Aurelia frowned and drew her knees up to her chin, chiding herself for thinking that last night could be anything other than the result of being overtired and overly sad.She felt a sudden need to talk to her sister and, almost as soon as she had the thought, her phone rang.
“It really is amazing,” Aurelia said as she answered.She smiled and nestled deeper into her chair.
Antonia gave the slightest pause as she processed this.“Did we do it again?”
“We did.I wasjustabout to call you.”
“I know you think it makes us special—”
“And I know you think it makes us freaks,” Aurelia laughed.
She could hear the faint sound of children’s voices raised in either a game or an argument; she couldn’t tell which.Her heart ached to hear how distant their voices sounded.
“How are my darling niece and nephews?”
“Well, Julia’s been readingLittle Womenand is now making up her own plays.”
A shriek made Aurelia pull the phone from her ear.
“As you can no doubt hear, she and the boys are in the other room practicing one right now,” Antonia added.
“Aw, Mum’s favorite book.I’m glad Julia likes it.”
“Yeah, it felt like the right time to share it with her.”Antonia paused, her signal for a shift to serious talk.“How are you doing?”
“Fine?Fine, I suppose,” Aurelia said before adding the obvious.“Sad.”
“Me too.”
“It’s not like I haven’t missed her all year, it’s just hard having it be the end of the first year.‘The first anniversary.’”Aurelia swallowed down a few threatening tears.
“I know,” Antonia said softly just as the children’s voices reared up through the phone again, punctuated by a high-pitched scream.“It helped having the kids to distract me.I talked to Dad—did you?”
“I did.He sounded okay, didn’t he?”
“I might have rung up a few of his friends to remind them to check in on him,” Antonia said without a hint of guilt.“What did you get up to after we talked yesterday?”
“Oh… I went on a sort of pilgrimage and walked around some of Mum’s favorite places.”
“Did it help?”
“I don’t know.”Remembering last night’s events, Aurelia amended that, saying, “I don’t think so.”
“Are you alright?”
“Yeah, it’s just… The strangest thing happened.I woke up convinced people had broken into the shop.But I checked and no one was there.”
“Youchecked?”
“I called the police,” Aurelia reassured her.“But the shop was empty—there was no sign of anyone breaking in.”She gave a mirthless laugh and added, “I thought I heard them talking about Pemberley.”
“What’s that?”
“You remember—Darcy’s place!FromPride and Prejudice.”
“Oh, right.Well, leave it to you to have literate burglars.”
“I know,” Aurelia said, rolling her eyes at herself.“Still, it did spook me a bit.I’m just getting used to Aunt Marigold’s flat, the different noises.”
