She felt restless despite the walk, like she had an itch she couldn’t reach. It had been there ever since she received the photograph. An urge to run away and not look back. But she’d done that once before and had returned in the end, this place always pulling her back, like she was attached to it with a long piece of elastic that refused to snap.

She swore back then that she would never come back, but here she was.

Her home, but not a home she had ever wanted.

The photograph was tucked into her writing notebook in her handbag, between the pages containing new book ideas and character sketches, hidden out of reach of prying eyes. She kept the notebook on her at all times since ideas could come to her at any moment.

Hidden in plain sight.

Helen hadn’t worked out where the photo had come from yet. A plain white envelope, her first name in block capitals, nothing out of the ordinary. She had been alone when she opened it, no witnesses to her reaction when she dropped the Polaroid, her fingers burning like it had scalded her.

It had landed face up on the carpet, the girl smiling back.

A face that haunted Helen.

The envelope was empty apart from the Polaroid. No note or letter; no indication of who had sent it – or why.

Why now? All of that happened thirty years ago.

Was she reading too much into the bicycle bell? Was that just a coincidence? Or placed there by whoever sent the photo? Did they know she walked on that beach?

Helen needed to put it out of her head before she drove herself crazy. She needed to focus on the bookshop and her next writing project, try to distract herself, forget about all of it. No good could come of any of it.

She heard a key in the front door and kicked off her sandy shoes, before walking in her socks to the front door. Her cleaner, Pauline, had just arrived, ready to bleach away the family’s dirt.

There was some dirt that could never be cleaned though, no matter how much bleach they poured on it.

“Hi, Pauline, how’s things?”

“Hey, Mrs Whitmore, can’t complain. Clive! Hi!”