I sat upright, hand clutching at the edge of my desk. I felt a pounding in my temples and a slight greyness smouldered at the periphery of my vision.

‘Are you sure? She was supposed to be at the hospital. She shouldn’t be there still. What would keep her there? Was Jude home too?’ I was babbling.

‘No, just your mum.’

‘Shit, shit, shit. Okay, I’ve got to go, got to sort this. For God’s sake, don’t go home until I ring you again.’ I hung up before she had a chance to reply and then dialled the number for the hospital. Maybe Mum had left after Maggie; I had to check. After what felt like a thousand transfers around half the departments in the building, I finally got through to Dad’s ward and was gutted to be informed that no, Mum wasn’t there.

Fuck.

I had to warn her.

I took a large breath, steadied myself, and dialled the number for home. After three rings someone picked up.

‘Hello?’ It was Phil.

Surely he’d hear the hammering of my heart in my chest. I tried to sound casual, but the quaver in my voice felt patently obvious.

‘Hi Phil, it’s Sam. Hey, is my mum about?’

There was a pause. ‘Are you okay? You sound a bit shaky. Are you having problems with that guy again?’ he asked. He sounded so genuine, so concerned.

‘No, nothing like that. Had a run-in with the boss, that’s all.’ The moment the lie came out of my mouth, I found myself wondering if Phil would take care of that problem too. ‘I need to check out Mum’s timetable for the day. Is she there?’

‘I think so. I’ll see if I can find her.’

I had a few moments to get my head around this. If I told Mum about Uncle Phil, she was just as likely to turn around and have him on about it. How could I get her out of the house without her arguing the point?

‘Sam? Is that you?’ I never thought I’d be so pleased to hear that voice.

‘Hi Mum. Hey, look, one of the doctors at the hospital rang me, trying to get hold of you. They’ve got some specialist who wants to have a chat to you and Dad, but he’s only available for another thirty minutes max, so they were wanting you to get down to the hospital straight away.’

‘Oh? Which one was that? I thought we’d seen the specialist?’

She had to question it.

‘She didn’t give the exact details, only that if you wanted a chance to see him before you left for home, you’d have to get down straight away.’