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a smile for Rose, and was determined to learn how to care for her properly. Diabetes Nurse Shelley was my daytime mentor, coaching me in the use of finger-prick tests to read blood levels, and in how to prepare and give injections, and where on the body was best to administer them.
    Having failed maths at school, I struggled with the numbers. The desired blood sugar reading for a diabetic is between four and ten, though this range varied depending on which website I read at night or which nurse answered my endless questions. Shelley said it would take time to get Rose down to such levels and that I shouldn’t worry if her readings were still as high as fifteen for some weeks yet.
    ‘Sadly,’ Shelley said, ‘these early days are hard because the pancreas occasionally adds its natural insulin to the insulin you inject.’
    And then more numbers to baffle me – the dose of insulin. How to work that out? I learned that it depended on numerous factors; size of child, what has been or might be eaten, recent blood reading, and how many doses were being given each day.
    I asked Shelley to give me a mnemonic, explaining that I did better with patterns, with words, with rhyme. When I was small I’d loved the quirky expressions my English teacher gave us to remember grammatical rules: I before E except after C, and when she told us to think of the apostrophe in it’s and she’s as a gravestone for the missing letter.
    ‘You’ll have to find your own way with that, pet,’ Shelley told me. ‘Diabetes is a condition where practice really does make perfect, to use a more helpful phrase. At home you’ll fall naturally into your own routine. One day something will click – I promise you. But it’ll take time.’
    Time stretched before me, like darkness beyond the car headlights on a country lane. I knew there was plenty of travel looming but could only see the next few hours of it. At the end would be Jake’s return, but between now and then it was just Rose and me. I longed for him to call. I knew he’d want to, that he’d have understood and forgiven my overreaction to his news. But his role as army sergeant in the middle of a warzone meant a quick visit to the nearest telephone whenever his wife had a tantrum wasn’t warranted.
    I’d already decided I couldn’t go back to work, though for how long yet I wasn’t sure. How long would it take to make sure Rose was okay?
    I worked part time in our local theatre as an usher and loved that I got to see shows for free and watch the occasional rehearsal. Being in such a creative place made my heart warm, reminded me of how I’d felt long ago when I scribbled made-up stories in notepads. It never ceased to amaze me how a story could be brought to life by the actions, tone and voice of the actors, how lights and sound could recreate a scene from the past or realise one from the future. I would miss being there but knew the staff would understand.
    My good friend Vonny looked after Rose when I was working. Vonny and I had known each other at school but being in different years meant our paths never really crossed and we only met properly at a prenatal group when we were pregnant at the same time, her with her son Robert and me with Rose. Then we’d found a gentle compatibility, a friend we could each turn to at any time.
    She came to the hospital twice while Rose was there, bringing small gifts and making little fuss, as was her way, something Rose usually enjoyed. This time Rose took her presents but just nodded politely at Vonny’s attentions, rather than making jokes and asking where Robert was.
    Vonny would be a perfect carer for Rose with this new challenge, but I didn’t want her to do it; I couldn’t expect her – or anyone – to have to deal with injections. I wanted to leave work and be home all the time, whenever I was needed, so Rose never had to go to bed sad or wake up afraid.
    In the hospital she ate everything the trolley provided and asked for more. I