An hour and a half after my allotted appointment time, I get an X-ray and then, after more waiting, I hobble in to see the consultant, Mr Brown. Greg follows me.

When I’m up on the couch, the consultant hums and hahs over my foot. The X-ray goes up on the wall.

Then Mr Brown takes off his glasses. ‘Well,’ he says, ‘your foot has healed marvellously, Mrs Ashton. You have the bones of a woman half your age.’

That’s a good thing, I know – but somehow I can’t get excited about it. If he’d said I had the face of a woman half my age then I’d have been whooping.

‘Have you been having physio sessions?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then you can start to walk on it from today,’ he continues, but I’m not really listening. Who cares how long it takes to heal now?

‘Take it gently at first, then gradually build it up. You’ll be as right as rain before you know it.’

Mr Brown helps me off the couch and, for the first time in weeks, I can put my weight on my foot. It feels a bit weak but, other than that, not too bad at all.

‘Keep one crutch,’ the consultant suggests. ‘It will help with the balance.’

‘Thank you.’ It looks as if I might have been fit enough to go to Peru, after all. A bitter taste rises to my mouth. But I’m not going. So who cares?

Outside in the corridor, Greg takes my arm. ‘Need a hand?’

‘I’m fine.’ I limp towards the car park.

‘It’s good news.’

‘Marvellous.’

‘I thought you would be pleased,’ my husband says, perplexed.

‘I am,’ I snap. ‘Overjoyed. I might just do a happy dance in a minute.’

Now he looks alarmed. ‘The consultant said to take it easy.’

‘That’s why I’m managing to restrain myself.’

Greg turns me to face him. ‘Is this because you can’t go to Peru?’

‘How very perceptive of you.’

‘There’s no need to be like that.’ He sighs at me. ‘I didn’t want you to go because I was worried about you. Because I didn’t want you to go on your own.’

Because you don’t understand my needs. Because you’re happy with your life and I’m not.

‘I don’t want a conversation about this,’ I tell my husband. ‘Not now.’ My disappointment is too raw, too painful, too all-encompassing.

‘We could do something else instead.’

I hope that Greg has thought about this very carefully, because if he suggests going to Cromer for the weekend as a substitute, I may just have to batter him to death with my one remaining crutch.

Chapter 105

Chapter 105

‘It didn’t quite work out the way I planned,’ Lauren says, ‘but, bizarrely, I’m so glad it didn’t. I never thought I’d hear myself say that.’