Oh, he was just the most squeezable, adorable thing. She had to go see him before he grew too thin. She simply had to.

And it would be nice to see Sophie, too. She’d written that she was still feeling a bit weak, and Posy did like to be a help.

A few days into the visit, she and Sophie were taking tea, and talk turned, as it occasionally did, to Araminta and Rosamund, whom Posy occasionally bumped into in London. After over a year of silence, her mother had finally begun to acknowledge her, but even so, conversation was brief and stilted. Which, Posy had decided, was for the best. Her mother might have had nothing to say to her, but she didn’t have anything to say to her mother, either.

As far as epiphanies went, it had been rather liberating.

“I saw her outside the milliner,” Posy said, fixing her tea just the way she liked it, with extra milk and no sugar. “She’d just come down the steps, and I couldn’t avoid her, and then I realized I didn’t want to avoid her. Not that I wished to speak with her, of course.” She took a sip. “Rather, I didn’t wish to expend the energy needed to hide.”

Sophie nodded approvingly.

“And then we spoke, and said nothing, really, although she did manage to get in one of her clever little insults.”

“I hate that.”

“I know. She’s so good at it.”

“It’s a talent,” Sophie remarked. “Not a good one, but a talent nonetheless.”

“Well,” Posy continued, “I must say, I was rather mature about the entire encounter. I let her say what she wished, then I bid her good-bye. And then I had the most amazing realization.”