The buzzer on the oven sounded and they both jumped.

“Come on in,” Polly said, getting to her feet with what Serena could only think was relief. “The chicken should be ready now.”

Serena picked up her glass and followed her aunt inside, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the cool darkness. Polly, originally from England as she was, had worked in real estate in California for the past twenty years and her sense of style was enviable. The penthouse had 360-degree views and exuded modernity with neutral shades, lots of wood and chrome, and bold splashes of color in paintings and soft furnishings. When Serena had first arrived, she had been almost afraid to move in case she ruffled the pristine surface of the apartment, so different from the chaotic mix of her own flat back in Bristol. It was odd; she was so organized in her working life and yet her living space overflowed with books, magazines, clothes, stuffed toys, all sorts of bits and pieces. It was some excuse that she had so little space, using the spare room as an office and squashing everything else into her living room and bedroom, but somehow there was an impermanence to it, as well.

Jonah, her ex, had told her bluntly when he had left that her whole life was rootless and that it was her choice to be like that. “You don’t commit to anything,” he had said, as he had shoved the last of his shirts into his bag, already halfway out of the door and miles away mentally, “whether it’s people or places or jobs. You complain about feeling lonely, but you won’t let people close to you. I’ve tried, Serena. But you were always determined to push me away.” He’d stared at her for a moment then, his dark hair ruffled, glasses askew in the way she had once found so endearing. “It’s not me,” he said. “It really is you.” And he was gone, to move in with his colleague Maddie, as it turned out, because Maddie was apparently so much more fun to be with and was prepared to commit to him.

His criticisms had been harsh and, Serena thought, untrue. She’d worked really hard over the past five years to make her company successful. She and her friend Ella specialized in arranging bespoke historical tours and were starting to get the business on a sound footing at last. It was true that she had moved around a lot in the past ten years and she had lost touch with almost all the friends she’d had from her childhood and college years, but so did a lot of people. She had had a couple of unsuccessful relationships but again, that wasn’t unusual. It was only when she thought about Jonah, which she did less and less since the split, that a tiny doubt crept into her mind that on the issue of people at least he might have been right and that she didn’t really want to commit to anyone. Losing Caitlin, the person who had once been closer to her than anyone else in the world, had inevitably taken a toll in terms of how much she was prepared to invest in a relationship. She had the self-awareness to know that and absolutely no idea how to change it.