“What? I’m not going to pretend to be nice, just because they’re Julia’s sons and she’s ill.”

“No, that’s not what I meant. Will you try?”

“Try what?”

“Go and see Sean—try and get him to visit his mother.”

I wait until Dad and Julia have gone to bed before I talk to Max and Lena. We sit in the kitchen so our voices don’t carry upstairs.

“What’s up, Tess?” Lena asks, fiddling with a bottle of wine and a corkscrew. “You’ve been trailing round with a face like a smacked arse all evening.”

“Julia wants to see Sean and Jack again.”

Lena looks blank. “Well, duh—they are her sons. Why wouldn’t she want to see them?”

“But wanting something and it actually happening is…I asked Leo and he said they wouldn’t even talk to him. I don’t think they’ll be popping in with grapes and flowers anytime soon,” Max says, peeling the label off the bottle of beer he’s drinking.

I rub my hands through my hair. “God, I’m so torn. The last thing I want to do is see them again, but Julia…Dad says Sean is here. Over at Dean House. He’s actually here and hasn’t come to see her. He’s such a shit. Is it really going to be good for her to see them again? When they haven’t bothered in all these years? Won’t it make things worse—or is that just me wanting to believe that because I don’t want to see them?”

“I don’t know. If it’s what Julia wants.”

I sigh and look at Max. “I know, I know. Maybe you should speak to him? You’re still friends—he’s more likely to listen to you than me or Dad, isn’t he? Perhaps Dad didn’t manage to explain how little time Julia has.”

Max and Lena exchange a glance and then look back at me. “He knows, Tess,” Max says. “I called him before I called you. He basically told me to stay out of it, that it was none of my business.”

“So I’m our last shot at getting him here?” I shake my head. “I haven’t set eyes on either of them since the wedding. I think…did I have a fight with Sean? It’s another thing I can’t bloody remember. There was something…something Bella said. I…”

My voice dies as lightning flashes in my mind. A thunderous roar and Bella…Bella’s voice shouting, screaming at me. Oh God, the storm, the woods, it’s that night. I’m remembering…what am I remembering?

“Tess? Are you okay?”

“Shh,” I say, pushing Max’s hand away and standing up. There. Clearer. Bella’s crying, she’s in her jeans and tank top, soaked by the rain. We’re in the woods.