‘You need some help,’ Kate said in the firm tone that Carol imagined her adopting with her pupils. ‘From someone on a more permanent basis, I mean.’

I can cope,’ Carol lied. ‘I’m not an invalid. The doctors said it might be temporary.’

Kate glanced at Carol’s wheelchair. ‘Then just until we hear back from the hospital and we know what’s happening. That’s all. We can take it a step at a time.’

Taking a sip of her tea, Carol looked at her daughter on the other side of the kitchen table. She was right, of course, but the thought of surrendering her independence, even temporarily, filled Carol with dread. She’d celebrated her seventieth birthday earlier in the year and, until the road accident last month, not once felt her age. How quickly things could change. If only she’d not taken the car out that day, if only she’d gone to Tesco instead of Waitrose, if only-,

‘I know you’re going to hate my saying this,’ Kate continued, interrupting her thoughts. ‘But the garden-,’

Carol looked through the windows of the French doors beside them. On the vast lawn lay dozens of plump, brown apples, riddled with rot. Until now, Carol had pretended not to notice them and the defeat that they symbolised. Ever since Kate had been little, she’d always found use for the surplus fruit that the apple tree bore; there’d not been chance for rot to set in. But things were changing now, she knew that. She would be a fool to pretend they ever would be the same again.

And so it was with weary resignation that she replied, ‘I suppose some help wouldn’t hurt.’