At no point did I think he might be dead. Mothers must be programmed that way. To consider the possibility of your child dying is already to bury them. And burying a child is quite simply impossible. Louis wasn’t dead. He couldn’t be dead.

I was in shock. I don’t know if that’s the official, medical term, but I think I heard someone say the word. I experienced the rest of that arctic Saturday floating in a haze, as if sounds and sensations were deadened by a cocoon enveloping me from head to toe. I felt anaesthetized – perhaps thanks to the tranquillizers that I was immediately given, perhaps as a result of the bombshells that were being dropped around me, one after the other.

Emotional bombshells, like when the doctors explained to me that they had pumped my son full of drugs to prevent him from suffering, that the priority was to stop any infections that would cause internal lesions. That his condition was life-threatening, that for the time being it was impossible to assess his real state of consciousness because of the medication, that they would have to wait until the treatment was finished to have a clearer idea. ‘We’re very sorry, madame.’

Then, tear bombshells when my mother arrived at the hospital, shook me, screaming, blaming my inertia, my irresponsibility, my inattentiveness. The doctors had to drag her away from me – my own mother. ‘Everyone reacts to this kind of situation differently, madame; you must respect your daughter’s response, as we respect yours; and, no, we’re not arrogant little fools.’

And word bombshells. Legions of new words, acronyms, incomprehensible signals, armies of adjectives, little medical soldiers that only make sense if you want to hear them. From this fug, the only ones I remembered were the key words, those markers that you sense play a crucial part and are more important than the others.

Multiple trauma.

Haematomas.

Intracerebral.

Pulmonary.

Coma.

Deep.

Respirator.

E.E.G.

Electroencephalogram.

Wait.

How long?

No idea.

Unpredictable.

Never?

No idea.

Too soon.

Hope.

Courage.