“How are things in the countryside?” Eve asked.

“Green,” Tamsin said. “And spacious.” To her sister, her move away from London had been rather abrupt. “Bramble loves it.”

“How about you?” They sat on Eve’s tiny balcony—if you could even call it that, enjoying what they could make out of the sunset in between the high-rise buildings.

“I’m getting used to it. The club’s nice.” Tamsin sipped from her gin and tonic. Eve always used Hendrick’s gin and topped it off with an elaborately carved slice of cucumber. “I’ve given some lessons already. Darren, the old pro, will be retiring soon. It’s all looking pretty good.”

“Not much chance for love in a village like that, though.” Eve and her husband James had helped move Tamsin’s belongings from her tiny flat in Croydon, on the outskirts of London, to the cottage in Tynebury.

“You never know.” Tamsin smiled at her sister. “We are many and we are everywhere these days.”

“Is that why you came all the way to London to go on a date?”

“I came to London to see my sister,” Tamsin said. “The date tomorrow is just… I don’t know. Something I might as well try while I’m here.”

“Thus proving my point,” Eve said. “Tell me about this date, then. Is she of age?”

Tamsin shook her head. She guessed she deserved some snark from her sister. “She’s in her late twenties.” She fished her phone out of her pocket. “I’ll show you a picture.”

“Late twenties?” Eve rolled her eyes. “Are there no available lesbians in their late thirties? This is London, for crying out loud.”

“Here.” Tamsin ignored Eve’s outcry. “Cute, right?” Andi’s profile picture had immediately jumped out at Tamsin last week, when she’d been ‘consulting’ Tinder. She had long blonde hair, big brown eyes, and a constellation of adorable freckles on her nose.

“Late twenties,” Eve repeated. “I don’t think so. She looks to be more in her early twenties, perhaps even late teens.”

“Don’t be silly,” Tamsin said.

“As if no one ever lies on their Tinder profile.” Eve put her glass down. “You won’t want to hear this, but in that picture, Andi is the spitting image of Ellen.”

“So, I have a type. What’s wrong with that?” Tamsin sipped from her drink to hide her agitation.

“I just think you’d have more chance at a successful relationship if you tried dating someone closer to your own age.”

“James is ten years older than you,” Tamsin said.

“Exactly. Ten, not twenty. It makes a world of difference.”

“Andi’s only ten years younger than me.” Tamsin knew her sister meant well—she had to admit she didn’t have the best relationship track record.

“So she says.” Eve sighed. “And what if you miraculously hit it off? Are you going to do long-distance with a woman who’s at a totally different stage in her life than you?”

“Hold your horses, Evie. It’s just a first date.”

“Do you want my honest opinion?” They were waiting for James to bring home a takeaway and were on their second drink.

“You’re asking me now?” Tamsin grinned.

“I sometimes think you subconsciously choose women you don’t really have a future with.”

“Been watching Oprah again, have you?”

“I’m serious, Taz. You always date these twenty-somethings. But you seem to forget that you aren’t in your twenties anymore. In fact, we’ll both be forty soon.”

“Don’t remind me.” Tamsin drank again.

“It’s kind of a big thing for me as well.”

“Why? You have everything to be a happy forty-year-old.” Tamsin couldn’t help but compare herself to her twin, but their lives had always been vastly different. And Tamsin had taken a big step when she’d decided to go for that job in Tynebury—and move away from the city.

Eve rolled her eyes again. “It’s not about having things. It’s about balance.”

“And your point is?” Tamsin saw her sister as the very picture of balance.

“No one has it together all the time. Not even me.”

“I didn’t say you had, but you’re pretty happy, aren’t you? You don’t have too many regrets?”

“I have a good life, but there’s always room for improvement.”

“Maybe you should move to the country. I know this cute little village about an hour and a half away from London. You have family there.”

“And have James leave the city?” Eve shook her head.

“I’m not so sure,” Tamsin said. “When he helped with the move, I could see some appreciation in his eyes for my new surroundings.”

“Maybe for a weekend away.”

“Quite a few people do the commute and what with all the working from home these days.”

“He’s forbidden to work from home. I already work from home.” Eve grinned. “This is my territory!”

The intercom buzzed. “Speak of the devil.” Eve rose. “He’s probably forgotten his keys again.” She headed inside to buzz in her husband.

Ten minutes later, the three of them sat huddled over plates of butter chicken and garlic naan. Tamsin had missed a good takeaway. She was lucky to find an open supermarket past 6PM in Tynebury.

“Your sister-in-law has a hot date tomorrow,” Eve said, with obvious glee in her tone.

“It’s just coffee,” Tamsin said. She fought the urge to kick her sister in the shins underneath the table—she’d done plenty of that when they were younger.

“Coffee can go a long way,” James said, in his typically amiable James way. Tamsin couldn’t imagine her sister being with a nicer man.

“I’ll keep you both posted,” Tamsin said, even though she had no intention of doing so. She needed to meet Andi first.

Tamsin stared into her coffee cup. She and Andi seemed to have already run out of topics of conversation. The main reason, Tamsin realised, was that Andi didn’t know the first thing about golf. The only thing she’d said about it, after Tamsin had told her what she did for a living, was, “Isn’t that a sport for old farts?” Granted, the grin on her face when she’d said it had been adorable, but Tamsin needed a little more to work with than that.

Her sister’s words rang in her ears. We’ll both be forty soon.

“Have you seen the latest Avengers movie?” Andi asked, breaking the silence. “Maybe we can go see that.”

Ellen had been more a rom-com kind of girl, eschewing superhero movies, for which Tamsin had been glad. What was she doing comparing Andi to Ellen, anyway? She shouldn’t be looking for a replacement Ellen. She truly believed she hadn’t been. She’d set the search parameters on Tinder so that no one younger than twenty-seven would show up. Ellen had been twenty-six. Tamsin inwardly cursed her own silliness—she’d only gone and fooled herself again.

“I’m not sure going to the movies is such a good idea, after all,” Tamsin said.

“Oh,” Andi said.

Tamsin wondered if that was genuine disappointment crossing her face or if she was just a good actress.

“Let a girl down easy, why don’t you?” Andi offered a smile.

“Look, Andi, it’s not you. From what I can tell, you’re a lovely girl. But I just got out of something… rather painful. Perhaps I’ve put myself out there too soon.” And I’m twelve years older than you and live in Tynebury. She hadn’t been entirely honest in her Tinder profile. It still stated she lived in London. She hadn’t had the heart to tell Andi that she’d recently moved to the countryside. The date was cringe-worthy enough as it was.

“I get it.” Andi flipped her long hair back with a practiced gesture. “Maybe in a few months, eh?”

“Maybe.” Tamsin gave her a wide smile. Next time she went on Tinder, if she ever did again, Tamsin would narrow her search to ensure any future dates lived closer to her new location. Not that she expected to find many women of her persuasion in a twenty-mile radius around Tynebury.

Tamsin rose and leaned over to kiss Andi on the cheek. “It was lovely to meet you,” she said.

Andi didn’t respond.

“Bye, then,” Tamsin said, and exited the coffee shop. She hadn’t picked it and, truth be told, she’d felt a little out of place among the hipsters with their MacBooks, manbuns, and trendy clothing.

Maybe she had reached that age, where she couldn’t pass for someone ten years her junior any longer. Until she’d moved to Tynebury, Tamsin had dressed like the people in that coffee shop, but her choice of what to wear had altered along with her change in location. An image of how Diane Thompson had been dressed at the golf club’s opening dinner popped into her head. Whether she liked it or not, that was the crowd she was mingling with most these days.

Maybe her taste in women was changing as well.

Tamsin walked through the streets of London a while longer before picking up her car at her sister’s and driving back to Tynebury—back home.