And yet … although she was secretly starting to enjoy David’s dry sense of humour, there was definitely a shrewdness behind his affable exterior. It wasn’t just book-intelligence; he did seem to ‘get people’, as Kasia had pointed out. David seemed to see things in people they didn’t even see themselves.

‘I believe,’ she replied, carefully, ‘there’s room for a broad spectrum of methodology under the umbrella of therapeutic intervention.’

‘Really? As someone once muttered in my direction, “In English?”’

They were at the Wellness Centre door now – the walk had gone much more quickly than normal – and David was holding Tara’s gaze with that quizzical, look-into-my-eyes-not-around-the-eyes directness, as if he was waiting for the real answer. Feeling herself slipping into another inappropriately honest comment, Tara blurted out one of Justin’s meaningless space fillers. ‘It is what it is, isn’t it?’

She couldn’t break their gaze. Now she looked closely, David had unusual eyes – a delicate tiger-striped hazel, the colour of the polished oak staircase – that seemed to see right inside her. And one or two pale brown freckles on his nose that she hadn’t noticed before. He smiled, as if he could hear her thoughts, and Tara visualized fuzziness in her head. Fibre glass. Packing chips. Bubble wrap. What were you meant to do to fool hypnotists?

Wordlessly, David held the door open for her and Tara swept in, not entirely sure how the conversation had ended. Inside, Chloe the receptionist was obscured by a huge bouquet, with several therapists crowded round it.

‘They’re for you, Tara!’ Judith announced before anyone else could, and the reception committee swung round to catch her reaction, which was not positive.

Tara wasn’t a fan of bouquets. They never boded well, in her experience. Generous bunches of flowers had arrived on a regular basis throughout her childhood, usually just before or just after Dad went away for a few days; Mum seemed miserable or furious as she dismembered the arrangement into a vase, not swoony with delight like women on the television. The open-plan downstairs of the house was always filled with roses and dahlias from their own garden, so Dad’s hothouse bouquets ended up in Tara’s room, where she had to look at the slowly wilting lilies and wonder what was going on. Luckily Justin hadn’t been one for sending flowers – or doing anything controversial enough to need to apologize florally – so it hadn’t been much of a problem in her adult life.

Dad, she thought. He thinks he’s overstepped the mark so he’s sent me flowers to apologize. The last bouquet he’d given Tara was on the day of her graduation, and she’d had to leave them with her old next-door neighbour.

‘White roses,’ Hero informed her, solemnly, ‘are a magical symbol of innocent love and new beginnings. It’s a beautiful gesture. Although totally unjustifiable in an air-miles sense.’