Chapter Twenty-One
Some moments in life stay with you.
A vivid memory, full of colour and texture, which, years later, still has the power to make the breath catch in your throat thinking of it.
Of course, they’re not always the moments you’d expect to live on in your mind.
I can’t remember a thing about my first kiss, for example. Nor can I recall what I ate for breakfast the morning I turned twenty-one. And as for my first day in the job as a shy, newly qualified photographer at the advertising agency all those years ago? Well, stomach-churning nerves probably crowded out the details of that particular milestone.
But that moment with my sister, laughing and clinging onto each other, jumping up and down like five-year-olds who’ve over-dosed on gummy bears?
That was one of those moments …
I’d called in at our local printer’s in Willows Edge on the way home to collect the glossy leaflets we’d designed for our brand new business. The brown package lay on the passenger seat, one of the leaflets taped to the front, and every time I glanced over and saw the words, Sister Act Photography, printed in that elegant, curly script we’d chosen, a little bubble of excitement rose up in me.
When I arrived home, Sienna’s car was parked outside. My sister – at twenty-one, almost a decade younger than me – was still living at home with Mum. But we’d decided to use my house as our business headquarters, so she had a key.
I let myself in, yelling, ‘I’m back!’ and I was about to run upstairs when Sienna appeared in the hallway.
‘Got a surprise for you,’ she said, her eyes sparkling.
Curious,
