A BENCH. A vending machine. Night.

To that list now add: a traverse stage design by Victoria Hinton with tiled walls at both ends, one leading to public loos, out of view; three actresses; assorted bags; and the roll of a dice by an audience member. The number on which the dice lands will determine which character each actress will play, with the six configurations depicted on the programme for this Black Toffee Theatre and Harrogate Theatre co-production.

This opening manoeuvre is designed to chime with the 65-minute play's theme, reinforcing the role that chance or choice plays in the outcome of our lives. "I hope you embrace the not knowing what the future might hold, for any of us," says director James Baker in his programme note.

This unpredictability applies too when choosing to see a new play, in this case only the second work by Black Toffee, a new writing company with a penchant for resonant drama with a dark sense of humour, first expressed in Hidden.

York Press:

Seda Yildiz, left, Arabella Gibbins and Laura Lindsay in rehearsal for Parallel. Picture: Anthony Robling

There is however, a more serious issue at hand here: the issue of homelessness in a punchy comedy drama by Black Toffee producer, writer and actress Laura Lindsay that has been developed in association with Crisis and the Harrogate Homeless Trust.

On press night, the dice landed for Lindsay to play Beth, who just came to this place for a think with a bottle of wine after quitting her job that day, having already run out of friends to stay with after her relationship imploded.

Seda Yildiz would play Anna, a pent-up worker bee with one of those modern corporate jobs that everyone else despises, who finds herself stranded with no juice in her mobile, an uptight girlfriend at home, no food, no fags, only a few pennies...and her kittenish boots are killing her.

Arabella Gibbins would be allotted C, who just wants some kip and lays ownership to the bench, the loos and the vending machine, both of which she cleans fastidiously. She calls this place home whenever she's booted out of the hostel and she has so many mental issues, she has more initials after her name than her doctors.

Such a shard of black humour is typical of Lindsay, whose script manages all at once to be acidly witty, pugnacious, caring, streetwise, empathetic and angry, as she depicts how these three women meet by chance late at night, when none of them really wants to be there, yet none of them leaves. She challenges your perceptions of the homeless stereotype, yet can find humour in the lonesome crunching of a carrot.

Watching Lindsay, Yildiz and especially Gibbins in their allotted roles, it is hard to imagine them playing the other parts because their performances are so committed and convincing, but that also makes you want to see Parallel on another night.

Should you be wondering about the title, life has a habit of cutting across the parallel line with the juddering impact of the perpendicular.

Parallel, Black Toffee/Harrogate Theatre, Harrogate Studio Theatre, until tomorrow. Box office: 01423 502116 or at harrogatetheatre.co.uk