Twenty years ago, almost to the day. The past had called out to her, too loud to be ignored.

An hour or so after she’d left, her phone had begun buzzing with texts from Mack, but she couldn’t bring herself to open them; she had turned the phone off again after sending a brief I’m okay holding message in reply. It wasn’t until she’d arrived in Falmouth that evening that she realized she’d left her wedding ring by the kitchen sink, where she’d taken it off to wash up. He was probably imagining the worst – but even so, she just felt numb about the situation: she didn’t even miss them. There was white noise in her brain where any normal mother would have been thinking incessantly about her precious children; static where any normal wife would feel concerned about her husband. Olivia just felt too used-up to care any more; too broken and tired.

So no, it was probably best that she didn’t mention any of this to Lorna, on reflection. And no, she wouldn’t confess in blank emotionless tones that she actually had no desire to go hurrying back to Bristol today; no inclination whatsoever to walk back through her own front door, knowing that she’d be immediately swallowed up in toddler chaos and her own feelings of inadequacy. Right now she couldn’t imagine herself ever being able to deal with it again.

‘Oh, darling,’ said Lorna. You could see the confusion on her face, ‘I’m sorry to hear things are difficult. You’re not a terrible person, though, whatever’s happened. I know you, Olivia, and you’re not.’

‘Is there anything we can do to help?’ asked Roy.

‘Not really,’ she said. They didn’t know her, she thought. For one thing, they wouldn’t be so sympathetic if they knew what she’d done twenty years ago. But Lorna and Roy were the last people she wanted to hurt. Back when she and Aidan had been an item, Olivia had loved going round to his house for tea or Sunday lunch, because they would both make such a fuss of her, especially Lorna. It was the first time in years that she’d felt properly mothered, and she had drunk it up like someone dying of thirst.

Innate politeness forced her to pull herself together now, remembering that Lorna and Roy did not need to be burdened with her misery, today of all days. ‘But thanks anyway.’

‘Maybe you just need a break,’ Lorna said, her brow furrowed with concern. ‘Is there any chance you could take a few days off, recharge your batteries? Because . . .’ Then she stopped and looked at Roy. ‘I was just thinking: Mawnan’s empty, isn’t it?’