‘It looks stupid with this.’ Loo plucked at her T-shirt, which had once been bright blue, and she could see that Bee was torn. ‘I don’t mind,’ she said, ‘you can have it all.’

And she didn’t mind – the clothes in the box, she didn’t like them. She tugged at the skirt again. It felt – wrong.

‘Well, that won’t work, will it?’ said Bee. ‘We have to match.’ She rifled through the clothes on her bed, pulling out a little vest, greyish white and studded with tiny bone buttons. ‘Here. Try this.’

Loo didn’t move.

‘Bloody hell, Loo. You’re not shy, are you?’ Bee chucked the vest at her. ‘I won’t look,’ she said, turning back to her bed and making a show of sorting through the remaining clothes.

Loo turned her back on her sister and the mirror too, peeling off the T-shirt and letting it fall to the floor, shaking out the camisole and pulling it over her head as quickly as she could, her skin puckering despite the heat as the musty cloth settled into place.

It was too big. She didn’t need to look in the mirror to see that, but she looked anyway. It was almost comical, the way the top sort of slithered off her shoulder, as if she had begun to shrink, leaving the clothes behind. She might have laughed, if it hadn’t felt so . . .

Bee grabbed her and swung her round. ‘We’ll have to fix this too,’ she said, pulling the camisole back into place and digging the pins through the double layers of cotton.

‘Ow.’ Loo flinched as Bee scraped a pin across her collar bone.

‘Oh, give over. I didn’t hurt you.’ Bee swung her around again and began to gather the fabric at Loo’s back. ‘Now, stay still.’

Loo did as she was told. It was always easier to do as she’d been told, in the end. Anyway, the sooner Bee finished, the sooner she could have her own clothes back.

‘Right.’ Bee stood back. ‘That should do.’

Loo looked in the mirror, straightening the camisole, trying to get used to herself. Bee stood next to her, admiring the effect, how alike they looked now. She posed with one hand on her hip. ‘Say thank you, Lucia,’ she said. She’d been in a funny mood ever since they’d found the box: loud, giddy, frantic.

Loo didn’t say anything; she went back to the window.

The scene in the garden had changed. Michael was helping Cathy to her feet, and Flor was jigging around next to her, Simon and Issy were drifting towards the house. No one seemed to be missing them, the girls, at all. They were saying their goodbyes, getting ready to go. One day, soon, Michael and Simon would be gone for good. And then perhaps Joe would come back.