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When I first got here I was so upset. I did my best to give my details, answer every question the staff asked me, and waited where they told me, even though every part of my body wanted to start kicking down doors until I found him.

I’ve now been waiting exactly long enough for my sadness and my fear to mutate into anger. Not at the nurses or doctors, they’re just doing their jobs, but at everything else – rugby, Jamie, myself, even Eddy briefly.

Someone switches the waiting room TV over to the news, where they’re talking about the rugby. After Eddy got stretchered off, they played on until the end without him – without Jamie too, because the coach took him off. England still won, it turns out, but I don’t really care about that now.

It seems like the press conference became entirely about the injury – I should be thinking about the media response. That is why I am here. Sol will need statements, updates and a plan… but I can’t think about that because all I keep seeing is Eddy’s body hit the grass again and again and again.

A nurse appears near reception and calls out my name.

‘Yes?’ I say, quickly jumping to my feet.

‘This way,’ she tells me. ‘You can see him now.’

‘Thanks.’

‘Are you family?’ she asks as we walk.

‘I’m his girlfriend,’ I reply – words I’ve said so many times lately but, now, I don’t know, I’ve just decided that I mean it – because if Eddy opens his eyes and still wants me, I never want to call what we have fake again.

The nurse leads me through a set of double doors and along a corridor lined with curtained bays. My heart beats faster with every step.

Finally, at the end, she shows me into a room. I don’t know what to expect, I’m not expecting it to be pretty, but I just want to be with him.

So imagine my surprise when I walk in to find him sitting up in bed. His back is supported by several pillows, and he is wearing a hospital gown that looks like there’s no way it can close at the back, not while stretching around his large frame. When he sees me, he smiles.

Oh my God, I’m just so relieved to see him awake, his eyes open, him smiling – him so pleased to see me.

‘Hi,’ he says. That is all he has time to say before I launch myself at him.

I cross the room, throw both arms around him and squeeze.

‘Careful,’ he says, laughing as I press my face against his chest. ‘Don’t knock this monitor off my finger – they got angry when I accidentally knocked it off; all the machines went mad.’

‘I thought you were dead,’ I blurt unhelpfully, but I did.

‘Ah, it was just a knock,’ he replies, but I can tell he’s playing it down.

I pull back enough to look at him, then peck him on the lips. I can’t stop myself.

He takes me gently by the hands, placing them on his chest. I can feel his heart beating, and I want to burst into tears, but I’m trying to hold it together, because I don’t want to freak him out.

‘See, I’m okay,’ he reassures me. Surely I should be the one reassuring him?

‘I’m sorry,’ I blurt. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. For this morning, for everything I said, for pushing you away.’

‘You have nothing to apologise for,’ he says. ‘I’m sorry, I was the one being daft.’

Eddy’s thumbs move slowly over my hands.

‘I’m just so glad you’re okay,’ I tell him, my voice wobbling. ‘And I know you like me. I know you do. I know everything we had wasn’t just to piss Jamie off.’

He sighs.

‘Seeing you lying there, not moving, was the most frightened I’ve ever been,’ I continue. ‘No one feels that way about someone they don’t like a lot.’

‘Brooke…’

‘I guess I was worried you might hurt me, earlier, but I’m not. Not really. I’m worried about losing you,’ I say.