As I head off to check who is next, I overhear my colleagues talking about plans for tonight. It’s one of the other junior doctors’ birthdays, but I won’t go, and they have no idea it’s my birthday in four days. There’s nothing in my job description saying I have to bond over tears or tea or G&Ts in the pub round the corner.

I prefer a glass of wine alone; that way, if I get mopey, I don’t inflict it on anyone else.

My current low mood is just a phase. I did complete the PHQ-9 out of curiosity, and my scores were a tad high, but it’s not actual depression. I don’t cry or anything. OK, there are days when I feel like I’m going through the motions, but there are other days when this job makes my heart soar.

Though when was the last time I had a day like that?

I shake my head to rid myself of my thoughts – too much introspection is a bad thing – and go to find that coffee.

‘They’re knocking the bungalow down?!’

I don’t come home often, so I never even saw the FOR SALE sign. I haven’t seen the builders move in, or the barriers erected.

‘Are you sad?’ Mum says, standing behind me as we look through the lounge window at the shell of the building: the windows have been removed and Elaine’s favourite toile de Jouy wallpaper is just visible through the holes left behind.

This is dangerous territory, but I check myself. I feel nothing. ‘No. Though we had some good times there.’

When Tim asked about selling, so he and Maria can buy a permanent place now they’re going through the adoption process, I didn’t mind. He insisted on giving me a percentage, even though I never thought of the place as mine.

‘You do know you can talk to me about anything, don’t you, Kerry?’

I spin round to face my mum. ‘Why do you say that?’

She shrugs. ‘Well, I worry. It’s a mother’s prerogative.’

‘Do you worry about Marilyn?’

‘Ha! No. She’s an open book.’

‘And I’m a closed one. Doesn’t mean there’s anything sinister buried in my pages, does it?’

‘Sorry. I’ll button it again now.’ She mimes it, pressing her lips together.

‘Mum, I’m fine.’

‘Auntie Kerry, come through, we’re doing karaoke,’ Ava calls through from the family room. She’s my sister’s minime but all the qualities that drove me mad in Marilyn when we were kids – the preciousness, the demands to be the centre of attention at all times – seem utterly adorable in my niece.