As she does so, Kat allows herself to enjoy the deep curve of her arm muscles, and the feel of their hard strength underneath her palms. There was a time when she could sink her fingers into her flesh, and it would yield with pathetic acquiescence. But her dad had a punchbag on the farm, hanging in the centre of a dilapidated barn, and one night he invited her to train with him. Kat hated sport at school: the pressure of trying not to screw up in team sports, or the loneliness of losing individual ones alone. But Kat found that she loved boxing, as long as her only opponent was a heavy leather sack. She’d done enough damage to other people by then.

Her father had never married, preferring the simplicity of mates down the pub and dogs back home. But even though Kat was just the product of her mum’s backpacking trip after finishing college, and lived half a world away from him, he’d always acknowledged his responsibility to her. There were cards at Christmas and birthdays, and even the odd phone call. And when Dr Sharp said she could leave the unit, he’d invited her to stay.

As a 16-year-old town dweller just released from a mental health clinic, Kat had wondered whether she could survive on a remote farm in the Australian outback. But in the end, she thrived. Her father, who’d only been a pen pal before then, turned out to be her kindred spirit, and the physical farm work helped toughen her body. The guilt didn’t go, but it kept its distance. Even enough for her to meet someone special a few years in. Vic. Their relationship fizzled out in the end, but it was real while it lasted. Solid. Something she’d considered impossible before she fled the UK.

Kat might have stayed on the farm forever if her dad had noticed the cancer growing on his skin, or bothered to tell a doctor about it when he finally did. They buried him on the farm – that was never up for debate – and as Kat helped cover his coffin in red soil, she’d felt her connection with Australia snap like a dry rubber band. Three days after the funeral, she’d signed ownership of the farm over to her father’s right-hand man and best friend – Shane had kept the farm going throughout her dad’s illness and deserved that and more. Then she’d flown back to England to make a fresh start for a second time. She’d thought that her years in Australia would have made her strong enough to cope with the other side of her family, to not care about being the runt of an alien litter. But it didn’t work out that way, so as soon as she could, she escaped again – to London this time.