The twenty-seventh of February arrives in what feels like no time at all. Lucy had to take the day off work—had to organise to take a day, once a fortnight, for the duration of the six-psych-sessions plan. ‘For stuff to do with the accident,’ she told them, keeping it vague. It wasn’t that she was ashamed of seeing a psychologist, she just didn’t think everyone on the peninsula needed to know, which was how it would have turned out.

‘Why do you think you, or why do you think people in general, dress the way they dress?’ Suzette asks, once Lucy has settled into her chair.

Lucy looks down at her breezy floral shirt, her denim cutoffs, her Birkenstocks. She feels suddenly aware of her earrings and the fact that she ran a hair-straightener through her hair before she left home this morning. ‘I know, I know,’ she says. ‘We always construct our image in order to present ourselves to the world in particular and purposeful ways. But sometimes you dress yourself and you feel as though you look like you, or like the version of you you want to be on that day, and other times none of your clothes feel quite right.’

‘Just like the breasts didn’t always feel right?’ Suzette asks. ‘And how your flat chest doesn’t always feel right?’

‘Yes, but, this is different. There’s something about my chest that feels exposed. Have you ever been waxed then had a shower and noticed the way the water feels so strange on your bare skin? That’s a personal question. Sorry. But if you have, you’ll know it feels odd: familiar and yet not. It’s like a sensation you’re used to, but it’s too intense and it makes you feel—I don’t know—bare, or unprotected or something. More naked. Too naked. That’s how I felt with the breasts: too naked, like my body was hyper-visible. And now I feel too naked in a different way. It’s like I’ve been stripped, you know?’

Lucy doesn’t mention the tattoo to Suzette. Nor does she mention the fact that she’s going to see Kat to talk through the entire tapestry once she’s finished up here. (Kat said she ‘couldn’t get more ink’ today, but that doesn’t mean they can’t get planning.) It makes her feel a little like she’s two-timing Suzette, but she feels it’s necessary because she suspects Suzette wouldn’t approve. She suspects that Suzette would think she’s being impulsive and reckless, which is not the impression she wants to give off in the current circumstances. Which means that Lucy also doesn’t mention that, with the tattoo, things have changed.

Kat was right. The octopus has been moving as Lucy’s scars tighten into puckered lines, which soften as they fade. Lucy’s been watching its progress these last couple of weeks, fascinated. It’s like it’s alive. But more than that, it’s like it’s experiencing her healing body with her. Living her body with her. And while it stretches its limbs with her skin, its shape hasn’t distorted. Instead, it’s moved as an octopus might and she loves it for this.