The way the light drops into the grove, before spilling outwards as if dispersed by a powerful mirror, issues a curious sense of the sacred and hallowed that she finds immediately affecting. Her admiration for that distant beauty, and what feels like an affinity with it, appears with a warm familiarity, without her knowing exactly why. It’s as if something is being withheld, like a compelling memory just out of the reach of her recall.

Reluctantly turning her gaze from the vision of the glade beyond the garden, she steps to the chair and searches Mrs Gardner’s murky eyes. They continue to comb the distant tree-line. Still mystified by the strength of her own reaction to the glade, she identifies the same childlike adoration in Mrs Gardner’s expression; a fascination that she feels she shares without any precise idea of how and why that arrangement of trees is so irresistible. Jess looks out again, both carer and client now peering at the trees together, Flo yearning, Jess mystified yet seduced by such beauty.

Only Morag’s introduction, which aspires to a bellow, destroys Jess’s preoccupation. ‘Blossom! New girl’s here! Jess! She’s gonna look after you for a bit. I gotta get on.’

It is then, as Jess turns from the light, that she catches sight of the slack, unbuckled restraints on the footplate and arms of the patient’s wheelchair. Her horror prompts her to search Morag’s face and silently implore the older carer for an explanation.

Morag scowls. ‘Legs is all stiff and she can’t walk no more. But she can be quick with her hands. Gotta watch ‘em. Had a stroke three years ago. Ain’t much facial expression so you get no warning, like.’

‘She’s eighty-nine.’

Jess kneels before Flo’s wheelchair and makes sure she has eye contact. She smiles. Placing a hand gently on Flo’s withered claw, the yellowing nails too long untrimmed, she speaks softly to her new client. ‘Hello, my love. I’ve never seen such a pretty garden. I know just what my little girl would say if she saw it. She’d say, Mummy, I bet fairies live here.’

Agitated before Jess finishes speaking, Flo pulls her hand away and returns her gaze to the glade. Her stare intensifies, perhaps with an expectation, as if she waits for someone to appear.

Disappointed with the rebuff, Jess turns her head as if led by Flo’s stare to the garden.

SMACK.

Flo’s hand connects with the side of Jess’s head. Lumpy fingers entangle in her hair. A veiny old fist closes, yanking hard, pulling Jess face-down.

Using both hands to peel her hair from Flo’s grasp, Jess shrieks and wriggles backwards until her knee strikes a jug beside Flo’s chair. The jug discharges blackcurrant squash like a flood of old blood.