‘Hope, I’ve asked Owen and Pryia to look after you today. You can shadow them this week and then you can shadow me and Nikhil the week after?’ I’m the only trainee this summer, and despite my induction I’m nervous. Mum runs through her staff list as if I should know them. The last time – I can’t think about the last time I saw them – the last time I refused to look at them and pretended that I couldn’t hear their sympathetic words and sorries when they came back to the house afterwards. And now I’m in a place I vowed I’d never return to – a hospital. Trapped here for the whole summer.

The automatic doors magically open as we approach. Dad’s joke about using the force to part the doors plays like an old black and white film in my head. I run up the ramp after Mum, leaving the memory behind me, and I’m hit by the stench of clinical cleanliness.

‘Morning, Erin. Hey, Hope.’ It’s Nikhil, Mum’s partner at work. I feel embarrassed. He’ll know all about my auditions. But he doesn’t even say ‘Sorry’ or ‘Things will work out.’

As Mum fills out some paperwork at reception, Nikhil rubs his hands under a cleaning gel dispenser, gesturing that I should do the same. My skin absorbs the gel in seconds but I keep rubbing my hands for something to do while we stand by the lift waiting, him smiling and smelling nice, and me breathing in and out, trying not to sweat with nerves.

In case anyone doesn’t know who Nikhil is, the massive capital letters SINGING MEDICINE TEAM on the back of his purple polo shirt should make it clear. Nikhil’s clean looking, like his whole body has just come out of the washing machine. His top is crisp and smells freshly ironed. As we get out of the lift, Mum is coming up from the stairwell. She never uses the lift unless she’s with a patient, says the stairs are healthier. She and Nikhil fall into step and I follow along a corridor inventively called Hospital Street.

When we get to the staffroom, I sit next to the kettle and fiddle with the milk, feeling out of place. I watch them rushing about, gathering up purple buckets full of musical instruments, ward sheets hidden in purple plastic wallets and bottles of hand-sanitising gel. They don’t look like nurses and doctors but there’s an air of medicine about them, a smell of something clean and smart about their purple Singing Medicine polo shirts.

‘Come on then, Hope. Come and meet the children on Pan ward!’ Pryia says, holding open the door to a corridor full of posters, paintings and photos of smiling children. I can’t help but notice her belt. It has the Catwoman symbol on it. She sees me checking it out, grins, then passes me a name badge. I reluctantly stick it onto my new shirt, pricking my finger on the pin. Pryia passes me a Gruffalo plaster. She clicks her tongue at me as if to say to take more care.

There’s a big sign saying RENAL outside the Peter Pan ward, which is noisy with footsteps, trolley wheels rolling, curtain rails being pulled back, spoons clattering against bowls and chatter everywhere. The patients are having their breakfast. This must be a high point in the day as the children seem a bit hyper. As I walk down the ward the noise grows. Owen is waving to the children, laughing at some of the things they say as he bounces past them. His trainers squeak on the floor like manic mice. The children’s noise is because of them – Pryia and Owen. The kids sit up looking hopeful. Some of them were watching individual TV screens pulled down over their beds but now their attention is firmly fixed on the Singing Medicine team. It’s like a celebrity has walked into the room.

Each kid is hooked up to a machine which whirrs and clicks. A dial spins around constantly and I see red coming out of one of the tubes.

‘They’re having dialysis, the machine is cleaning their blood. They have to sit still for up to four hours. See that there? That’s a Hemo-Cath, which is basically their lifeline, so they can’t jump around too much,’ Pryia tells me. They’ve got tubes going into their noses as well. I’m not sure what they do – could be food or oxygen, I guess. Most have a parent holding their hand, or watching the telly with them. One parent and a little girl are doing some colouring-in, but she stops to look up when she hears Owen’s footsteps. Her face changes, excitement making her sit up.

‘OWEN!’ shouts a small boy with a big afro. He breaks into a smile as Owen pulls a silly face at him and shakes a maraca. Then Owen and Pryia start singing and everything changes.

It isn’t just the atmosphere on the ward. It’s more than that. The air fills with something. Even the nurses change the way they walk: they are smoother and almost fade into the background. The singing has a soothing effect like a salve and envelops everyone in its magic.

In the corner I spot a girl who looks much older than the others, and is almost tucked away from them behind a partition. No one sits with her. She doesn’t move as I walk up to her bed so I whisper, ‘Are you awake?’

She doesn’t reply.

‘She’s awake.’ A nurse appears from nowhere. I’ve got no idea what to do as he checks her blood pressure. I look at the big machine she’s hooked up to. It says Gambro on the front and is bluey green. I try not to look at her blood – it seems way too personal, but I can’t help it. I watch her blood coming out of her body and going into the machine, which turns constantly and makes a strange sound. I wonder if you get used to it. The nurse makes notes on a clipboard at the end of the girl’s bed. I feel in the way and lean over to make sure he can get past me. I don’t know where to put myself.

The girl doesn’t register me, as if she’s pretending she’s not in the room with us. She looks about twelve. Her hair is tucked away under a sky-blue hijab with tiny silver stars on it. I sit on the chair near the little cupboard on wheels next to her bed. I try and make myself small and let them get on with it, but the nurse shakes his head at me.

‘Aren’t you going to sing to her?’ He’s obviously used to the Singing Medicine team.

‘Um, no,’ I tell him, hoping he’ll leave me be. He stands there, looking pointedly at my name badge. I get his confusion. I’m confused too. How the hell am I going to make it through this summer in a team of singers when I can’t trust my voice anymore?

‘Well, make yourself useful then.’ He passes me a hot-pink book with yellow writing on the cover, holding it across the girl’s bed until I have to take it. I wait for further instruction but he walks off. He’s left me on my own with her, as if I know what I’m doing. I turn the book over in my hands and read the blurb on the back.

Sunny, Kitty and Hannah are set for the Best. Summer. Ever.

Of course they are, everyone’s going to have a ball this summer. I open the book to a creased-down page. I look around in search of inspiration but everyone is doing something. There’s no way I’m going to ask for help so soon. I can do this. I’m not totally useless. I tap her very gently on the shoulder and hold the book out to her, hoping she might take it, but she blanks me. I start reading aloud.