It’s 9.20 a.m. now, and back in my own office I check that I have everything I need: the file and its printout, my work mobile that has only work numbers on it, and the master key which will open up the flat, if we need. I even have my coat on already, and yet I somehow don’t feel able to head straight out. Instead I duck into the staff toilets to check myself in the mirror. It’s me in the glass, of course it is, but this morning, the lines of my reflection seem a fraction out of place; when I move, I have the sense that my reflection moves a millisecond too late. It’s fatigue, I tell myself, all that worrying that kept you up and the fact that it was all such a rush this morning. I run the tap, and bend to splash water round my eyes and cool the pouched, raw feeling of lack of sleep. In my handbag I have make-up, things I can use to tidy myself back up. My tube of mascara is running low – I have to push the brush down hard to the bottom – but I get enough to stiffen my lashes and my eyes look brighter after that. I check myself in the mirror again, catching the stray hairs that came loose in the wind and pushing them back into the tight elastic band at the crown of my head. Once that’s done, I look all right, I think. Smart and meticulous. My normal professional self.

Even so, my stomach tightens as I head out of the office. I don’t like this part of my job, I never have: stepping in when people’s lives have gone so wrong, seeing all the mess and muddle that they’ve made. I want to help. In my job, all I’m trying to do is make people safe: getting a roof over their heads; space, security, warmth. I suppose, in a way, it scares me a bit, knowing how easily things can go wrong. How everything might fall apart without you being able to do anything about it.

Outside, I head up the road that rises towards Streatham. Our offices are above a row of shops on Brixton High Street, and the block that we manage is at the bottom of Brixton Hill. Brixton is loud and bright and chaotic: trains on the bridge, buses pushing along the wide road and the pedestrian traffic lights blipping and beeping. The shapes and sounds jangle together, and there’s a smell in the air, like scorched tyres. In the street behind me, someone is shouting and I can’t tell whether it’s in excitement or anger, but I don’t look. Most times, it’s best not to get involved.