‘For fuck’s sake, Mum, don’t you understand that he’s never going to wake up! What do you expect me to fight against? I can fight all right when there’s an enemy. But, in this case, there’s no one! They’ve stopped the treatment and nothing’s fucking happened! Nothing! Do you know what that means? It means that, if there’s no activity in his brain within the next month, they’ll stop everything. Thirty days from now, they’ll switch off his life support. It’ll be over. There’ll be nothing. I’m up to my ears in nothingness. Look at me. What do you see? A poor girl who’s got nothing left. Who’s no longer anything.’

My mother came over to me. She sat on the sofa very close to me and put her hand on my shoulder. That was the first physical contact between us for some ten years, I think. I recoiled, but I left her hand there.

‘That’s not true. You’re wrong. You are much more than you think, but you can’t see it any more. You have to get out of this negative spiral. I’m here. Louis is here and the doctors aren’t lying. If they’re keeping our little man, it’s because they’re hopeful. You’re strong, Thelma. I haven’t said so to you for a long time, but I’m proud of you. I’m proud of the woman you’ve become.’

‘Bullshit.’

‘For goodness’ sake, stop telling me how I feel! You’re not inside my head, so let me speak, let me think. I’m moving in with you until further notice.’

I sat up, stung to the quick by a sharp point.

‘That is absolutely out of the question.’

‘I’m not asking you. I had a set of keys cut while you were asleep.’

I didn’t have the energy to fight back. Not right then. I let it go and lay back down on the sofa. My mother stood up and I dozed off, lulled by the hum of the vacuum cleaner. I was thirteen again, and my head hurt so badly . . .

*

That day, for the first time since the accident, I didn’t go and visit Louis. I slept all day. When I woke up, my mother was bustling around the kitchen and a familiar aroma was coming from it. A fragrance of the south.