She was shopping again. It might have been because they’d run out of instant coffee, even though she preferred fresh, or it might have been some primal hunter-gatherer instinct, she didn’t really know these days. With the kids old enough to look after themselves if she dropped out to the supermarket, and with her husband always occupied with some scheme or other, she had come to see her shopping trips as her special time for herself.

Everything in the display was neat and free from dust. It was like the whole of the world of the supermarket was a three dimensional catalogue of everything you could possibly want. Unlike a catalogue, though, you didn’t just admire the goods from afar, modelled by some strangers. You could reach out and touch anything. It was all here. Just put it in your basket or trolley, take it to the till, and after entering a few digits on the credit card machine, it could be yours right away. She always found something she wanted to take away with her.

Rounding the corner of aisle seven, she noticed that the special offer shelf was in a state of disarray. Checking over her shoulder to see that she wasn’t observed, she hurriedly set about putting it right. It wouldn’t do to leave it like that. The shelves of neatly stacked goods were the ideal, the ordered world she escaped to when everything at home was chaotic and stressful.

Getting back to the car, she found that she’d bought a number of things that she no longer wanted. She had a feeling that she was missing a few things she really needed. She’d be back again tomorrow to see if they were sitting neatly on a shelf somewhere.