Holly paused. She’d made it clear to her mother that she didn’t want the information that she’d met Charlie before being shared, but she trusted Rachel, and apart from a little good-natured ribbing, her sister could be relied upon not to broadcast it to all and sundry. Rachel had teased her, often, about how much the previously strait-laced Holly had loosened her stays over the years, and perhaps she should know that there was a small, missing puzzle piece now that Charlie Thorpe had rocked up in Willowbury.

‘So, Mum gave me back a suitcase from their loft the other day,’ Holly said, trying to inject a casual tone into her speech. ‘And it turns out that, according to some very old photos, and you’ll never believe this, me and Charlie have actually met before.’

‘Really?’ Rachel paused in her own folding. Glancing to where Harry was playing contentedly with the toys in his tabletop sandpit, making sure he wasn’t up to no good, she looked questioningly at Holly. ‘When? And I’m hoping you don’t mean in a past life or something, because that’s not something I, personally, can buy into!’

‘Oh, ha-ha,’ Holly threw a line-dried flannel at her sister, who caught it, folded it and popped it on her own pile of washing. ‘You remember that conference I went to in my first year at university? When I was still really into party politics.’

Rachel snorted. ‘Party line doesn’t even begin to cover it! That old boyfriend of yours from school has a lot to answer for.’

‘OK, OK,’ Holly said. ‘Let’s not go down that road.’ She placed the clothes she had folded into Rachel’s washing basket. ‘Anyway, it turns out that I met Charlie at that conference… and I, er, well… that’s to say we…’

‘Oh my God, you didn’t shag him?’ Rachel’s jaw hit the floor. ‘But you were in the no-sex-before-marriage brigade back then, too! That’s basically why Simon dumped you during your A Levels!’

Holly rolled her eyes. ‘Chill out, sis. I didn’t shag him.’ And, stung, even after all these years, she couldn’t help adding, ‘And Simon didn’t dump me because of that. We made each other bloody miserable for a whole bunch of other, teenage-angst-related reasons, not sex!’

‘So why did he end up going out with Chantelle the village slapper straight after you, then?’ Rachel teased.

‘Ask him,’ Holly replied tartly. ‘But the fact is, Charlie and I have met before. And we kissed a little bit back then. And, to be honest, I’m feeling a bit weird about it.’

‘Does he remember you?’ Rachel asked, as, washing all off the line, she slumped down into one of her garden lounge chairs.

Holly shook her head. ‘I don’t think so. I mean, he’d have said something by now if he did, surely.’