They were told to include their families. Give them little jobs to do so that they felt part of their recovery. So she asked her brother if he would send her some flowers.

She could see it was a man through the glass panel in the door. She tried to move forward but she couldn’t. She forced herself to reach her hand out and open the door. She asked the man to put the flowers on the floor and leave.

The florist phoned her brother. They said they were worried about the person that they had delivered the flowers to. The brother spoke to his boss, left work early, and got the train up from Southampton to Leeds to see his sister.

He texted her at every stop on the route to let her know he was on his way.

When he arrived she was so pleased to see him, but she couldn’t hug him. She couldn’t hug her own brother.

She couldn’t sleep that night because there was a man in the house. Even though it was her brother.

Over the next few days he helped her to face the impossible. Getting a taxi. Going to see the bank manager to close the joint account and open a new one in her name only. Going to the shop. Impossible to her because it meant being in the company of men.

When I talk to my brother about it now he says that what shocked him was how I couldn’t trust anyone at all, not even my family. He finds that more shocking than all the other things I have told him. Mostly I feel numb. I don’t know if I can be shocked anymore. But also, I don’t think I’ve told him everything yet.