Emily had lain awake half the night trying to decide what to do, tossing all the possibilities around in her mind until they blurred into one giant knot of confusion and frustration.

I can’t stay here, she thought, sitting up in bed and staring across the garden, beyond the church spire to where she knew the tide would be slinking across the beach, across to a stretch of ocean that wrapped itself around the globe, connecting all the dots of land her grandmother had once been so desperate to explore.

I don’t want to leave. Emily sighed to herself as she went into the bathroom and stepped under the showerhead, let the steady flow of water camouflage the sound of her own doubts. She slowly massaged shampoo into her scalp in an attempt to knead the tension away. Standing at the sink, not bothering to wipe away the condensation on the mirror, she roughly dried her hair, then padded across the landing and back to her room.

I could go with him, just get on a train to London. She scanned the contents of her wardrobe, taking out a random assortment of clothes and stacking them on the bed. Simple as that, no need to actually do anything more than pretend to go along with the idea, at least until she figured out another way to stop herself from being evicted.

She could get on the train, take the letter, then get off at the next stop, come back again.

Emily bit back the idea that if she failed to complete the task, in less than two weeks, there would be no home to come back to.

Only it didn’t feel like her home anymore. She had sensed it from that very first moment after returning from the funeral four weeks ago, and then every morning, every evening, and all the hours in between. There was no clink of silver spoon that stirred sugar into her breakfast tea, no scent of frying bacon or lavender shampoo, and no hushed words as her grandmother spoke on the phone to her doctor while Emily sat in the next room, pretending not to hear.

It was the absence of her that screamed loudest of all.

Emily traced her fingers over the frame of a photograph taken before it all began. Or ended, depending on your point of view. Three generations of women, all in a row. Her grandmother caught midsentence, with mouth open and hand pointing to the sky. Next to her, Emily’s mother with her head thrown back as she laughed, one arm draped around the shoulder of a little girl dressed in a bathing suit and cape, goggles obscuring all but a wide grin.

Once there were three, but now it was only her. Where else was she supposed to go other than on a crazy adventure with a boy she used to know?

Tap, tap, against the windowpane and Emily turned to see Milton on the ledge, watching her from outside. She let him in, watched as he hopped inside the suitcase, and she shooed him away.