One night, exhausted from lack of sleep, she had begun to cry. Quietly at first and then more loudly, until she was sobbing. She had tried to stifle the sound, knowing her father in the room next door might hear her, but part of her had hoped that he’d hear, and she had promised herself that if he came she would tell him the truth and accept the consequences. But he must have been sleeping soundly because he hadn’t appeared. Her tears had subsided and she had slipped into an uneasy sleep. In the morning, she had gone back to believing that it was nature playing tricks. Her period would come. Of course it would.

But now, she could no longer pretend that her body wasn’t changing. It was the sickness she felt every morning; the heavy feeling in her breasts; the thirst; the need to rush to the toilet. She clung to the idea that they signified something else, but she had to check. She had to be sure. It was the only way to stop this panic that was spiralling through her, affecting everything she did.

‘Connie?’ The doctor said.

She looked at the robin for guidance. It hopped and pecked and flew away.

He coughed.

‘I’ve been off colour,’ she said.

‘Off colour,’ he repeated, his hand creeping towards the prescription pad. ‘What are your symptoms?’

Connie swallowed. ‘I feel sick.’

‘Sick?’

She nodded.

‘Anything else?’ His fingers rested on the paper. ‘Any aches or pains?’

‘I’m tired.’

‘Are you sleeping well?’

‘Yes,’ she lied. No point telling him how often she lay awake at night, missing her mother, missing Johnny, worrying about her predicament, her fear and loneliness so acute that it felt like pain.

Doctor Franklin pulled the pad towards him. She had never liked him, and neither had her mother. Not that her mother had told her so directly. She would only mutter that he took more interest in his lunch than in his patients. Connie knew too that her father thought the cancer should have been detected sooner. He blamed Doctor Franklin for not diagnosing it in time.

‘Is it your period, perhaps?’ he asked, smiling a little.

She gripped the sides of the chair, hating his tone. Maybe she should have gone to a different surgery, but where? If there were any other options, she didn’t know what they were.

He blinked, glanced at the clock on the desk. It was two minutes after twelve. Lunchtime perhaps. As if to confirm the suspicion, his stomach rumbled.