Emergency nurses, I realise about two hours into my first night shift, are particularly problematic. They have more skills than ward nurses, which gives them more confidence. The nice ones are a dream to work with. The not-so-nice ones add another layer of anxiety. In the eyes of emergency nurses, all new junior doctors are put on trial. Apparently, they give you a month and then, if they decide they don’t like you, they refuse to help you. With anything. The Godfather slept with the wrong nurse early into his emergency term and he paid for it until his last shift.

‘Katarina, your cannula field isn’t clean enough,’ Mandy, the head nurse in emergency, snaps as she picks up the cannulation equipment I’ve arranged in order to stick a drip in a seriously dehydrated patient. ‘I’m throwing it out. Get yourself another one and I’m going to watch and see that you’re doing it properly.’

‘Maybe you can put the cannula in, Mandy,’ I suggest. ‘I’ve got five patients at the moment and one is about to go into theatre.’

‘I’m not up to date with my accreditation,’ she says smugly, ‘so you have to do it.’

Nurses love not being up to date with their accreditation, which is an excuse not to work. Doctors don’t need to be accredited or taught new skills. We’re just expected to learn on the job.

‘It’s all right, Kitty.’ James, one of the other doctors, appears next to me. ‘I’ll do it for you.’

He rolls his eyes as Mandy storms off in a huff, annoyed that I have managed to avoid her on-the-spot cannulation assessment.

‘Thanks, mate,’ I say, feeling grateful I am on with decent doctors tonight. ‘Appreciate it.’

It’s nearly midnight, and James and I still have a good nine hours ahead of us. Maybe tonight there won’t be many patients, I think hopefully.

I walk around the corner to have a look in the waiting room.

Every chair is full. Some of the people waiting try to catch my eye. Their expressions are angry, as if saying, ‘We know you’re a doctor—why haven’t I been seen yet?’ I feel my stomach clench.

When Max did his emergency term, he told me, he started altering his opening line when he saw patients. ‘If they look well and the triage says they’ve come in for something like, I don’t know, elbow pain they’ve had for a year, I used to open with: “Good evening, I’m the doctor seeing you tonight. What is your emergency?”’

I like that. ‘What is your emergency?’ I practise, trying not to sound as passive aggressive as I am feeling.

I walk back to the main department, where the doctors on the shift before mine are finishing up, leaving me, James and Matt, the senior, on overnight.