‘Hello, Mum,’ she says to the air, and then looks around, but of course there’s no one there to hear. This isn’t a TV drama, she reminds herself, no one is watching.

She touches the stone and feels its cold penetrate her palm, then she leans back into the ground and reads the headstones either side of Stella’s: son, father, brother, sister, mother, daughter. Labels. Who really are we if we don’t belong to someone else? She feels guilty then. She puts it down to the daffodils, their browning petals making this grave feel unloved, enough space made for guilt to slip in. She pulls them from the short vase and hears her knee crack as she gets up off the grass. She regrets now not bringing more flowers to replace these.

She takes the path down towards the watering shed and inside dumps the daffodils in the compost bin. But as she turns to leave, she sees it, the same black granite stone she’d come across the other day, and the same matching single daffodil standing up in the vase. That one needs replacing too. Only as she goes to take it, she has a closer look at the stone, and this time she notices the name – it can’t be. She blinks, making sure her eyes aren’t playing tricks on her. But it’s there, for all to see: Angela Kyle. She can barely believe it.

Slowly, she crouches down, removing the old daffodil and laying it down on the gravel path beside her. She takes her thumb and rubs it across every bronzed letter scored into the stone, still incredulous at her discovery.

Angela Rose Kyle, aged four,
taken from us 27 October 1979.

Always loved, never forgotten.

We pray for the day when we will meet again.
Mummy and Daddy

She pulls her hand away from the stone and examines it, as if somehow it had provided a direct link between her and the Kyles. As if somehow this shared touch was all the confirmation she needed that fate was at that moment encouraging them towards one another. And somewhere deep inside, the emptiness she had been feeling since she had packed that pathetic box in her office lifts ever so slightly.

She steps back from the stone and checks her watch. She’d better leave now otherwise she will be late for Hollie. But as she walks further away, she is aware that she’s actually nudging closer – although to what, she doesn’t know.

‘So you just stumbled across the grave?’ Hollie says, stirring her coffee and frowning into her cup. ‘Just like that?’

‘Well, it is a cemetery, Hollie. I just feel so sorry for the parents.’