He woke feeling a little brighter on Sunday. I think by then there was so little in his system that there was nothing left to come out. I bought him some clear soup and he ate it tentatively and pronounced himself well enough to go for a walk. Twenty minutes later we jogged back and he locked himself into the bathroom. He was really angry then. I tried to tell him it was okay but that just seemed to make him angrier. There’s not much that’s more pathetic than a six-foot-four man-mountain trying to be furious while he can barely lift a glass of water.

I did leave him for a bit then because my disappointment was starting to show. I needed to walk the streets and remind myself that this wasn’t a sign, it didn’t mean anything, and that it was easy to lose perspective when you’d had no sleep and had been stuck for forty-eight hours with a gastro-intestinally challenged man and a bathroom with deeply inadequate soundproofing.

But the fact that it was now Sunday left me heartbroken. I was back at work tomorrow. And we had done none of the things I’d planned. We hadn’t gone to a ball game or on the Staten Island ferry. We hadn’t climbed to the top of the Empire State or walked the High Line arm in arm. That night we sat in bed and he ate some boiled rice I had picked up from a sushi restaurant and I ate a grilled chicken sandwich that tasted of nothing.

‘On the right track now,’ he murmured, as I pulled the cover over him.

‘Great,’ I said. And then he was asleep.

I couldn’t face another evening of scrolling through my phone so I got up quietly, left him a note and headed out. I felt miserable and oddly angry. Why had he eaten something that had given him food poisoning? Why couldn’t he make himself better quicker? He was a paramedic after all. Why couldn’t he have picked a nicer hotel? I walked down Sixth Avenue, my hands thrust deep into my pockets, the traffic blaring around me, and before long I found myself headed towards home.

Home.

With a start, I realized that was how I now thought of it.

Ashok was under the awning, chatting to another doorman, who moved away as soon as I approached.

‘Hey, Miss Louisa. Aren’t you meant to be with that boyfriend of yours?’

‘He’s sick,’ I said. ‘Food poisoning.’

‘You’re kidding me. Where is he now?’

‘Sleeping. I just … couldn’t face sitting in that room for another twelve hours.’ I felt suddenly, oddly, close to tears. I think Ashok could see it because he motioned me to come in. In his little porter’s room he boiled a kettle and made me a mint tea. I sat at his desk and sipped it, while he peered out now and then to make sure Mrs De Witt wasn’t around to accuse him of slacking. ‘Anyway,’ I said, ‘why are you on duty? I thought it was the night guy.’

‘He’s sick too. My wife is super mad at me right now. She’s meant to be at one of her library meetings but we don’t have anybody to look after the kids. She says if I spend one more of my days off here she’s going to have a word with Mr Ovitz herself. And nobody wants that.’ He shook his head. ‘My wife is a fearsome woman, Miss Louisa. You do not want to upset my wife.’

‘I’d offer to help. But I think I’d better go back and check on Sam.’

‘Be sweet,’ he said, as I handed him his mug. ‘He came a long way to see you. And I can guarantee he is feeling way worse than you are right now.’

When I got back to the room, Sam was awake, propped up on pillows and watching the grainy television. He looked up as I opened the door.

‘I just went for a walk. I – I –’

‘Couldn’t face one more minute stuck in here with me.’

I stood in the doorway. His head was sunk into his shoulders. He looked pale and unutterably depressed.

‘Lou – if you knew how hard I’m kicking myself –’

‘It’s fi—’ I stopped myself just in time. ‘Really,’ I said. ‘We’re good.’

I ran him a shower, made him get in and washed his hair, squeezing the last out of the tiny hotel bottle, then watched the suds slide down the huge slope of his shoulders. As I did he reached up, took my hand silently and kissed the inside of my wrist softly, a kiss of apology. I placed the towel over his shoulders and we made our way out to the bedroom. He lay back on the bed with a sigh. I changed out of my clothes and lay down beside him, wishing I didn’t still feel so flat.

‘Tell me something about you that I don’t know,’ he said.

I turned towards him. ‘Oh, you know everything. I’m an open book.’

‘C’mon. Indulge me.’ His voice was low against my ear. I couldn’t think of anything. I still felt really oddly annoyed about this weekend even though I know that’s unfair of me.

‘Okay,’ he said, when it was clear I wasn’t going to speak. ‘I’ll start then. I am never eating anything but white toast again.’

‘Funny.’

He studied my face for a moment. When he spoke again his voice was unusually quiet. ‘And things haven’t been easy at home.’

‘What do you mean?’

It took a minute before he spoke again, as if he wasn’t sure even then if he should. ‘It’s work. You know, before I got shot I wasn’t afraid of anything. I could handle myself. I guess I reckoned I was a bit of a tough guy. Now, though, what happened, it’s at the back of my mind all the time.’

I tried not to look startled.

He rubbed at his face. ‘Since I’ve been back I find myself assessing situations as we go in … differently, trying to work out exit routes, potential sources of trouble. Even when there’s no reason to.’

‘You’re frightened?’

‘Yeah. Me.’ He laughed drily, and shook his head. ‘They’ve offered me counselling. Oh, I know the drill from when I was in the army. Talk it through, understand it’s your mind’s way of processing what happened. I know it all. But it’s disconcerting.’ He rolled onto his back. ‘To tell you the truth, I don’t feel like myself.’

I waited.

‘That’s why it hit so hard when Donna left because … because I knew she’d always look out for me.’

‘But this new partner will look out for you, surely. What’s her name?’

‘Katie.’

‘Katie will look out for you. I mean, she’s experienced, and you guys must be trained to take care of each other, right?’

His gaze slid towards me.

‘You won’t be shot again, Sam. I know you won’t.’

Afterwards I realized it was a stupid thing to say. I’d said it because I couldn’t bear the idea of him being unhappy. I’d said it because I wanted it to be true.

‘I’ll be fine,’ he said, quietly.

I felt as if I’d failed him. I wondered how long he’d wanted to tell me that. We lay there for a while. I ran a finger lightly along his arm, trying to work out what to say.

‘You?’ he murmured.

‘Me what?’

‘Tell me something I don’t know. About you.’

I was going to tell him he knew all the important stuff. I was going to be my New York self, full of life, go-getting, impenetrable. I was going to say something to make him laugh. But he had told me his truth.

I turned so that I was facing him. ‘There is one thing. But I don’t want you to see me differently. If I tell you.’