It’s Dominica at the door. She’s grinning behind a big bouquet of flowers. She flings her arms around Helga and embraces her and Helga wants to cry. It’s so good see her without her being covered in all that hideous plastic PPE.

‘I called the ward and they said you’d come home. This is easier without all those damned masks,’ Dominica says.

Helga is so touched that her swimming friends have looked out for her. She couldn’t believe it when she got home earlier in the cab and there was a flask of soup waiting for her and a cake from Claire and the house had been cleaned and her bed freshly made. Claire and Tor had got the spare key from Katie and had come in to clear up and prepare it for her return.

Helga unpacks the delicious-smelling croissants from the bag, along with the butter and jam. She puts on a pot of coffee, delighted to see her friend, but she can tell that something is bothering Dominica.

‘So? What is it? You’ve got something on your mind. I can tell.’

‘Oh God, Helga. You have no idea.’

It’s not like Dominica to be dramatic about anything, so Helga is intrigued by her tone.

‘Go on. Tell me?’

Helga listens, aghast, as Dominica tells her about the call with Jamie on Friday night and how Tor, Claire and Maddy went to the pier. Bill, her supervisor, is not happy with how things went down, but Dominica is unrepentant. What else could she have done? Knowing it was Jamie?

‘You did the right thing,’ Helga assures hers, but now the doorbell rings and Dominica smiles.

‘It’ll be the others. I said on the chat I was coming round and they all wanted to see you too.’

Claire, Maddy and Tor all bustle in and hug Helga warmly and soon they’re all sitting on the sofas whilst Dominica puts the kettle on to top up the coffee.

Helga won’t countenance any talk of her operation or recovery. She needs to know what happened on the pier.

‘You went in after him?’ she asks Maddy. She can’t believe all of this has happened whilst she was lying in that damned hospital bed.

‘Thank God Tor was there, pointing. I saw him and I managed to get a life ring around him.’

‘And Jamie? Is he OK?’ Helga can hardly bear to hear the answer. Oxygen starvation? Brain damage? She knows what happens to people when they end up in the water.

‘They revived him in the lifeboat.’

Maddy starts to cry.

‘We thought for a moment …’ Maddy says, then shakes her head. ‘Claire kicked up enough of a fuss to get the lifeguard out straight away. If she hadn’t have got there in time …’ Maddy takes a hiccuppy breath. ‘That’s all I keep thinking about. How close it was.’

‘You did the right thing. You all did. I told you the Sea-Gals were invincible. Look what you all did.’