She paused as she reached her mother’s front door. She had briefly considered going through the back lane and into the yard and knocking on the kitchen door, but it had felt wrong. It would be suggesting an intimacy that was no longer hers by right.

Swallowing hard, she told herself to lift her hand and knock. If her mam and da weren’t pleased to see her, if they had decided to cut her out of their lives as, in all honesty, she had done with them, then that was fair enough. She hoped they could exchange a few civil words and she could leave on a good note, but if not then she would have to deal with that. Steeling herself, she raised a trembling hand.

It seemed like minutes but in reality was only probably twenty or thirty seconds before the door was opened. Her mother stared at her for an unending moment before reaching out and grabbing her, as though she thought Ruby was going to disappear again, but without saying a word. Ruby found herself gathered into her mother’s embrace and borne into the house, still clutched so tightly she could barely breathe.

‘Lass, oh, lass, lass.’ Cissy was half-laughing, half-crying. ‘Oh, Ruby, thank God, thank God.’

They stood together in the hall and now Ruby was clinging on to her mam and they were murmuring incoherently, tears streaming down their faces, unable to let go of each other. It was only her father’s voice calling from the front room that broke them apart and enabled Cissy to say through her sobs, ‘Come an’ see your da, lass. He’s never given up hope of seeing you again. He’s kept me going in my darkest moments. “She’ll come back,” he’s said, an’ he was right. Thank God, he was right.’

Now Ruby was thrust into the front room and she saw immediately that it had become her parents’ bedroom and the reason for it. The figure in the bed was all skin and bones but at the sight of her the gaunt face lit up and it was her da again. She flew to his side, kneeling down beside the bed, and as he opened his arms she leaned into them. ‘Aw, lass, lass.’ His voice was thick. ‘I’ve prayed for this day. Oh, aye, every night since you’ve bin gone. Me bonny lass.’

Flooded with guilt and sorrow, she sobbed, ‘I’m sorry, Da. I’m so sorry.’

‘Nowt to be sorry for, lass, not on your part leastways. You needed to find your own path after what happened, I understand that, but I’m glad you’ve come. By, lass, I am.’

Cissy had followed her into the room and now, as she wiped her face with a handkerchief, she said huskily, ‘You sit with your da, lass, an’ I’ll get a cuppa. When did you have something to eat last?’