I pop over to Mark who is still turning burgers.

‘Do you want me to take over so you can mingle?’

‘With my parents, and our next-door neighbour who’s still pretending she doesn’t remember me? You’re all right, thanks.’ He grins.

‘Fran? Did you introduce yourself?’

‘Yep, and she just looked blankly at me. Maybe I’ve aged badly.’

‘Not one bit,’ I tell him, kissing him on the cheek.

Liz is inside, filling a glass of water at the sink. She points through the window, to where her children and mine are sitting in a circle at the end of the garden. Heads together, deep in conversation.

‘Wonder what they’re up to,’ she says.

‘Plotting something, no doubt. How to get more crisps. How to sneak on to the Nintendo without us noticing.’

‘As long as they’re not nicking the wine yet, it’s all good,’ Liz says with a grin. ‘I’m just delighted mine have someone to play with. They can meet on the green during the summer, and maybe play in the woods too. I’ve never been keen on the woods and the river, after what happened to Lily Murphy, but now that we know she didn’t drown, it feels like a weight lifted somehow. A shadow gone.’

I roll the lighthouse in my hand. ‘That it does.’

‘Do you think she’s happy?’ Liz asks. ‘I suppose there’s no way to know, but I’d like to think she is.’

I place the lighthouse on the kitchen windowsill as I choose my words.

‘I think … I think that thanks to the bravery of the strong women in her life, there’s a very good chance she’s happy,’ I say, swallowing the lump in my throat. ‘In fact, I’m almost sure.’

Fran sits across from Zara, sipping her wine. The bar is busy and bustling but the wine is making her sleepy, after Joanna’s do-over housewarming this afternoon.

‘So how was it? Did you meet you-know-who?’

‘I did. Pretended I didn’t remember him. It’s driving him mad, I’d say.’

‘What’s he like now?’

‘You know what he’s like, I showed you the photo I took at their first housewarming.’

‘No, I mean what kind of person is he.’

‘Actually, he seems like he turned out OK. If you decide to tell him, I reckon it would go well.’

Zara smiles. ‘You’re never going to stop pushing me to do this, are you.’

‘Wouldn’t it be nice for Saoirse to know her dad?’

‘Maybe.’

‘That’s the first time you’ve gone from a flat “no” to maybe. Progress.’ Fran clinks glasses.

‘Does he look like Saoirse?’

Fran nods. Zara looks anxious.

‘Like, really obviously? Would Joanna guess? Would Saoirse, if she saw him?’

Fran pictures Mark Stedman – the boy who broke Zara’s heart all those years ago, and the husband, the father, he is now. ‘No, not obvious unless you know already. Then you can see it. In the set of the mouth and the line of the jaw.’

In her room in St Teresa’s Nursing Home, Ruth Cavanagh watches as Tracy tucks her flowers into a vase.