‘Ah, so you must be Flo,’ she said, lowering her hand and feeling pleasantly surprised when the little tabby walked towards her, tipped her head and started rubbing it round and round against her fingers, her tail pointing straight upwards as she arched her back and purred loudly. ‘Well, I can see we’re going to get along just fine, aren’t we, sweetie?’ She tried to remember which cupboard held the clean cat bowls and found them on the third attempt. Her memory, quite worryingly, wasn’t as good recently as it had once been. ‘Now, let’s find you some breakfast, shall we?’

The first day in any new place always felt a bit unsettling. Not knowing where things were, or how things worked. She’d moved around a lot as various theatrical productions she’d been involved with had toured the country. It was a life she had chosen long ago and had grown used to. Two or three nights in one town, then maybe a week or two in another and, if she was lucky, a few days back at home in between. Different dressing rooms, different guesthouses and hotels, different rules. A changing circle of colleagues and crew members and friends, some of whom she would come across often and some she would never meet again. Her face and her name on the posters outside greeted her at every theatre they went to, sometimes in a leading role, sometimes (and more frequently as she grew older) just as one of the supporting cast, but she always made a point of keeping a programme to add to her vast collection. She had even been in a TV soap once, although only for a dozen or so episodes, and still had the Radio Times to prove it.

This, she told herself, peering through the curtains at the lane outside, was going to be just the same. A new place to explore, a new bed to sleep in, new people to meet, and then home again to touch base and await whatever opportunities might follow. Was there any call for a damaged ageing actress without a full head of hair? She hoped so, but it had become all too easy lately to look at life more pessimistically. Just four months ago she had been utterly oblivious to what was going on inside her own body, those horrid little rogue cells gathering together and ganging up on her, determined to do their worst. But she was rid of them now and, despite the surgery and the chemo, she was still here. She had survived and, apart from occasional visits from Betty next door to check she was doing okay or to get her heavier bits of shopping in, she’d done it alone. And from now on it was all about recovery, regaining her strength and her positivity, making time for herself for a change. She fought back the tears that so often threatened to overwhelm her. What good would it do to cry? It would change nothing and, besides, the worst was surely over now. Life could only get better.