‘Will you give me twenty minutes?’ he asks me. ‘I’ll be on a break then. Will you wait here until then?’

There is a little line of chairs by reception. I point to them. ‘Can I sit here?’ The nurse on reception is watching us the whole time. ‘Will that be okay?’ I ask him too, and he just shrugs.

Alastair and the boy head through the main doors to the ward and they fall closed, snicking behind him. I sit down and place my handbag on the chair beside me, sliding my hands between my thighs. I try not to think too hard about where I am. I should have eaten something before I came. I’m feeling light-headed. But I will wait for Alastair and then we will talk. It’s all right, I tell myself. It’s all right.

On the clock on the wall above reception, the hands seem to move very slowly. The reception phone rings; the nurse on duty answers it and there’s a murmured conversation. From where I am sitting, I can see through the doors with their big glass panels into the main ward inside. There’s one bed in particular, with blue and red balloons all around it. Maybe just to say get well, or maybe for a birthday. When children are in here long enough, I imagine all kinds of dates come and go. There is a girl in the bed with a tube in her nose. I have no idea what she might be in there for, but what I see is her family gathered round her bed. I can see a woman who looks to be her mother sitting at the head, a man in a chair on the other side. And I see a couple, what looks to be grandparents, by the side of the bed.

The memories come, as I feared they would. I try to push them down but they keep rising, ballooning into my mind. The shock and the panic, arriving at the hospital. The medics rushing up to us, me, Mum and Dad, then rushing away with that little body in their arms … And how later they came back, they came back and told me—

I jerk round at the hand on my shoulder: Alastair, here beside me. ‘I’m free now,’ he says, ‘if you want to talk.’

We go to the big hospital canteen, which reminds me of the one at my old high school: low ceiling, strange smell. I mention this to Alistair, trying to ease the tension, trying to let him know a little more about myself. He just smiles tightly and nods in reply.

We order our drinks: him a coffee and me a green tea. As we queue, it feels as if we’re on some strange, terrible date. We each pay for our own drinks though. I put three sachets of sugar in mine, hoping it will stabilize my dizziness. I’ve dressed smartly to come here, but in the mirror this morning, I could see I looked unwell.