The light turns green and we’re off again. I can’t help but notice that, despite feeling exhausted, for the first time in a long time I feel like I’m doing something that’s making a difference.

Chapter 12

I take hold of Miles’s hand as we walk through Westerly. On one of our date nights, I mentioned the night out Soph had arranged and he seemed genuinely excited to be invited. We checked in to our B&B this afternoon and now we’re heading to the pub to meet the gang. Westerly’s changed a lot in the past seventeen years. The town centre’s had a face lift; it’s a little glossier and prettier, the Victorian buildings all freshly painted and decorated with hanging baskets, and bunting hanging between the old-fashioned streetlights. Yet, despite the gentrification, there’s still enough of the old Westerly to make it seem familiar.

I walk past the pub where I had my first legal drink when I turned eighteen. Past what used to be a greasy spoon where we’d eat away our hangovers and that’s now an upmarket seafood restaurant. I spot the old newsagent where Dad used to insist we bought our ice creams from when I was little as they were the cheapest in town.

Soph’s chosen The Quays, which was one of our old haunts, and, like the town, when I step inside I notice it’s had a bit of a makeover. There’s a new slate floor underfoot and the bar is polished and shiny.

I spot Soph and Brett talking to a woman at a table in the corner and make a beeline for them.

‘Hey, you came.’ Soph stands up and wraps me up in a huge hug. ‘And you must be Miles, I’m so thrilled you could come.’

He seems taken aback as she gives him a big hug too.

I lean over and Brett kisses me on both cheeks and then shakes Miles’s hand. A woman with long, glossy brown hair is sitting at the table with them and she flashes a smile of perfect white teeth.

‘Edie, this is Verity, Verity, this is Edie and Miles,’ says Soph.

‘Lovely to meet you,’ she says with an American accent.

‘Ah, is that an East Coast accent I detect?’ says Miles.

‘It is, I’m from Massachusetts.’

‘Nice. I’ve got an aunt in New Hampshire.’

‘Well, we won’t hold that against her.’ She flicks her hair over her shoulder. ‘Sit, sit.’

I squeeze into an empty seat next to Soph and Miles rests his hand on the back of it.

‘I’ll get us drinks first,’ he says, backing away. ‘Edie?’

‘I’ll have a beer, thanks.’

‘Anyone else?’

‘We’re all set.’ Verity flashes her perfect smile again, then turns to me. ‘Soph says that you all used to work together back in the day.’