“God, Jem.” Rosie used the heel of her hand to wipe her eyes. “I thought kids grew out of asthma. Shouldn’t you be growing out of it by now?”

Her indignation made Jem smile. “My birth mother smoked pretty much everything she could get her hands on while she was pregnant with me. Crack, heroin, you name it. She shot me out eight weeks early and basically buggered up my lungs.”

“That was good of her,” Rosie said with admirable diplomacy.

“Yeah. Needless to say, I’ve never tried to track her down. On the bright side, Harriet’s kept me stable for about ten years now. Tonight was a blip, but there were extenuating circumstances, so I’m hoping a blip is all it was.”

“Ten years, eh?” Rosie nibbled on a smoke-blackened thumbnail. “And she’s your respiratory specialist?”

“Yes,” Jem said, busy working the sums out in her head. “It’s more than ten. Blimey, thirteen, I think. I was referred to her just before I started as an ambulance tech.” She stopped counting on her fingers and looked at Rosie, who seemed to have developed a series of nervous twitches, chewing a nail one moment and twisting her hair into a knot the next. Jem buried a laugh behind her blanket. “She’s lovely, isn’t she?” she said, adding a wistful sigh for maximum effect.

“Aye,” Rosie said, her hair so snarled around her pinkie that it had whitened the tip.

“She’s also very straight,” Jem added.

“Really?” Rosie frowned and slowly unravelled her little finger. “But I thought you and her had had a thing.” She folded her arms, obviously stumped. “Have you never had a thing?”

“Nope. She’s married to an orthopaedic surgeon called David, and they have two precocious children. What the hell is wrong with your gaydar?”

Rosie shook her head in dismay, but she was starting to laugh. “Clearly it’s defective. You just…you finish each other’s sentences, for fuck’s sake. If you were on the telly, I’d definitely ship you.”

Jem covered her face with her hands. “Bloody Nora. Please don’t ever repeat this conversation in front of her.”

Rosie waited until Jem peeked out, and then gave her a Scout’s honour salute, looking delighted. She had probably been worrying about Harriet since that night in the wood with Kyle Parker. “My lips are sealed,” she said, and checked her watch. “Your thirty minutes are up. Are you ready for the return trek?”

“As I’ll ever be.” Clutching her drip on one side, Jem took Rosie’s hand and managed to stand. “Nothing to it,” she said, tottering through a head rush that almost knocked her back onto her arse. Three steps across, she stopped to cough and felt Rosie slip an arm around her.

“Easy, I’ve got you,” Rosie said.