Catarina Loss did not care about food. She barely ate at all. But she was making conversation as they walked down the street. This was what you did—you pretended life was normal, even as death rained from above. It was the London spirit. You kept to your routines as much as you could, even if you slept in a Tube station at night for shelter, or you returned home to find the neighbor’s house or yours was no longer there. Businesses tried to stay open, even if all the glass blew out of the windows or a bomb went through the roof. Some would put out signs that said, MORE OPEN THAN USUAL.

You carried on. You talked about bananas and lemons.

At this point in December, London was at its darkest. The sun started going down just after three in the afternoon. Because of the air raids, London was under blackout orders every night. Blackout curtains blocked light from every window. Streetlamps were turned off. Cars dimmed their lights. People walked the streets carrying torches to find their way through the velvety darkness. All of London was shade and corner and nook, every alley blind, every wall a dark blank. It made the city mysterious and mournful.

To Tessa, it felt like London itself grieved for her Will, felt his loss, turned out every light.

Tessa Gray had not particularly enjoyed Christmas this year. It was difficult to enjoy things with the Germans raining bombs overhead whenever the whim suited them. The Blitz, as it was called, was designed to bring terror to London, to force the city to its knees. There were deadly bombs that could crush a home, leaving a pile of smoking rubble where children once slept and families laughed together. In the mornings, you would see walls missing and the inner workings of houses, exposed like a doll’s house, scraps of cloth flapping against broken brick, toys and books scattered in piles of rubble. More than once she saw a bathtub hanging off the side of what remained of a house. Extraordinary things would happen, like the house where the chimney fell, smashing through the kitchen table where a family ate, shattering it but harming no one. Buses would be upturned. Rubble would fall, instantly killing one family member, leaving the other stunned and unscathed. It was a matter of chance, of inches.

“Did you have a good visit this afternoon?” Catarina asked.

“The younger generation are still trying to talk me into leaving,” Tessa replied, stepping around a hole in the pavement where part of it had been blown away. “They think I should go to New York.”

“They’re your children,” Catarina said gently. “They want what’s best for you. They don’t understand.”