She walked quickly to the nearby shops to buy a bottle of milk and a box of Coco Pops, and then went straight back up to the flat. Whatever sightseeing plans she had for the day were pretty vague and there was nothing to stop her putting off her trip for an hour or so while she sat down and sent an email to find out what she should do about the letters, and any more that might turn up. Leaving them in a public hallway where anyone could take them or tamper with them just felt wrong somehow. It would be a nice gesture to check that Madi was settling in okay anyway, and emailing would give her a chance to ask about Flo, whom she missed really badly every time she thought about her.

She dropped the letter on the coffee table with the others, dug out her old laptop and tried to switch it on, but the battery was dead. She pulled out the cable from its case and plugged it into the mains, then, while the system was firing up, which took ages these days, she went on a hunt for the wi-fi code that Madi had been unable to remember but had assured her, in her last hastily written email before she left, must still be there, written on the original installation sticker on the back of the router. Prue found it on a high shelf in a corner of the kitchen, the blue light at the front reassuring her that everything was in working order, and hurriedly grabbed a pen and scribbled the code down on a sheet of paper from a narrow pad headed ‘Shopping List’ which she spotted stuck to the side of the fridge.

There were eleven unopened emails waiting on the screen, none of which she had any intention of dealing with. Work, junk, work, Sian, Mum, more work … They could all wait. What was the point in hiding away and wanting some time alone if she then went straight back to communicating with the very people she was hiding from? She scrolled down the list until she came to one of Madi’s brief messages, and clicked the Reply button.

Dear Madi,

I hope you have arrived and settled in and that everything in the cottage is OK. My main reason for getting in touch is to ask what you would like me to do with any post? There are already a few letters waiting for you. Should I send them on? Similarly, I assume you might receive some for me, so we could perhaps exchange them every now and then? Just in case anything might be urgent. Can you let me know that Flo is all right too? Give her a big cuddle from me. Your flat is beautiful, by the way, and I am loving London. We must swap more often!

Very best wishes

Prue

Of course, it was unlikely that she would receive a reply straight away. In fact, Madi might well be avoiding emails in just the same way she was. It had been made clear that she was looking for a place to escape to, although she had never mentioned what she was escaping from, and keeping in touch with a stranger was probably way down her to-do list. Prue switched the laptop off again, afraid she might be tempted to start reading her own mail and get dragged back into real life before she was ready. She wound the cable up and opened the laptop case to stow it away. Inside was a smaller cable for charging her phone. Should she? She had deliberately kept it switched off since she’d left Shelling but she really should at least glance at it in case of any missed calls or messages. What if there was some emergency? Her dad taken ill? Her boss telling her she was being made redundant? Joe ringing to say he had made a terrible mistake and that he did want to marry her after all?