‘You can’t think like that. These things happen. It’s nobody’s fault, and certainly not yours. Now, come on, wipe that miserable expression away. Flo won’t want to see you looking sad. She’ll just be glad her mummy’s home.’

‘You make her sound like she’s my child, not my cat.’

‘Same thing really. Flo’s family.’

‘Yes, she is, isn’t she?’

They climbed out of the cab, Sian pushing Prue’s purse away and insisting on paying the fare, and they hurried up the narrow lane towards the surgery. The bells were silent for a change.

‘No Donny tonight?’

‘It’s football on Thursdays, remember? And besides, it’s almost ten o’clock!’

‘Is it? I’d lost track.’

‘Actually, there’s talk of our Donny taking up other interests, thanks to your house guest, so we may yet be spared!’

‘I’m curious. And relieved! Tell me later.’

Once inside, Sian ushered Prue straight through to the back room and to the wire cage at the end where Flo lay sleeping on a blanket. Prue felt her heart lurch when she saw her, looking so small and helpless. ‘Hello, sweetie. Have you missed me?’

Flo tried to lift her head, swathed in bandages so Prue couldn’t even see her ears. One eye was swollen and almost closed, one leg held straight by some kind of splint-like contraption, and there was an IV line feeding her fluids.

‘Oh …’

‘It’s not as bad as it looks. Her leg is fractured but her skull isn’t, thank God.’

‘But the blood … you said on the phone that there was blood.’

‘She was quite badly cut, so your dad’s had to stitch her up, and she’s lost a couple of teeth, that’s all. Her poor old mouth’s taken a bit of a battering lately, what with one thing and another. She’s still in shock, Prue, and she’ll be very sleepy for a while, from the drugs we’ve given her, but she’s been incredibly lucky, especially considering her age. Here, I’ll open up, then you can stroke her. Gently, mind.’

Prue nodded, feeling her best friend’s arms close around her. And that was when she finally allowed herself to cry.

Prue sat in her mum’s kitchen the next morning, nursing a cup of tea.

‘You were so late last night I must have nodded off waiting for you. Your father says you were at the surgery until nearly midnight!’

‘I had to make sure she was okay. Thanks for the bed though, not that I actually got a lot of sleep.’

‘Well, you must have slept eventually or you wouldn’t have got up so late. Still, it’s good to have you back, love. I assume you’ll be staying? Not swanning back to London again?’

‘There was no swanning involved, Mum. I needed a break. A short break, to get my head together. I was always coming back.’

‘Glad to hear it. And have you? Got your head together?’

‘Getting there.’

‘No pining over what’s not to be? Because he’s not good enough for you, you know. That Joe Barton. Never was.’