‘Connie?’ The voice is so familiar; these days I cannot tell what is inside my head and what isn’t. I don’t bother opening my eyes.

‘Connie?’

‘Yes,’ I say.

‘It’s me,’ she says.

‘Hello, me,’ I say.

‘I’m here,’ she says. And then I begin to think that perhaps this voice is not in my head and with great effort I open my eyes and focus on the ceiling. There’s daylight. The panels look grey not white in this light. There are three peeling, not two.

I feel a hand take mine; it’s cool and clammy. I try to turn my head. I see someone sitting there at my bedside, a bag on their lap. I don’t recognize her at first: she’s sideways to my horizontal world and she looks different. But I know that fragrance. Yes, there she is, sitting on the chair, full of the glow of outside people from that other reality I am no longer a part of. I think perhaps I am imagining her.

‘Ness?’ I say, but my voice has gone now, there’s been no call for it. She smiles. She is so familiar to me. She’s cut her hair and she looks older but she is just as beautiful. Her dark eyes are full of a sweet sadness that I do not recognize.

‘Oh, Connie,’ she says, and for some reason she starts to cry; silently, just tears spilling down her cheeks.

I wonder if something has happened. I try to squeeze her hand but I’m so weak I don’t know if she can feel it. She leans forwards and rests her head on my hand. I look down at her, confused, and then I notice my wrist; the scars are pink now so some more time must have passed by, weeks I suppose. Months? What does time matter? Slowly I raise my other hand and touch her frizzy bob and we stay like this for a while.

It’s so lovely to have her here, even if she is only in my imagination. I have that peculiar feeling again that we are playing parts in a play, that we are old souls, battling through eternity together. This time I am an invalid and she is a nurse. We say nothing; we have no need for words because they are inadequate. But I feel her love.

The moment is crudely interrupted by the door opening. It’s the Squeak, my only constant. ‘OK, Connie, sit up for your visitor,’ she says, and I know then that Ness is real. I stare at her as the Squeak walks round to the side of the bed and talks to me like the simpleton I have become. She leans over, presses a button and makes my bed move into a semi-upright position, and Ness spins round accordingly.