When I walked away from Ames, and the super cool pub he managed, I faced the prospect of my tiny, windowless hotel room with more than a little trepidation. Despite being windowless, it wasn’t awful. If I lay on the bed and stretched my arms, I could touch the padded wall at the far end of the room and the glass enclosure that held the shower, toilet, and sink.

It was the oddest room I’d ever stayed in, and for someone like me—it was far too silent.

When I’d left Colorado, I’d been surrounded by the things that reminded me of Colin, the man who had collapsed in my arms. The man who had made me promise, a hundred times throughout our relationship, not to see him should he end up spending his final days in a hospital.

And in keeping the promise I made to him, in staying away when his heart stopped beating, I’d successfully broken a part of my own heart.

The main reason I slept horribly was because the high I’d felt in leaving the bar had dissipated once I’d arrived at my lonely little room. Perhaps part of that high was thanks to that whole nearly-drowning incident. But it was also the first time since leaving the States that I’d been able to forget a little bit about the heaviness I’d carried across the Atlantic with me. It’d been three months since Colin had been buried, but it felt like many more. My restlessness tonight, tossing and turning and tangling myself in these sheets, blurred into all the others where I could hear Colin as though he were only a few feet away but always out of reach.

Finally, in the morning, after a terrible night of sleep, I opened my eyes to stare at the ceiling.

“This isn’t what Colin would have wanted for you.” I could hear my brother’s words as if he was sitting beside me, reassuring me as he had so many times. “He’d want you to keep spreading your happiness, Mila.” The promises Jude spoke did little to buoy me, even as I’d agreed to his offer to go to London in his stead. We both knew he didn’t need me to go there for him. As his twin sister, I could see right through him. But neither of us called each other on it, and so I agreed to hop on a plane to London for five weeks, to do the things he wanted me to do for the travel blog, with a few off-the-beaten-path things as well.

I’d grabbed a handful of pamphlets from the local restaurants and my hotel, and now I stared at them, spread out across my unmade bed, unable to choose what to do next. I’d seen Big Ben, had fish and chips, and had managed to get lost more than once—though I wasn’t sure that last one qualified on anyone’s must-do bucket list.

As if he could hear me thinking of him, my phone buzzed atop a pamphlet for a double-decker bus tour with my brother’s face lighting up the screen. I briefly debated not answering it, not wanting to hear his disappointment in my complete lack of work ethic these last few days. But I knew that’d only concern him more, so I answered it after the third ring.

“Hello, brother dearest.”

“Mila-moo,” he said, his nickname for me. “What kind of trouble have you gotten yourself into in London?”

“Surprisingly, none thus far.” I decided to leave off the part about me hanging over the Westminster Bridge for now, as I flopped onto my back on the bed. “But the day is still young. Speaking of,” I leaned over to look at the clock, “it’s noon here. It’s gotta be six in Colorado, right? That’s early.”

“We’re going on a hike today,” Jude explained, and I knew the “we” was him and his girlfriend, Trista. “What’s on your shortlist of plans today?”

I chewed on my thumbnail as I eyed the brochures. “Um…”

Jude laughed, that deep, rich sound reminding me so much of home that my stomach hurt. There was something about having a twin, that invisible thread keeping you connected no matter how far you were separated by physical distance. “Do I need to go to London and force you into the wild?”

“Would you?” That would make it all so much easier on me, to have my brother here, nudging me along.

“I was thinking about it, actually. Mom and Dad wanted to go, too.”

I made a face and rubbed my forehead. “Could you just … lose them, maybe? Airports are big. It’d be believable.”

Jude laughed again. “You know how they are. They won’t want me to fly alone.”

“Yeah,” I said softly. The same heart condition that had killed Colin was present in Jude, which meant that my brother could meet the same fate. It wasn’t a thought I entertained too much, because I didn’t delight in melancholy things, but it wasn’t something I could easily forget. “Bring Trista. That’s what girlfriends are for.”

“I’m not sure if she’ll be up for it, so it might have to be Mom and Dad.”

“Ugh,” I sighed. “The fact that I’m debating dipping into my nearly-empty savings to buy a plane ticket and escort you here myself—instead of them—should tell you just how excited I am about having them around.”

“It’ll be great. You can show us all the places you’ve been and the things you’ve seen and maybe it’ll bring you guys together a little bit.”

My brother and I had different parenting experiences. But I supposed that it wasn’t terribly surprising that having one sick child and one healthy child meant the latter would be forgotten, often. I never held it against my brother—of course not. If anything, the fact that I was born with a whole heart had been like a constant reminder to not waste time, to not take things for granted. So, in my parents’ minds I was Mila, the reckless wanderer. The girl born with wings and a spirit for life that exhausted those around her. I’d played my part well, until a friend in high school psychoanalyzed me and said my antics were cries to my parents for attention. I didn’t need attention; I needed to live for me and for Jude.

“Yeah, maybe,” I told Jude, sounding more resigned than I should’ve. Poor Jude always felt like he was stuck in the middle between us, a position I didn’t envy in the least. And while they would tsk and sigh and say, “Did you hear your sister did…” inserting whatever ridiculous thing I’d done that week—I’d never tell Jude, “Thanks for having a heart condition—I’m basically an orphan when you’re around.” Even thinking it made me cringe a little, because it was such a terrible and insensitive thing to think. “When do you think?”

“Probably near the end of your month there. So, tell me, what did you do last night?”

I made a face that if he’d seen, he would’ve known that I was debating on what to reveal, exactly. “Well,” I began, closing my eyes briefly to try and remember what I was doing before I nearly fell off the bridge. “I wandered down a few streets. Bought some trinkets in—or is it at?—Piccadilly Circus. And then I got on the tube and got off on the wrong stop, somewhere around Westminster Bridge, which was pretty perfect timing, actually, because I made it just before the hour struck.” I chewed on my thumbnail some more. “And then I ran into this guy—Ames. He has a bar. Or pub. Or whatever. Anyway, it’s this dark, kind of moody place with a really cool name.”

“Oh yeah?” I could hear Jude shuffling papers and knew the inevitable was coming. “Did you take notes?”

“Sure did,” I lied through my teeth, eyeing my empty notebook with a bit of annoyance that I hadn’t thought to bring it out once.

“What’s it called?”

“Free Refills. In Camden.” I impressed myself for remembering, which wasn’t saying too much. And because I was remembering, I grabbed my notebook and jotted down the name and area of London, and a quick note: Good sangria. “I…might go back.”

“Great. Maybe this Ames fellow can give you a few places to visit while you’re in town. I’d like you to see things that aren’t in every guidebook. Big Ben is great, but it’s not going to bring a lot of traffic to our site—everyone’s seen Big Ben. You know?”

I nodded and rolled to my side, staring at my coffee maker longingly. I hadn’t yet had a cup, even though it was noon, but the talk about Ames’ bar had me thinking about that sangria I’d had. “I’ll ask him,” I said, already deciding that I would go back—if nothing else but to pick his brain a little. “Be careful on your hike today, okay?”

“I will. Bye, Mila-moo.”

After hanging up, I sighed and stretched my back. I’d be seeing Ames again, and this time I’d have to take better notes about the bar, and create a list of things to see in London to appease Jude and my own natural curiosity.

After looking up Free Refills online, I had the hotel call a taxi and packed my backpack purse with my things, before setting off to Camden.