It came to me this spring, when pink buds grew from dead branches, and I finally talked about millennium night: those eighteen minutes of pummelling life into someone and the five mind-altering months that followed it. Euphoria, love, rejection, failure. I’ve been cycling through that same sequence ever since.

Until the counselling forced me to admit that I can’t save everyone. That sometimes even the doctor’s basic law, first do no harm, is an almost insurmountable challenge.

‘Kerry?’

‘Sorry. I was thinking about your question.’

‘And?’

‘I . . .’ I am about to bottle it, tell him I still need him, when I remember a patient from the weekend. ‘There was this woman on Saturday. Younger than me. She’d been knocked off her bike. She arrested in the ambulance; we took over resus. Kept going for a very long time because you could see she was fit, capable of surviving most things.

‘But it didn’t work. When we removed her helmet, we could see why she was never going to make it – her whole head . . . well, her injuries were not compatible with life.

‘For the first time I can remember, I knew there was nothing more I could have done. We had a debrief and when I took the newest member of the team into a side room – it was his first resuscitation – I held him and I told him it was OK to cry. And I meant it.’

Earl nods.

I expect to cry again now but it doesn’t happen. ‘I’m done.’

It’s the first Saturday in August and Tim is over for a conference: he’s been the headline speaker, talking about what developing countries can teach other nations about maternal health.

I doubt the delegates would recognize the Tim who has just danced non-stop to The Human League. We’re at Pride with a couple of doctor friends from A & E. NO canisters are scattered like bullets all over the park and I feel sorry for colleagues who’ll be dealing with the aftermath later.

‘Keynote speaker and you’ve got the moves, Tim,’ I say when the others go to get more beer.

‘Yep. Who’s the daddy?’

‘You’re the daddy!’

And he is. He and Maria finally became parents last September, when they adopted three-year-old Julia and her baby brother Andreas. It’s his first overnight away from them. He got the early flight into London this morning and is heading home first thing tomorrow.

‘I’ve got the wrinkles to show for it.’ He grins at me. ‘Whereas you are all zen and glowing, like you walked off the set of Grey’s Anatomy.’

‘Ha. Hardly. But I do feel better.’

‘The counselling has helped?’

‘Massively. My only problem these days is I’m about to start a stint in ICU, which I suspect will be a deadly combination of dull and scary.’

Tim laughs. ‘I meant to mention, I’ve found you the perfect specialty.’