She kept her eyes trained on her daughter, searching for any sign of a softening, but when Jess began to speak her voice was so eerily calm that a chill inched down Audrey’s spine.

“I don’t know how many times I can say it, Mum. I know it’s hard for you, but this isn’t about you. It’s about me and Lily. And I’m an adult so you have to let me manage my relationships as I see fit. I don’t want Lily in my life and I never will, and there’s nothing anyone can do about that.”

“But if only I knew the reason, if only you’d tell me why you won’t speak to her, perhaps I’d understand. Perhaps I’d be able to help. I just don’t believe we can’t sort this out, whatever it is. I have to try, you must understand that.”

Jess thumped hard on the steering wheel. “I am not telling you. How many times do I have to say it? I don’t want to see Lily and that’s that. I don’t want you and me falling out about this, Mum, but if you mention it again then I can promise you we will.”

Jess glared at her, and Audrey resisted the temptation to try to bridge the gap between them with words of reassurance. She knew, from decades of experience, that there were times when her attempts to appease Jess only exacerbated her anger.

Neither of them spoke until Audrey heard Jess sigh, then swallow.

“I’m sorry, Mum. I’m sorry for getting so angry. I know this is hard for you, really I do. And if there was any way I could make things better, I would, honestly. But I can’t. I just can’t.”

Their eyes met fleetingly before Jess turned back to the road. Audrey looked out of the window to see a throng of shoppers emerging from Westfield—friends, families, couples, laughing, chatting, sharing stories of their day—the knowledge settling in her head like a thick winter fog that, nearly a month after moving in with Jess, she was still no closer to effecting a reconciliation between her daughters.

Part Three

April

Chapter 12

Audrey

“I’m so sorry it’s not better news. I know it’s a lot to take in. Can I get you a glass of water?”

Audrey moved to shake her head but she felt as if it were no longer attached to her body. “Thank you, no. I’m fine.”

I’m fine. She almost apologized to the doctor for the absurdity of it.

She’d known, as soon as she’d walked into the doctor’s room and seen the home-care nurse sitting in a high-backed chair upholstered in standard NHS blue vinyl, that today was going to be a Bad News Day. They only ever brought in the home-care nurses when there was heavy emotional lifting to be done.

“I know it’s really difficult news to hear. I wish I could be telling you something different. But from your latest scan and blood tests, it does seem to be spreading more aggressively than we’d originally thought. And this fourth tumor we’ve found on your lung—as I say, it’s small, but of course we’d rather it wasn’t there at all.”