We stare vacantly at the image, heads tilted slightly left in perfect unison. The clock ticks above me, snapping me out of a daze, and I snatch the images from their clips. ‘Sounds like an avoidable accident, surely. Have we talked to her about how it happened?’ I file Susan’s X-rays and papers, then reorganise the desk into my preferred system. Emma watches me with a wry smile. ‘What? It works better this way…’ I try, feeling caught out.

She grins. ‘It works perfectly well the other way too,’ she says good-naturedly. ‘Anyway, yes, we did ask, but getting Susan’s story is proving to be a problem.’

‘Why?’ I move to study the rota, getting to grips with today’s team.

‘Well, she isn’t answering our questions. She won’t actually talk at all. We offered her a pad and pen to make notes, in case it hurt her to talk, but she wouldn’t take it. We haven’t been able to identify a next of kin either. There was some ID in her handbag, one of those old paper driving licences, but little else.’

‘She’s not communicating at all?’ I ask, my hand resting on a pile of files stacked high on the desk. ‘Have we tried everything? You said notebook and pen?’ Emma nods. ‘Signing?’ She nods again. I try thinking up alternatives. My heart quickens at the realisation that actually, I’m in charge now, and I need to at least look like I’m on top of things, even if I don’t entirely feel it. My mind goes blank, Emma helps me out.

‘We’ve tried notes, signing, blinking and Morse code,’ she winks. ‘I considered the medium of dance, but apparently it’s not a universal language.’

‘Right.’ I only hear what she’s said after the fact. My focus to stay on top of this mixed bag of emotions pretty much entirely swallows my sense of humour.

‘There’s no evidence to say she can’t talk, nothing on her records. It could be a post-traumatic thing of course, from the accident. We just need to give her time. From what we can tell, there’s no next of kin either.’

‘Okay…’ I look back through Susan’s file again. Mr Barnes’s handwriting spiders across the pages. ‘Of course, this would be a lot more useful if I could actually read it,’ I mutter, turning the file this way and that in an attempt to decipher his words. I ignore the fact that my own penmanship is no better. ‘Oh, ignore me. Sorry! Okay.’ I snap the file shut. ‘Have we lodged it with mental health?’

‘No, actually,’ she answers, and for a second I feel like maybe I do know what I’m doing.

‘Okay, I’ll sort that, no problem. Anything else?’

Emma scans the whiteboard and looks around the desk. ‘I don’t think so,’ she says, still visibly searching her brain for remnants of handover she might have forgotten. There won’t be any. She is admirably organised. Intimidatingly so – or maybe that’s just me. ‘Nope, that’s it.’ She places her hands on her hips. All done.