Helen had watched her that morning, sitting at the table, a plate of toast in front of her. Two slices of wholemeal, one with cream cheese, one with marmalade, cut down the middle into triangles, like she had had it since she was little. Helen watched her eat one half with cream cheese before eating one half with marmalade, savoury then sweet, followed by the savoury again. Still her little girl, with her familiar habits and eccentricities, yet now unapologetically wearing the body of a woman. In that moment, Helen had had an overwhelming urge to cry – with pride, fear, yearning, love – and had had to get up and fuss over the dishwasher in order to compose herself.

Helen let herself into the shop through the back door and immediately set about making a strong cup of tea to try and warm the chill that had settled in her stomach after the confrontation with Peter. Tonight was Helen’s regular Friday date night with Hugh. She would have to tell him that she had fired Peter. Maybe then he would confess himself.

As she carried the tea out to the front, ready to open up, she noticed a package on the mat inside the front door, which was still locked, the sign reading “Closed”.

Helen picked up the package, feeling the weight of it in her hands. It was wrapped in brown paper and A4 in size, most likely a book. Curiously, it was far too big to have come through the letterbox. Her name was handwritten in capital letters on the brown paper in black Sharpie, the handwriting vaguely familiar, but there was no postmark or courier label. She was used to locals dropping off copies of their self-penned manuscripts in the hope that she might have a contact in the publishing world to get it into print, but this didn’t feel like a manuscript.

She sipped at the tea, sat down at the desk and tore open the paper. It was a book, not too thick, but heavy and encased in a leathery cover.

She turned it over so that it was face up – and stopped breathing.

It was the yearbook from her last year at school. The Seahaven crest and motto were etched into the burgundy leather in pretentious gold foil. She dropped the book onto the desk with a thud. A jaunty pink tag was sticking out from between the pages and she couldn’t stop herself from reaching out with a tentative hand and turning to the marked page, even though instinctively she knew she should just put the book aside, throw it into the recycling bin, set fire to it, anything but open it.