The letter arrived in the office with the morning post, Sylvia’s name in a cursive script on the envelope, a Swiss stamp in the corner. It was little over two months since she’d been to Switzerland, but it felt so much longer. She pictured the small apartment – the girls crammed around the table, steam rising from the fondue, David Bowie on the record player, Daniel drinking beer on the tatty old couch. So much had happened since then. Opening the letter was like stepping back to before: before she’d admitted what was happening to her, before the clinic, before she took a left turn off the route she thought she was on.

Dearest Sylvia,

I can’t tell you how excited I was to receive a copy of the wonderful article you wrote. We are so incredibly grateful to you for shining a light on our cause and helping others understand our fight. I knew, from the moment I met you, that you were on our side, and it means so much to us I cannot say! And so I wanted to invite you back. We’re staging an event later in the summer, a feminist festival, where we hope to spread the word about everything we’re passionate about. Will you come? It will be the school holidays, you can stay with me, and I would be simply delighted to show you a little more of my country at the same time. Say you will?

With my very best wishes,

Evelyne