Queuing to enter the graduation hall, conscious of curious eyes flitting from her face to her tummy, its gentle curve concealed by the generous cut of her gown. Self-consciousness pinching her cheeks while the palm of her hand rested over the place where six inches of life was just beginning to swallow, suck its thumb, hear Jess’s voice. And then the clasp of her mum’s hand telling her she was proud of her, whatever the circumstances.

Lying on the sofa, Mia curled up on her chest, at eight days old still preferring the fetal position she had been accustomed to inside Jess’s womb. Jess’s head heavy with fatigue, her breasts aching with the milk Mia was not yet able to drink despite repeated, frustrating attempts to help her latch on. And then the gentle fingers of her mum’s hand telling her she could do this, she could be a good mother.

Sitting in an armchair, legs hugged tightly against her chest where panic knocked at a door she was too scared to open, Mia at her feet, pulling at threads on a rug Jess could not imagine ever being able to replace now that she was a single parent. Single parent. The phrase throbbing in her head, too new to feel real, less than three days since Iain had left her. And then the encircling of her mum’s hand around hers telling her that this was not the end, just a different beginning, one she was capable of surviving.

A lifetime of love, reassurance, and pride expressed through the gentle containment of one hand inside another.

And then a more recent memory: sitting in the concert hall just a few hours earlier, watching her mum sing, feeling Mia’s hand inside hers and knowing there would never be anything at once so simple and yet so complicated, so straightforward and yet so profound, as a child’s hand held inside their mother’s. A gesture which she had, for so many years, taken for granted.

As Jess glanced between her mum and her daughter she had an image of a future she hoped never to encounter: of sitting where her mum was now, Mia opposite, Jess asking her daughter for something so small—so undemanding—and Mia refusing.

“OK, Mum, I’ll come. I’ll come to New York.”

Part Six

July

Chapter 48

Jess

A deep sigh emerged from the back seat of the car, and Jess glanced in the rearview mirror to where Mia was staring out of the window, chewing her thumbnail. She seemed distracted—anxious, almost—as though she cared more than anyone about whether or not Jess got on the plane. Jess still didn’t understand why Mia had insisted on accompanying them to the airport but it had been too early in the morning for an argument.

In the passenger seat next to Jess, Audrey was fiddling with something in her bag. Jess had first heard her pottering around at half past five this morning and had already watched her unpack and repack her hand luggage at least half a dozen times.