It was years since Lucas had been home, and he wouldn’t have been there now if his aunt hadn’t contacted him to say his mother was ill. The town, he was pleased to see, had moved with the times, although he did experience a pang when it also meant some of his favourite shops as a teenager had been swallowed up by the town centre regeneration. They followed a bus up the hill towards his parents’ house, still a number 12, although the livery was new. Most of the houses in the cul-de-sac had been modernised over the years, so his parents’ house stood out, looking just as it had been when he’d left for the final time.