When she picked up Tom from Alice’s, he was happy and calm.

She gets up and does the dishes, wipes down the table, and pours herself another half glass of wine.

The truth?

Yeah. We tell the truth.

The way Dea had said it, as though she wanted to hear the answer. As though anything other than the truth would not be good enough.

The truth is I’m scared too.

Go on. What of?

Of everything. All the time. I’m lonely. I’m in pain. I still can’t deal with the fact that they sliced me open. I feel like a failure. As a woman. As a mother. I get everything wrong. My mother isn’t here. I miss her. I realize I’ve always missed her. She didn’t prepare me at all. I’m angry that she left me on my own. I’m not coping. Not coping. No one told me it would be like this.

I think I married the wrong person.

She didn’t say the last bit, but she said all the rest. Once it started it didn’t stop. And Dea sat there, listening—the simple, giddy feeling of being listened to.

So. Same time next week? Mum Club?

Yeah. Same time next week.

“Hey.” Sam comes into the room. “Tom seems in a good mood. Did it go well with Mum then?”

“Oh,” says Cate. “Yeah. I think it’s going to work.”

Lissa

THEY ARE GOING TO PLAY A GAME, KLARA SAYS. ALTHOUGH IT IS a serious game, a technique, a technique for getting out of their skin. They need this technique because they are stiff. They are stiff in an English way. Not like the Russians. The Russians are not stiff, not at all. They have vodka and grief and the blood of the land in their veins, and the English have weak tea and the dampness.

So.

The director stares around the room—her cast is assembled before her, a full roll call. It is first thing Monday morning, the beginning of the third week.

“Leesa.” She narrows her eyes. “You are stiff. Always you are stiff. See how you sit? What does Vanya say about Yelena?” She turns to Johnny. “About the way she is?”

“If you could see the way you look,” says Johnny, fixing Lissa with his eyes. “The way you move. The indolence of your life. The sheer indolence of it.”

“Thank you, Johnny. So, Leesa—does Yelena sit like this?” She crosses her hands over her lap in imitation of Lissa’s posture. “No. You are English. You are all wrong. Why did I choose English people to interpret this Russian play? I am mad. Never again. Leesa—do you know the Meisner technique?”

Lissa nods, she does. “We did it at drama school. Although it’s been years since—”

“Good. Sit here, please.”