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“Why me?” Hope asked, looking up quickly. Did he know something?

Jake smiled at her. “Because you’re persuasive.”

“Ah.” So no, he knew nothing.

“And because I get the feeling that Ava Stanford might do more for you than she would for me,” he added.

Okay, so maybe he’d guessed. Hope swallowed. She desperately wanted to ask, but she shook her head. “I can’t ask her to stay. If she says she doesn’t want to, then she doesn’t want to. I won’t emotionally blackmail her.”

“Good heavens, Hope. I wasn’t implying that. Simply that the two of you have spent a lot of time together over the last term and maybe you have better insight into her than I do.”

“Oh,” Hope said. But she still shook her head. “If she turned you down then she doesn’t want to stay.”

There was the sound of applause coming from the hall and Hope stood up straighter.

“They’re almost done,” said Jake. “I’d better re-claim my seat. We’ll talk about the coming changes later, don’t worry about them though, you’ll all have input.”

He hurried off and Hope took one second to close her eyes and breath before she too turned around and headed back to the classroom.

IT WAS OVER. The children had been sent home with their parents, over-excited and over-stimulated. Hope didn’t look forward to trying to put Alice to bed tonight. She’d run off quite happily with Caz though, so maybe her grandmother could calm her down.

The classroom was quiet and empty, the chairs had been stacked in the hall, and all Hope needed to do now was pull on her coat and go home.

Except Ava was there, wiping off the white-board, collecting things together on her desk.

“It went well,” Hope said, the lingering thought that Ava didn’t want to stay still at the back of her mind.

“It did,” said Ava, not looking at her.

Hope took a breath. “So, um, I suppose, well, I should say goodbye.”

Ava still didn’t look up. “I’ll be in tomorrow. There’s class in the morning and then cleaning up to do in the afternoon.”

“Right,” said Hope. “Yes. Well, goodnight then.”

“Goodnight,” Ava said, still not looking up.

Hope put her coat on, put her bag over her shoulder, closed the cupboard door and walked toward the exit.

She was two steps from the door when she heard a small sniff.

She might not even had heard it. It might have been nothing.

She took the last two steps, put her hand on the door and then…

And then she thought about all the sleepless nights she’d had, all the sleepless nights she would have. She thought about regretting this moment for the whole rest of her life, about thinking this could be the moment she could have changed everything.

And she thought about Ava crying, stifling her sobs so they couldn’t be heard, building her wall higher and hiding herself behind it.

She didn’t turn around.

But she did speak.

“Don’t leave me.”

Chapter Thirty Five

There was a long silence as Ava tried to understand the words that she thought she’d heard.