As she loaded her rented van, reversing the process she’d gone through with such excitement six years before, the door to the neighboring café jangled and its owner, Lina, emerged. Emma had watched Lina tidy away her one outdoor table and best vegan scones this side of the thames! sign on countless evenings. She observed her swishing through the routine now, untying her apron, her braided hair gathered inside a scarf. When Lina glanced over, Emma smiled. “Hey!”

It was unmistakable. Lina froze. A look of wariness glazed her features. Emma felt a hole open in her stomach as her business neighbor smiled thinly and darted back inside, flapping her closed sign into place. A blind unfurled over the café window, juddering as it got stuck and Lina seemed to yank at its cord.

And how could Emma blame her? She’d behaved so badly on her last proper day in business, over a month ago now. Had forgotten her professionalism and let her personal life erupt in the street. Maybe Lina’s customers had objected to having their afternoon coffees disturbed by drama from next door. Drama was something Emma tried to keep consigned to her outfits and hairstyles these days. She liked to think they deflected it. But it seemed her armor was flimsy.

She dragged her eyes to her own shop, to the name, Threads, hanging over the door. It no longer evoked that tingle of pride. She felt she should apologize to the sign she’d designed herself, and the unsold treasures squished into boxes, and the regular (and in many ways irregular) customers who’d kept her afloat and enlivened her work. It had never been easy to stay in business, had taken most of her energy, her focus, her self-belief, but until recently she’d seemed to have just enough of all those things.

—

She steered the van through Kingston’s tight streets, half enjoying the looks of surprise on people’s faces when they saw that White Van Man was actually Blue-Haired Woman. The vehicle gave her a temporary feeling of height and breadth, as if she was in control of a parade float. There was nothing to fanfare about, though, as she crammed the van’s contents into her tiny flat, which coughed up disgruntled clouds of dust in protest.

How could a place feel cluttered and empty at the same time? The more of Zeb’s things she had to nudge aside to make room for her stock, the more she was forced to acknowledge that his left-behind sneakers and toiletries had been in the same positions for a month.