The Good Part(30)

‘Right, I didn’t know,’ I say.

Sam squeezes my hand. ‘Temporary, she said. Hopefully you’ll be yourself again tomorrow.’

I nod, wanting to be optimistic, but I can’t help thinking that me ‘being myself again’ means something very different to him than it does to me.

As we walk through the front door, Amy waddles towards me with outstretched arms. She’s not covered in banana goo or drool now, so I don’t mind picking her up. She’s kind of sweet when she’s not crying, with her pink flushed cheeks and her wild, curly hair.

‘How did it go?’ Maria asks, peering into my eyes as though she might be able to see what the problem is.

‘Good. I’m fine,’ I tell her. I don’t remember giving birth to these children, but apart from that, perfectly fine.

‘Are you going to be all right with the kids? I’ll be half an hour taking Maria home,’ Sam says.

‘Sure. We’ll be fine,’ I say, in an overly cheerful voice.

‘They had spaghetti bolognese from the freezer for lunch, and we took Felix’s scooter to the park, so they’ve had their fresh air and exercise.’

‘Great, thank you,’ I say, but now I feel panicked about being left alone with them. Would I have a clue what to feed them or how much exercise they need? What if Amy poos again? Can Felix go to the loo by himself? What if I need the loo? Can I leave them alone for two minutes or will I need to take Amy to the bathroom with me? Will they listen to what I tell them to do? What do I do if they don’t? I don’t feel like these are questions I can ask without alarming people.

As Sam is about to leave, he kisses me, on the lips. It’s only a quick peck, but my body must have some muscle memory because I find myself closing my eyes, leaning into him, my lips following his as he moves away. Maria gives me a strange look, as though I’ve forgotten how to give an appropriate goodbye kiss and she’s marking this down as a sure sign of insanity.

‘I’m fine. I’ll be fine,’ I reassure them, pressing my lips together.

Once they’ve left, Amy tugs on my hair with her plump little fists. It’s annoying so I put her down. ‘What do you want to do?’ I ask Felix, who’s looking at me like I’m ET.

The living area is one long room, with sliding doors that partition it down the middle. One side is all scatter cushions and elegant table lamps, and the other is a playroom lined with shelves full of puzzles and toys. Above the fireplace is an eye-catching watercolour of a multi-coloured mountain, properly mounted in a thick, gilt frame. Amy crawls off in the direction of the playroom. Compared to the cramped living area in my flat share, this room feels decadent. Kennington Lane was always cluttered with washing racks and bicycles. It often smelt of rubbish bags waiting to be taken out and damp washing that had sat in the machine too long. Maybe middle-aged people rarely go out because their houses are too nice to leave.

Sitting on the floor beside Amy, we play a game of stacking cups. It’s a simple concept that involves me stacking colourful cups on top of one another and Amy knocking them over. The way Amy purses her lips in concentration as she swipes at the cups reminds me of my mum.

‘Hey, Amy, how about we make this more interesting,’ I say, grabbing a pen lid and hiding it under one of the cups. ‘Find the pen lid!’ I say, muddling up the cups. ‘Best of three.’ But Amy doesn’t like this game, she only wants to knock them over. As I’m looking around for something else we can play, Felix appears in the doorway wearing a colander on his head and a body shield made of kitchen foil.

‘Ooh, are we playing knights and dragons?’ I ask.

‘It’s not a game. It’s to protect me from your alien brainwaves.’

‘Right,’ I say slowly. ‘Look Felix, the doctor thinks it’s likely I have temporary memory loss. I’ll probably be myself again tomorrow.’ Whether I believe this or not, it feels like the responsible thing to say to a freaked-out seven-year-old who’s covered himself in several rolls of aluminium foil.

‘What do doctors know about aliens?’ Felix asks, his face puckered in confusion.

‘I’m not an alien. I’m . . . I don’t know what’s happened to me.’

Felix pauses, adjusting the colander as it’s slipped down over his eyes.

‘But you want to go back to where you came from?’ he asks, pointing a wooden spoon towards my chest.

Do I want to go back? Yes, of course I do. However interesting this glimpse of my future life might be, I can’t stay here. Sure, this house is amazing and my job seems incredible and that bookshelf upstairs is beyond dreamy, but I can’t miss the rest of my twenties, my entire thirties; I can’t just be this grown-up version of myself forever.

‘Yes, I do,’ I hear myself telling Felix.

‘Then we need to find the portal,’ he says, sitting cross-legged opposite me on the playroom floor while Amy bangs a doll against the toy basket in an alarmingly violent manner.

‘Portal?’

‘How you got here. What portal did you come through?’ Felix walks across the playroom and takes a science-fiction book from the shelf. He turns to a page and points to a big white hole. ‘Space is too big to travel anywhere by regular rocket, even the massive ones. If you want to travel a long way, you need a portal, or a wormhole, but they’re hard to find.’