As she leaves the room, Melanie turns and catches my eye, then she gives me the smallest nod. I know that nod, it means we did it. Once Melanie and Gary have left the room, Coleson and his Ferrets look on in disdain as my team all run in for a group hug and start jumping up and down.
‘Monsters under the bed, that’s really the best you’ve got?’ Coleson sneers, but he’s lost some of his bravado.
‘Team, that was masterful,’ says Michael. ‘I could watch you do that all day. That’s got to count for something.’
‘I can’t believe I got to explain the scoring,’ Callum says, a hand over his mouth to hide his grin. ‘I wasn’t prepared.’
Trey pulls me to one side as the others celebrate. ‘What’s the deal with Michael?’ he asks.
‘Jane,’ I say darkly.
‘Jane,’ he says, pushing a fist into his other hand.
I look for Coleson, I want to shake his hand, to make peace, but he’s already gone. Michael has perked up considerably and wants to take the team out for lunch.
‘Lucy?’ he asks. ‘You coming?’
‘I’m so sorry, I have to run, there’s somewhere I need to be.’
Hailing a cab in the street, I ask the driver, ‘Please, can you take me to Baskin Place?’
My heart is pounding in my chest, and my hand shakes as I try to buckle my seat belt. What if Dave is wrong? What if it isn’t there or if it isn’t a portal at all? But then a greater anxiety takes hold – What if it is?
Chapter 32
It’s here, the street that looks identical to Baskin Road, only here the buildings are all still standing. There, a few doors down, is the newsagent’s. It doesn’t have the blue and white awning any more, and the outside has been repainted. It is a completely unremarkable corner shop. I’m not sure I would have recognised it even if I had been on the right street. Thanking the cab driver, I run in, immediately recognising the shape of the small rectangular shop, with only two aisles and shelves piled high to the ceiling. There is no one behind the till and no other customers. As I dart around the corner aisle, my heart jumps into my throat, because there it is, the wishing machine, looking exactly as it did all those weeks – years? – ago.
Rushing to touch it, I want to check it’s real, not some optical illusion. But then, as my hands curl around the cold metal, I try to temper my excitement. The existence of this machine does not mean that it is a portal to the past.
‘I thought I might see you again,’ comes a voice with a soft Scottish lilt. My head darts sideways to see the old woman. Same white hair, same tartan waistcoat.
‘You?’
‘Hello, duckie,’ she says, giving me a broad smile.
‘Is this real? Are you real? Is this a figment of my imagination?’
‘It’s as real as it needs to be,’ she says, offering me a brown paper bag of green boiled sweets. ‘Soor ploom?’
‘Did I jump through time, or did I lose my memory?’ I ask, waving away the brown bag.
She takes one of the sweets herself, sucking on it for a moment before saying, ‘What do you think, duckie?’
I want to explode that I just want a straight answer, to shake her until she tells me what’s going on, but she’s so gently-spoken and calm, this little sweet-eating Yoda, that I can’t bring myself to raise my voice.
‘I jumped,’ I hear myself saying. Is that what I’ve thought all along? Or has finding the shop, the machine, her, let me finally believe it?
‘And how are you liking this new life of yours, the good part, where everything’s sorted?’
‘Ha! Life is never sorted.’ I narrow my eyes at the old woman. ‘Was that the lesson I was supposed to learn? Because if it was, you could have just told me that, I am very receptive to feedback.’
‘You wished it. So, tell me, is it a grand improvement on before?’ she asks calmly, taking a pocket watch out of her waistcoat and checking the time.
‘Yes, and no. It’s complicated.’ Then I look down at my wedding ring and say, ‘But also kind of wonderful.’
‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,’ the old woman says, still sucking on her sweet. ‘Maybe you weren’t ready.’
‘Well, there’s been a lot to catch up on,’ I say, relenting and reaching for one of her sweets. ‘But maybe there aren’t any shortcuts in life. Maybe you have to live it all, because it makes you who you are.’ I pause. ‘Wait, did I really say that? Wow, I’ve gone full Elizabeth Day.’
‘So much wisdom in one so young,’ the old lady says with a smile.
‘Who, Elizabeth Day?’
‘No, you, Lucy.’ And when I turn to look at her, she winks at me. Then she rolls up the top of her paper bag and stows it in a pocket of her waistcoat. ‘So, do you want to go back?’
‘Can I? I don’t know how all this works.’
‘If you really want to,’ she says, tapping the machine, ‘then you can go back.’
‘And will everything play out like I’ve seen? Will I meet Sam and have Felix, Chloe and Amy? Will I still get to be a part of this family?’
The old lady presses her fingers together and her face grows serious. ‘Nothing is guaranteed. No one’s path is set in stone.’
‘Would I go back knowing all this, knowing what the future holds?’
‘No, duckie. Knowledge changes the path, even if you don’t want it to. You wouldn’t be able to meet the love of your life, knowing their significance, without it affecting your behaviour.’
‘What about Zoya, Chloe? Can I stop them from dying?’
‘Like I said, nothing is set in stone.’ The old lady turns around and pulls up a stool from behind the till, her forehead creasing in sympathy. ‘But even if you could go back knowing, no one likes to be told they’re going to die, duckie.’
Something inside me crumples, as though I’ve been hollowed out from the inside with an ice-cream scoop. I sink to the floor, my back against the wishing machine. She is right – it would be miserable to know what lay ahead.
‘So, what choice do I have?’ I ask her.
‘You can stay here, your memories will no doubt return in time – the gaps filled in – or you can go back, forget all of this.’
‘But I might not end up here, with the life I’ve got now?’
She holds my gaze, her eyes glistening. ‘Our paths are not predestined.’
Finally, I understand what she’s telling me: stay and remember or go back and forget. If I go back, my life might end up in an entirely different place. It’s like Sophie’s Choice （not that I’ve ever seen it, but people always seem to mention it when there’s an impossible decision to be made）。 When all this began, I so desperately hoped for the wishing machine to be real, wanted to believe I had skipped forward, because that might mean I could go back. But now, I have fallen in love with the people in this life. I know I could be happy here if I stayed, especially if my memories returned.
‘I’ve been remembering things, from the in-between. What does that mean?’
‘When you choose a path, your brain will catch up. If you’re remembering things, you’re beginning to choose.’