‘What I’m hearing – and tell me if this sounds remotely true to you – is that sometimes you have to go to extremes just to feel something. To fight for that joy that’s actually your birthright.’

My head turned away from her, my burning eyes dropped to the ground. Here we were, right where Mum wanted me to be, discussing what a monumental fuck-up I was.

I spat my words out. ‘When I’m crying on the floor of a toilet or puking my guts up on the Kings Road with an ambulance on its way – trust me, there’s not much joy going on.’

I was shaking now, my face scalding hot. Amber stayed quiet, the few seconds of silence stretching like elastic.

‘And I believe you. You’re an intelligent, assured woman. I know you don’t want to be risking your life.’

‘You say that, but the fact is I do it to myself…’ It sounded tinny in my ears. It was Mum’s phrase, that one. Her syntax, not mine, even though I couldn’t deny its truth.

‘Yes, and I think that’s the paradox. A fucking annoying one, I’m afraid.’ There was something oddly thrilling about hearing her swear. I raised my eyes, let them meet hers – I stayed staring at her, almost craving what she would say next. ‘All you’re doing is trying to find comfort, to find connection – what all of us need to survive. But the tragedy is that in trying so hard to find it, you leave yourself more alone than ever.’

And then the tears came – not the kind of sobs that send waves of relief through your body and bring an exhausted peace; these tears felt like liquid rage. A rage that was bigger than the past few months. A rage that could annihilate me if I let it.

‘Why am I like this? Why am I like this?’ I couldn’t stop, the phrase pouring out of me again and again, my head in my hands, sooty tears running through my fingers. Then I felt Amber’s hand, warm and steady, land between my shoulder blades.

‘Let it come out. Let it out.’

Her palm started to work on my heaving back, circular motions that soothed me, despite myself.

‘Do you know what a mantra is?’ she said, her voice as soft as a whisper. ‘It’s a phrase we repeat again and again, until it’s part of us. This is yours, isn’t it? This is what you’re living by. And I want you to know that you can throw it away.’

The rage was for her now, for her stupid, trite little homily. This bawling fuck-up was who I was, not a coat that I could slip out of and fling across the room.