‘I… my relationship with Joan is not dysfunctional.’ My voice was a hoarse croak. ‘I’m helping out a neighbour – a friend – who is very ill. I don’t want to be the kind of selfish person who wouldn’t do that!’

‘So what’s next on the Dream List, then?’

‘How can I think about the Dream List when three days ago I found a woman unconscious on her bedroom floor? A woman who has no one else to pack a bag and take her clean pyjamas to the hospital, or to step up and take care of her child, so she doesn’t have to go and live with strangers in foster care? I’ve not had a spare second to think, let alone plan some stupid fantasy night out.’

‘That’s my whole point,’ Steph said, sounding calmer now. ‘You’ve not had a spare second, Ollie, because you’ve taken on the responsibility of fixing this whole situation. Other neighbours would drop a meal round, take a bag to hospital or offer to watch Joan after school. They wouldn’t expect to do all of those things, along with everything else, turning their entire life upside down indefinitely.’

She paused, but I had nothing to say in reply.

‘I know you want to help. It’s the right thing to do. But you have two choices here. Slip back into your old negative patterns, creating another cycle of unhealthy dependency. Or, you can use this opportunity to figure out the boundary between being a kind and decent person, and someone who is kind or decent to herself. It isn’t up to you to fix this.’

‘They haven’t got anyone else,’ I said, my voice hollow.

‘That’s exactly what you always said about Tina,’ Steph replied gently. ‘I love you like a sister, Ollie. You know that. Please, promise me you’ll at least think about what I’ve said.’

‘I have to go.’ I stopped, rephrased that. ‘Actually, I’m choosing to end this conversation.’

I didn’t promise, but Steph knew I didn’t have to. We had weathered too many storms together to allow a tough conversation to knock us off track. The least I owed my best friend was to think about what she’d said. Which of course I did, almost continuously, like a wire brush scrubbing away at my skull.

In the end, after two more days of relentlessly churning it over while frantically racing between the hospital and work meetings, picking up Joan from her holiday club and walking Nesbit, I reached some conclusions. I would care for Joan for as long as she needed me. It was the right thing to do, and children’s services would have to prise her out of my hands before they moved her away from her home or her dog. And I would help Joan find her grandparents, as soon as possible.