I hated myself for feeling fearful as I approached Mum’s door. I wasn’t afraid of being hurt. I was afraid of how I felt when I saw her that way. Like I just couldn’t deal with her anymore. I was afraid I couldn’t be the calm, soothing person she needed. I was afraid I made it worse. When I entered her room she was shouting at a girl in a care worker’s uniform, screaming so loud I couldn’t make out what she was saying. Her pillows and duvet had been wrenched from the bed and tossed in a corner. I spied her memory book overturned in the middle of the floor, and clothes and other bits and pieces were liberally strewn around the room.

As if transported straight from my memory into the present day, I saw Hannah standing in front of my mum in that uniform. At first, I thought I was imagining it and then I realized she really was the girl in the uniform. After everything, in the middle of everything, my stomach still flipped over when I recognized her. She didn’t look scared by Mum screaming in her face. She didn’t look surprised to see me.

“Liz, I want to help you. Let’s find it together, OK?” Hannah said, her firm, clipped tones authoritative and still somehow warm.

“Mum.” I spoke as softly as I could given she was shouting over me.

She hesitated when she noticed me.

“Mum, are you OK?” I asked.

“She stole my wallet.” Mum pointed at Hannah.

Mum didn’t have a wallet. She didn’t need one. She had no cash. She had a handbag, though, that she carried when we went out, and sometimes I gave her my wallet to put in it.

“I’m going to look for it now, is that OK?”

“She stole it.” Mum pointed at Hannah again and kicked her bedside cupboard. I winced, thinking she was going to break a toe, and quickly I went to her handbag, discarded on the floor near the bed. On my hands and knees, I slipped my own wallet out of my bag and stood up with it in my hand.

“Is this your wallet, Mum?”

Mum looked at it for a minute and I held my breath.

“That’s my wallet. Give it to me,” she said. I held it out and she snatched it from me.

“It must have fallen on the floor,” I said.

Mum stuffed it under her pillow. I’d be waiting a long time to get that wallet back.