“I’m sorry, Phoebe. Perhaps if we—”

“I don’t want to hear it, Mum. Your apologies are meaningless. You’re never going to change, never. And I’ve had enough of it.”

Phoebe turned and ran into the airport terminal. Lily’s hand reached out toward her just a fraction too late, the rest of her explanation shriveling on her tongue. She moved to follow, to tell Phoebe there was still time, there was still a chance for them to have the relationship Phoebe wanted—that Lily wanted too—her heart suddenly aching with love as though a dam had burst after years of restraint. But by the time she had hauled her suitcase through the revolving doors and into the terminal, Phoebe had vanished.

Chapter 50

Audrey

Nine hours later, a yellow taxi snaked through the midday Manhattan traffic, horns blaring, sunlight glinting on buildings that stretched up as if to touch the sky. Audrey gazed out of the cab window at a view that looked less like a city and more like a movie set. She couldn’t believe she was actually here.

It was only now that she could see the pinnacle of the Chrysler Building gleaming in the sunshine that she realized how deep her fear had been that she might not make it. She watched the steam rising from manhole covers and smelled the perversely delicious mix of car fumes, hot tarmac, and burning ambition all cooked together in the sweltering July heat. So many times over the past month she had imagined all the things that might have stopped her making this trip: Jess announcing she’d changed her mind; Lily deciding she couldn’t possibly leave work, even for a few days; her doctor prohibiting long-haul travel. So many obstacles, both real and imagined. But now she was here.

Inside the handbag clasped tightly on her lap, next to the Trebor Extra Strong Mints, a half-used packet of tissues, and her anti-nausea medication, nestled Audrey’s diary from 1969. It had felt only right to bring it with her. Without it, she might never have remembered how much her sixteen-year-old self had wanted to come.

Audrey glanced sideways, at Lily next to her and Jess in the front passenger seat, both of them staring out of the window. They’d barely uttered a word since they’d left London. Jess was clearly still furious with her and had watched movies back-to-back throughout the journey, while Lily had spent most of the flight under her eye mask, complaining of a headache. Any attempt to engage either of them in conversation had been met with monosyllabic responses until Audrey had swallowed her disappointment and instructed herself to be patient. She couldn’t expect decades of estrangement to be resolved during the course of one flight across the Atlantic.

But now, driving through the streets of Manhattan, Audrey felt irritated that her daughters couldn’t put aside their differences just for a few minutes so she could enjoy her first glimpses of a city she had waited so long to see. She turned to look out of the window—at the New York Public Library, Rockefeller Center, Radio City Music Hall—trying not to let the atmosphere spoil the moment completely.