They fall back into a routine. Almost every other day—and sometimes more frequently—they wander out into the surrounding countryside, or decimate the Longmans’ repaired greenhouses, or kick a ball around the green, or play lazy, made-up-rules tennis in Nan’s garden and knock over the lemonade glasses.
And like before, the bruises come and go, like visiting friends that nobody likes, but nobody has the temerity to ask to leave.
Ryan is reminded of his conversation with Mara after a mere coincidence—she texts him moaning about scraping her knee like a silly kid on a cross-country race, seconds before Alex jumps over the churchyard wall and sits down beside him, with a new black eye and a blank face.
And the question boils over before Ryan can really think about it.
“Have you ever…?” Ryan
