“Sometimes the best way to solve a problem,” her mother had said, “is to stop thinking so hard about the problem and just let your hands do the work.” Evelyn, sceptical, had tried it, and had been shocked when the strands yielded in moments. It wasn’t about brute force or even cleverness; it was about not giving up, and maybe, she thought now, about not doing it alone.
She wondered, as she often did, what advice her mother would offer her now. Maybe nothing so direct. More likely, Roslyn would have found a way to push Evelyn into something that felt like her own idea, to prod her gently into seeking what she really wanted rather than what she thought she was supposed to want.
Evelyn grabbed and stared at her phone, her finger hovering over her father’s contact. She’d been avoiding this call for weeks, the weight of her professional struggles pressing down on her.
Before she could second-guess herself, she pressed ‘call’.
Four rings. Five rings. Voicemail.
“Dad,” she began, her voice tight. “I know you’re probably on some tropical island, but I need to talk to you. The board is breathing down my neck, and I’m struggling to keep Crawford’s running the way Mum would have wanted. I don’t know if I’m doing this right.”
She paused, taking a deep breath.
A text pinged almost immediately after she hung up.
Richard
Can’t talk now, love. But I hear you. We’ll catch up soon.
Evelyn stared at the message, a familiar mixture of frustration and resignation washing over her. Soon never seemed to come.
Just then, another text arrived.
Richard
Your mother would be proud of you. Always.
The message hung there, simple yet profound. For a moment, Evelyn felt a weight lift from her shoulders, but the uncertainty remained.
Did she want to run a multinational company? Not particularly. Did she want to be remembered as the “Ice Queen,” the automaton who broke records and never broke a smile?Definitelynot. Evelyn realized, with a pang, that she wanted to be a force for something—maybe even something a little messy, a little unpredictable, like a sanctuary for unwanted dogs. Or a relationship that didn’t fit perfectly into the prescribed Crawford narrative.
She rolled onto her side, pulling the duvet tighter. It was embarrassing how much comfort she took in thinking about a Cocker Spaniel with a patch over one eye. And it was more embarrassing still to think of Alyssa’s face, all warm eyes and wild hair, and to realize that, for the first time in years, she felt an itch for more than just another task, another win.
The partnership with Four Paws, she decided, would be her project. Not the sanitised, marketable version, but the real thing—a shot at meaning, at connection. Maybe she’d even bring Bug home one day, if Alyssa was agreeable. She could almost imagine his paws clicking on the hardwood, his tail thumping against the baseboard, his gentle brown eyes watching her with the same patient expectation she’d seen in Alyssa’s.
She would call Maggie in the morning, tell her to set up a lunch with Alyssa. Not for business, not even for PR, but just because she wanted to. Evelyn wasn’t sure what would happen, or even what she hoped would happen, but the not knowing was, for once, exciting.
She closed her eyes, exhaled, and let herself drift. In the half-dream state between wakefulness and sleep, she found her mother waiting for her in a room full of tangled Christmas lights. Roslyn didn’t say anything. She just handed Evelyn an end of the strand and smiled.
10
Sunlight, Schedules, and Selective Socialising
Evelyn
The morning after was, predictably, awful.
Evelyn woke with a wine headache that felt like someone had taken a cheese grater to the inside of her skull. She’d slept through her alarm—an unprecedented failure—and had to skip her usual routine of coffee, breakfast, and the twentyminutes of silent dread she usually devoted to preparing for the day ahead.
She arrived at the office at eight-fifteen, which was late by her standards and practically lunchtime by her father’s. Maggie was already at her desk, looking annoyingly fresh and holding a takeaway cup that smelled like salvation.
“You look like death,” Maggie said cheerfully, handing over the coffee. “Rough night?”
“Wine,” Evelyn muttered, accepting the cup with both hands like a supplicant at an altar. “Too much wine.”
“Well, at least you’re consistent.” Maggie followed her into the office, clipboard in hand. “You’ve got the budget review at nine, the marketing presentation at eleven, and lunch with the board at one. Also, someone from IT wants to talk to you about the server migration, but I told them you’d rather set yourself on fire.”
“Accurate,” Evelyn said, collapsing into her chair. The office felt too bright, too loud, too everything. She closed her eyes and tried to remember why she’d thought running a company was a good idea.
