‘How about scrambled eggs on toast?’ she suggests. ‘That’s what my mum always made me when I was feeling poorly.’

‘Sounds great.’ I don’t even like eggs, but knowing they’ll be cooked for me by someone who cares, who hasn’t written me off, despite all I’ve done, makes them sound like the most delicious meal ever.

She stands up. ‘Don’t you dare go anywhere.’

‘I’m too much of a coward to risk your anger, Kerry.’

She opens the door, then turns back. ‘To answer your question. It’s because otherwise, what’s been the point of any of it?’

‘Huh?’

‘The reason I’ve stuck around. It’s because I am too stubborn to give up on either of you.’

Chapter 31: Kerry

5 June 2004

The detox was the easy bit.

Now we’ve got to give him a reason to stay clean, and alive, or it was a total waste of time.

‘He needs something to keep him distracted. How about ballroom dancing?’ Ant says, keeping his voice down. We’ve sneaked downstairs after Joel has finally fallen asleep.

Weirdly, Joel has been glued to a new Bruce Forsyth show where celebrities try ballroom dancing. ‘I doubt learning the foxtrot would be enough to keep him off the hard stuff.’

‘Some day trips, then?’

‘Would riding the rollercoasters at Thorpe Park give him a greater sense of purpose?’

We’re eight days past the intervention and beginning to make tentative plans for the rest of Joel’s life.

Ant laughs. ‘I was thinking about something a bit more meaningful. A cemetery tour?’

‘That would only work if he was afraid of dying.’

Ant gets up, opens a couple of beers and hands one to me. ‘You know, he went through a bad patch once before, last summer. Stopped turning up for his shifts, hung out with the wrong people.’

‘You’ve no idea why?’

Ant shakes his head. ‘It was like being on the shore and watching a boat get further and further away. I tried, but it happened after Dad had another stroke, and I only had so much to give.’

‘I’m sorry about your father.’

‘Yeah. He’s more stable now but not the man he was. Old age sucks. But losing Joel would have been so much worse. He’s been my best mate my whole life.’

‘I hope he’s out of the woods.’

‘Thanks to you. I still don’t get why you’ve done so much for him, Kerry. Unless you are an actual saint.’

I take a swig of the beer. It’s a question I keep asking myself. Why didn’t I turn around and leave him in that squat? I’d gone there to shout at him, not rescue him.