Briefly, at three a.m., she’d considered driving to the surgery and rummaging in cabinets for some heavy-duty medication to knock herself out, but she couldn’t risk feeling dopey, not now when she must stay clear-headed to find a helpful strategy for Rochelle Ferguson.

At four a.m., she’d made the decision—she had to be resolute with herself about this—to temporarily stop thinking about Rochelle. In Paula’s current state, her thought process kept sliding into pessimistic spirals which wouldn’t do that poor woman any good. So she must put the problem aside for now. Come back to it when she was in a more fit state.

In the morning, she contemplated ringing Anita but then let the idea go. She didn’t have the capacity to deal with her friend’s distress on top of her own right now.

Paula managed the morning’s appointments—luckily nothing cropped up that required too much fine judgement or dexterity. At lunchtime, she stepped out into the street and deliberately soaked up some sunlight, feeling it reinvigorate her a little, like a solar battery being charged. Then she bought a banh mi to take back to the surgery, in the hope food might help her to feel more normal.

Sitting at the desk, she ate quickly, worried that the smell of the pork roll would permeate the room. If the food didn’t help—if she didn’t feel she could function at a proper level through the afternoon—Paula resolved to finish work early, reschedule a few people, ask Li-Kim to cover anything urgent.

Even with her consulting room door shut, she could hear an altercation building at the practice’s front desk. There were the loud bass notes of an angry male voice, punctuated by Jemma’s placating responses. Paula shoved the rest of her lunch in the bin and went out to the hallway.

A large man stood at the reception desk, his forearms planted on the upper counter as if he was about to rip it up off the floor. Every time Jemma stammered out a reply to his badgering questions, he huffed his contempt and waggled his massive skull, as if nothing she could say was worth taking into his head.

Paula recognised the man. Ian Ferguson, Rochelle’s husband.

There was a flush of panic through her ribcage. Maybe Rochelle had confronted him, with Paula’s encouragement, and that was why he’d shown up here, angry.

‘Is there a problem?’ she asked. ‘Can I help?’

Jemma swivelled around in her chair and Paula saw how much she was floundering in the face of his bullying. ‘Mr Ferguson was hoping to see Dr Lang but I explained that, um …’

‘Yes, that’s right. I’m sorry. Mark Lang is overseas at a conference,’ said Paula, moving closer to the desk in order to draw Ferguson’s attention onto herself and away from Jemma. ‘If it’s something urgent—’