georgia went through the rest of the day in a trance.

Merlin’s help came in the form of his friend Jazz, whom he’d been at school with; Jazz helped his dad with his building business and what he called his property empire, which was the ownership of two large, crumbling houses the wrong end of the Portobello Road.

“They’re divided into bed-sits,” Merlin said, “and there’s usually at least a couple looking for occupants. I’ll give him a call.”

Jazz said he did have one, and if Merlin would bring Georgia round in an hour or so, he’d show it to her.

Jazz was fun: she liked him. He was taller than Merlin, and heavily built, with close-cropped black hair and almost black eyes; he kept punching Merlin on the arm and calling him his old mate; he also argued with him a lot, mocked his job, and told him more than once that he was a bloody great poof.

“Pardon my French,” he said, grinning, seeing Georgia ’s face, “just a joke-got stuck with it at school, didn’t you, mate? I thought so meself for a bit, used to stand with me back to the wall when he was around, but don’t you worry, my love; nothing fairylike about our Merl. OK, let’s go and have a look at this accommodation, shall we?”

It was pretty grim, right at the top of the house, one of two converted attics, and very cold. It had a gas ring and a sink behind a curtain, and a money-in-the-slot electric meter, and the bathroom was a floor down, not dirty exactly, but grubby, freezing cold, with stains in the bath and a suspicious wetness round the base of the loo. It was all a bit smelly.

But it had brilliant views, through a rather sweet little dormer window… and she loved the way the ceiling sloped almost to the floor on two sides. And it would be hers. Her very own home. She said she’d take it.

“Right-o,” said Jazz, “it’s yours. Next door’s some bloke who works for a charity real do-gooder. Won’t cause you no trouble. Anyone does, you just let me know. But we don’t take none of your rough types; they’re mostly a nice crowd, lotta females-you’ll be fine.”

And she was.

She replaced the filthy curtain that shielded the kitchen with a bamboo screen and bought some thick blinds at IKEA, and a gorgeous white furry throw for her bed and another for the lumpy armchair, which she supposed was what made the rooms officially bed-sits… and she bought a convector heater, which ate money, but even so, she was cold a lot of the time.

Nonetheless, she loved it; it was hers, her very own home that she was paying for; she felt independent and pleased with herself, and that kept her going through the very tough times she continued to have on the series.

She had also formed a hugely supportive friendship with Anna.

Anna had had a great life; she had trained as a classical singer, fallen in love with a jazz pianist called Sim Foster, and ran away with him. Georgia could see how it had happened; she was astonishingly glamorous and sexy out of makeup and looked far younger than her sixty years. She said she loved character roles: “The less I’m like myself the better I like it.”