Then Jimmy called, out of the blue, and asked to meet. She found herself saying, ‘Sure, okay.’ This was when she realised he was like a drug to her. Not sugar, not alcohol; Jimmy. From a module on addiction medicine, she grimly recalled the William S. Burroughs quote on drugs: ‘Wouldn’t you? Yes, you would.’

Yes, you would, and yes, she did. She met him at a cafe. She felt sweaty, bothered, wary. He wanted to tell her that he was leaving London. He’d accepted a job at a Hong Kong bank, a department with a name that meant nothing to her.

A job in finance in the East – this was what he’d always wanted.

‘Another kind of gambling?’ she asked.

‘Only with other people’s money.’

So: Hong Kong for him and a placement for her. Phoebe was going to Boston for a rotation, as part of an exchange program with Massachusetts General. She had plans to do postgrad after that, then apply for a specialisation. She wanted to be an anaesthetist. (Don’t be a GP, her lecturers had told her early on. As a female GP, you’ll spend your life doing Pap smears.)

She made Jimmy the offer in the cafe before she knew what she was doing. It just came naturally; she wanted to help him, look out for him. She said he could stay at her mother’s place when he first landed if he liked. Deborah liked Jimmy. Phoebe knew she wouldn’t mind.

‘Thanks, Pheebs,’ he said. ‘If you’re sure.’

‘I’ll give her a call.’

They were no longer in touch when she next visited the island, some months later, flying back for a break between one rotation and the next. Fifteen hours from Boston on Cathay Pacific. She landed in a bleary state. Her hair had got longer, more feathery, since London, and she fluffed it with her fingers as she waited at the airport.

‘Good to see you, sweetie,’ said her mother, meeting her in the car park. ‘You look well. Rather better fed.’

‘Thanks, I think,’ she said.

Deborah talked at her the whole drive, mainly about the dog she was planning to get. Phoebe thought she had aged since her divorce. When Phoebe’s father had moved to Thailand with his new wife and their baby, Deborah took over the family business, selling medical supplies. She pushed new product lines, selling eye-lasering equipment and training doctors in how to use it. She often laughed at the fact that people still asked her when she was going home, meaning the UK. ‘I am home,’ Deborah told them with jolly-hockey-sticks good cheer.