I hug my arms across my chest. Catherine was nine years old when Alice was born. Old enough to know who her mum was friends with. My mind races as I tuck the card back in its envelope and put it back with the others. I put the lid on the box and return it to the back of Mum’s wardrobe, carefully placing the sandals on top. Everything exactly as it was before.

Except it isn’t. Everything is in a different place now. For whatever reason, Mum has lied to me. Dad, too. Lying by omission.

32

Ross looks confused, as well he might. I’ve just woken him from his doze on the sofa and I’m talking nineteen to the dozen.

“Whoa,” he says, muting the TV. “Slow down and start again.”

“I’ve found a card to Mum in my baby box. It’s from Alice’s mum. From before Alice and I were even born.”

He gives me a blank look. “And this is important because?”

“This is important because they didn’t know each other back then.”

He frowns. “Well, clearly they did.”

“So why don’t I know about it? Why have they never told me?” I pace to the window. “If Mum used to be friends with Alice’s mum, why didn’t she say anything when Alice and I became friends? Why didn’t Alice’s mum say anything to her?”

“I dunno. Maybe they didn’t think it was important. Lizzie, should you even be looking through your mum’s things?”

“I wasn’t looking through her things. I was looking in my baby box. I looked in it loads of times when I was little. Anyway, you’re completely missing the point here. They were good friends when they were both pregnant, with me and Alice. Something must have happened or they wouldn’t have been so against Alice and me being friends.”

Ross scratches his head. “You’ve never told me they were against your friendship.”

I sigh. I’m expecting too much of him, I realize that now. How is he supposed to know these things if I’ve never told him?

“Well, they were, and I could never work out why. Neither of us could. All this time I thought they didn’t approve of Alice’s family because they weren’t churchgoers or ‘not the right sort of people,’ or something stupid like that.”

Ross blows air through his closed mouth so that his cheeks billow out. “We can’t know everything about our parents’ past lives.”

Just then, I hear the sound of a key in the front door. “They’re back,” I whisper. “What am I going to do?”

“Hello!” Dad calls from the hallway. “Only one customer the whole time. It’s a wonder Liz Metcalfe makes a living out of that shop.”

Ross throws me a warning look. He shakes his head and mouths the word “nothing.”