Now it was just a case of waiting until her mother turned up. Amber wasn’t quite sure how the two would find each other. But it was a small town. If they missed each other then so be it, they’d eventually catch her when she returned to Iceland and Lumin could be reunited with her.

‘Well, don’t you look a sight,’ Amber’s mum says as they approach. ‘So much better than that shivering girl we saw a couple of weeks ago.’

Lumin laughs. ‘I feel better than that girl did then too.’ She looks at the shop. ‘I didn’t really take this in last time I was here.’ She walks in and her fingers trace the objects inside. She crouches down to look at a shell-encrusted frame, renovated by Amber. ‘Your work is amazing, Amber. You need to get it out there more.’

‘Get it on Etsy!’ Viv and Rita say at the same time.

‘All right, maybe Etsy is the way forward,’ Amber says grudgingly.

‘Maybe, hey?’ Rita says to Viv. ‘That’s more than we’ve managed to get out of her, isn’t it? How do you manage it, Lumin?’

‘She’s scared of me,’ Lumin said matter-of-factly. ‘I have a mean left hook.’

‘She really does,’ Amber says.

The older women look at them in shock.

‘When it comes to throwing snowballs anyway,’ Amber adds.

‘The look on their faces!’ Lumin says. Lumin and Amber collapse into fits of giggles, leaning into each other as Rita shakes her head.

But Viv isn’t laughing with them. Instead, she’s standing up, the blanket falling from her knees as she stares at the woman watching them from afar.

The woman starts walking towards them. She is tall, slim, with a large rucksack on her back.

Viv lets out a sob, putting her hand to her mouth.

The woman comes to a stop in front of Viv. ‘Mum?’ she says.

Amber looks between them, mind throbbing with confusion. ‘I don’t understand.’

Then the woman looks at Lumin, her face lighting up. ‘Darling, what on earth are you doing here?’

‘Mum!’ Lumin shouts, running towards the woman.

Amber realises who it is now: it’s Gwyneth, Lumin’s mother.

‘Gwen?’ Viv says in a trembling voice. ‘Can it really be you?’

‘Gwendolyn?’ Rita says, mouth dropping open. ‘Surely not!’

‘Gwendolyn?’ Lumin says, confused.

‘I changed my name slightly,’ Gwyneth explains. ‘Reg kept getting it wrong, calling me Gwyneth instead. It stuck.’

‘What the hell is going on?’ Amber asks, so confused she feels her head might burst.

Lumin and Gwyneth pull apart. Gwyneth’s eyes drop to Amber’s bad hand and she puts her hand to her mouth. ‘Little Amber,’ she whispers.

‘Mum, what’s going on?’ Amber asks her mother.

‘Gwen is your cousin, love,’ Rita whispers, an unbearable sadness in her eyes.

‘Cousin? I don’t have any cousins!’

Lumin looks between all of them, shock registering on her face.