Audrey brings the dustcloth to a halt on the kitchen table. She is getting ahead of herself. First, she must navigate the next few minutes. Only then will she know what the rest of the summer—what her family’s future—may hold.

She checks the time again: 5:55 p.m. Her pulse quickens at the thought of Lily and Jess’s arrival. She imagines their faces when they find out what she has done, when they discover that she has engineered a playdate between their daughters despite Jess’s insistence that the girls should never meet and Lily’s acceptance that it would never happen.

She looks out into the garden to where Mia and Phoebe are climbing inside a hula hoop together, trying to spin it around them both, collapsing onto the lawn in a heap of hot, tangled limbs and infectious giggles. Surely, Audrey reasons, when Jess and Lily see how beautifully they’re playing together, not even Jess will be able to argue that Mia and Phoebe—who understand nothing of the sibling estrangement which began long before they were born—should not be friends. Surely Jess will see they are innocent casualties in a family war of which not even Audrey knows the cause.

The doorbell rings and Audrey jumps. She glances once more into the garden at a sight she has waited so long to see, before walking up the basement stairs and into the hallway, taking a deep breath as she opens the door.

“Hi, Mum.” Lily smiles and there is such trust in her expression that Audrey experiences a few seconds of panic. But as she ushers her daughter along the hall, down the stairs, and into the kitchen, she reminds herself—with all the fervor of a religious mantra—of why she has done this: Mia and Phoebe should not have to suffer for their mothers’ mistakes. Children should not be punished for the sins of their parents.

As they walk into the kitchen, to where double doors open onto the sunken patio and the raised lawn beyond, Audrey does not take her eyes off Lily. She watches Lily’s tender smile at seeing her daughter, watches her glance toward the second girl—so similar to her own yet so unknown—watches the question hover behind her eyes as she turns to Audrey.

“I don’t understand . . . What’s going on? Is that who I think it is?”

Lily has seen plenty of photographs and Audrey knows the question is rhetorical. But she nods and watches as Lily turns back toward the garden, as she gazes at Phoebe and Mia taking it in turns to jump up and reach for the unripe apples on the tree. Lily drinks it all in: the first time she has seen her niece.

The doorbell rings again and goose bumps stipple Audrey’s arms. As she turns away, she senses Lily’s head pivot toward her but she does not look back. Her legs, as she ascends the stairs, are unsteady and she clings to the banister, trying to remind herself that she has done this for the right reasons. She has acted not out of control or punishment but out of love. She opens the front door and there is Jess, head down, fumbling inside her bag.