Maud didn’t remember her dreams often. When she did, they usually featured food and eating food, often ferociously. Mum’s lasagne, Nani’s Biryani, anything in any fridge or cupboard. And the relief that came with it. Relief was Maud’s favourite feeling.

‘I will never, never, not love you my little Maudie,’ Tony had been seeing his “little Maudie” for the last 2 months. He had big, round eyes that bulged out of their sockets, waiting to be looked into. He only ate frozen food, mainly chicken nuggets with big smiley faces on them, that his mum would buy, cook, and bring up to his room.

‘I had a dream you were feeding me those. You said that the more you eat the happier I’d be,’ Maud hinted. ‘Cos of the smileys.’

She smirked. Tony looked bewildered, like a dead squirrel. His lifeless eyes stared into the void.

‘I only have four left,’ He shoved another one in his mouth, ‘Now three,’

Flying chicken nugget spit landed onto Maud’s bottom lip. She instinctively licked it off. Yes, she was disgusted. Her belly grumbled; she gazed at her sunken navel.

‘You can have half of one.’ He finished chewing.

‘No, that’s fine,’ Maud’s eyes crinkled like she was trying to smile.

‘Please? Have half?’

‘But you only have two left,’ she said, sarcastically. He didn’t get it.

‘Okay well, fine, but the offer is there,’ He picked up his penultimate nugget and engulfed it in a gulp. ‘Come here.’ He rubbed the grease off his fingers onto the bedsheet.

Maud twisted her legs round and slipped them between his, nestling her head on his chest, her scalp married to his pointy chin. It stabbed her with every chew. The wet, chicken nugget cave approached her forehead. The hot stench wafted out from the gaps in his grin. A kiss.

‘Sure. I can’t tempt you?’  He dangled half a chicken nugget in front of her face.

‘It’s all yours,’ Maud sat up and kissed him back on the cheek. She looked at her phone and saw the time. ‘I’m seeing Lena tonight; I should go home and shower.’

‘We could shower here?’

“No. I’m good.” Maud politely declined as she waltzed out of his room, past his freshly folded boxers and out of his front door.

‘Thank you, Mrs Cooke!’

Tony’s mother never interacted with Maud.

When Maud got home, she lay on her bed, still as a sirloin steak on a vegan’s plate. She was, naturally, in the recovery position. She rested her head on the pillow, like it was a shoulder, and dreamt of affection. Amongst her all-consuming inner monologue, a vow to never be in the same room as a happy chicken nugget ever again, played on repeat. She dozed off into a bakery.