At the age of 45, Lucy Henshaw has finally left home. Her decision to go has been reached neither lightly nor suddenly, since her marriage has been broken for some eighteen years. However, as the mother of twin sons and a daughter, Lucy has felt it her duty to stay as a couple in the family house she was born in near Bolton, giving her children the security she knows they need. Now that her family is grown, content in the knowledge that she loves them, Lucy decides she is free to leave. She secretly purchases a beautiful house overlooking the Mersey, near Liverpool, and there she plans to start afresh.