Kim breathed a sigh of relief as the nurse completed the cut of the fibreglass cast with a cast saw. All five toes appeared to be intact.

Finally, she could feel fresh, clean air circulating around the mummified skin.

She groaned out loud with pleasure as she reached down and scratched a spot halfway down her shin. A taunting itch that had been driving her mad for six long weeks.

‘Feel good?’ asked the nurse, smiling.

‘Hell, yeah,’ Kim said, raking the area so hard it was reddening beneath her nails.

And yet, after six weeks of torture the scratching of her flesh was not producing the level of satisfaction of which she’d dreamed. There had been nights she’d been tempted to use her own circular saw to release her limb for a scratch but she’d resisted, anticipating the pleasure of this moment. It was over all too soon.

The nurse passed her a wet wipe which she gratefully wiped all over the flesh indented from the cast.

The nurse threw the cast to the side as Kim moved her right leg to the edge of the bed. After six weeks of additional weight attached to it she had the sensation that her left leg was going to rise up and float away.

A steadying hand rested on her thigh. ‘Not so fast, Inspector,’ said the nurse with a knowing look. ‘Doctor Shah will be with you in a minute. The cast is off but you’re not out of the woods yet.’

She finished with a soft tap as though speaking to a child.

‘Yeah, and I’ve got places to—’

‘Aah, Miz Stone,’ said Doctor Shah. ‘I see you are your usual patient self this afternoon.’

‘Doc, I just want to get back—’

‘It is frustrating when the body is not so easily commanded by the will of the mind, no?’

Kim narrowed her eyes at his light breezy tone.

Doctor Shah peered at her over his glasses, as he had done the day she’d been wheeled in following the death of her colleague.

His calm, soft voice had punctured her rage as she’d fought to get off the hospital bed and flee. She’d had no idea where she wanted to go. All she’d known was that her colleague lay broken at the bottom of a bell tower and she’d been forcibly removed from the scene.

She shook herself back to the present, as Doctor Shah placed a hand on each ankle, as though gently holding her in place while he spoke.

‘Lift,’ he said, tapping her left ankle and then hovering his hand in mid-air.

There was a delay of a few seconds as her brain sent the instruction to muscles that had lain dormant for weeks.

The leg lifted and touched the outstretched hand. It faltered in mid-air before her upper thigh muscle controlled the descent back to the bed.

‘To the left,’ he instructed.

‘And to the right,’ he said.

‘There will be muscle weakness and this should be built up slowly. The leg is not normal yet,’ he said, again peering over his glasses.

And didn’t she know it? Her milky white flesh bore the marks of the plaster imprinted into her skin. A two-inch scar ran down her shin where the fractured bone had forced itself through.

‘The X-rays show that the bones have healed well, however…’ he said, pausing.

Nothing good ever came from however, Kim thought.

‘You still need to be careful. There will be pain and the leg muscles will be weak from inactivity. I’d like you to come to physiotherapy three mornings—’

‘Doc, you know what I’m going to ask?’ she said, cutting him off.

‘You need to understand that your leg needs time and gentle exercise to repair properly. The mending of the bones is only the first step—’

‘Doctor Shah,’ she pushed.

He sighed dramatically in the face of her impatience.

He nodded towards the crutches she’d leaned against the paper towel dispenser to the right of the door.

‘I’d like you to continue using them until you’ve completed a couple of physio sessions.’

‘Doc,’ she pushed again.

‘Providing you stick to light duties, preferably behind a desk, then I see no reason for you not to return to work.’

Kim swung her right leg to the edge of the bed and shimmied her left one along using her hip and buttock muscles.

‘So, I’m officially signed off, right?’

He nodded gingerly as though he felt it was a decision one of them might live to regret.

Kim lowered herself and held up a hand when both Doctor Shah and the nurse moved forward to assist.

She placed her right leg down then followed with her left.

A jolt of pain shot from her shin bone right into her hip.

She stumbled.

The doctor reached to stabilise her but she shook her head and hung onto the bed.

She did it again trying to ignore the sensation of weightlessness that made her think her leg was going to levitate of its own accord like a stage show magic trick.

She understood that her leg had spent six weeks encased in safety and the feeling of instability now unnerved her.

She focussed hard and took another step forward.

Still pain but not as blinding and this time she was expecting it. She ignored the sweat beads forming on her forehead as she took another step.

Doctor Shah had stepped back and was watching her movement.

She took another step. Towards the door.

‘Don’t rush your recovery,’ he said, as she took another step.

Her hand was on the door handle as she thanked him.

His kind eyes acknowledged her words as she stepped out into the corridor. She closed the door, leaving the crutches firmly behind her.

She moved slowly along the hospital corridor. She had forgotten how far she was from the main entrance. She had entered the hospital with two additional legs and six weeks’ experience in using them.

Ten steps she counted as she reached a set of lifts. Each time she placed her foot down it felt a little more natural, like a distant memory returning, but the effort had brought on a wave of nausea.

She took a second to rest against the wall, frustrated that her muscles were still waking up.

‘May I help you, miss?’ asked a red tee-shirted volunteer. His name plate announced him as Terry.

She shook her head as he opened a door to the right of where she stood.

‘There’s a chair,’ he said, pointing inside to the small space. ‘Just take a minute,’ he said. ‘You look like you’re about to pass out.’

‘Thank you but I’m fine,’ Kim said, moving away from his kindness and towards the hospital main entrance.

As she neared the automatic doors she spotted the taxi she’d instructed to wait.

She couldn’t reach it fast enough.

It was time to return to work and her team. And although her team would never be the same again, she’d been away from them for long enough.