I hold a paper towel while turning the bathroom door handle (minimise contact with germs at all times) and return to the relatives’ room. My mind is at war. I feel guilty at all the missed opportunities to reconcile with Clare, but I can’t quite relinquish the idea that the fault was hers. She was self-righteous. But then, what if I’d been less precious, had rung her up for a chat as if nothing had happened, maybe about our beloved Spurs and nerve-wracking rumours that Teddy Sheringham would be leaving at the end of the season? What if I’d called her yesterday afternoon, asked after her boys? Could we have met for a cup of tea? She’d have left her teabag in the mug of course. Only a small dash of milk. We could have chatted for an hour. Half an hour. Even a few seconds would have been long enough to stop her from turning on to the Embankment at that moment. But I am fooling myself, even now. The most senior woman at the Treasury. Tipped for even greater things. If she saw my number, she’d assume I was simply ringing to confirm a story. And she’d have been right. She would have refused to take my call.

I twist in the chair. There’s no comfort. It is my fault. Everything that’s gone wrong with my family always has been my fault.

The silence of the room is amplifying the unbearable noise of my thoughts. I try to drown them out. I hum. And then, when the humming is not enough, I start to sing. Mark Morrison’s ‘Return of the Mack’. I obsessively repeat the refrain about lying, and crying, and dying. It’s what I do. Slowly, I lullaby myself into a fitful doze, where Clare and I are ten and eight, holding hands outside the school gate. There’s snow everywhere, too deep to allow cars to move. No sign of Mum or Dad. We’re shivering, more out of anxiety at being lost and forgotten than from the cold. ‘They’ll be here in a minute,’ Clare says. I can tell she doesn’t believe it. But I feel safer, knowing that my big sister will look after me.

*

When I wake, my eyes are blurry because my contact lenses have been in too long and I can’t read the clock. But I can hear a voice – a man’s voice – in the corridor.

There have been noises all night, but this feels significant. They are the tones of someone feigning classlessness, like a BBC presenter. ‘How is Clare Peck?’ he asks. The nurse replies in a whisper, as if she doesn’t want to be heard. She talks at length, providing more information than she gave to me. Why would she do that? It’s not Charlie or Dad. Maybe it’s the doctor.