Chapter Six
SIX
Weird.
I brush it off as I creep out of bed, moving as quietly as I can so as not to wake Penny. At least I can get myself up and off to the airport knowing that the nightmare scenario of Callum coming too has been subliminally assuaged. Well done, brain!
Showered, final bits packed, suitcase dragged to the Tube, wet hair drying in the underground breeze.
I plug into a podcast en route to Heathrow, and tut to myself as the American host tells me not to let time boss me around.
Annoying that I’ve downloaded a podcast I’ve clearly already listened to.
Pulling my earbuds out, I run through the schedule for Australia instead, buzzing that this trip is finally here!
After a final breath of fresh air, I stride back into Heathrow to catch that flight.
The automated doors glide open as I trot back into the terminal, sidestepping some rubbish on the floor as I go.
My eyes cast down as I swerve my suitcase to avoid … an egg sandwich.
That’s odd.
In the world’s longest dream last night, I definitely remember a near-miss with a sandwich on the way into the airport then, too.
It stood out because I’d wondered who eats egg sandwiches for breakfast?
I feel briefly unsettled, concern prickling under my skin, but I shake my head, dismissing it as a weird coincidence while I find the check-in counter for my flight.
It’ll be so nice to ditch this bulging suitcase and hit the shops.
Wheeling my luggage up to the desk, I’m about to greet the airline operative when my smile turns to stone. There, at the desk, is a carbon copy of the person who was very grumpy about my heavy suitcase in my sleep. My wide eyes track down to his name tag.
It’s Alan.
I stare, dumbfounded, as the exact same airline operative gives me the exact same withering look.
‘Just inside the weight limits,’ he says.
I can’t reply. I cast around, staggered.
‘That’s going to need a heavy weight sticker,’ adds Alan. It’s another direct echo and I watch in stunned silence as he proceeds to sigh loudly, find a bright ‘bend your knees’ sticker and attach it to my bag.
What’s going on? A crumpled egg sandwich and an angry check-in person in quick succession. The parallels are creeping me out. It’s like last night’s dream is being reflected back at me in the water, like I’m somehow living through it again.
I take my passport back in silence, an unsettling feeling seeping into my bones.
Something seems off, I decide, as I hear Alan bark out the word ‘next’.
Something seems too familiar.
In the queue for the security check, I overhear someone saying we’ve got a thirty-minute wait. I pull out my phone and my stomach plummets when I spot an email titled ‘GO GET ’EM, TIGER’ from Kat in my inbox. I open it instantly, urgently scanning through the text for something, anything different.
But it quickly becomes clear that I am reading the exact same message, Kat’s words echoing what I already know to be true.
With a huge sense of unease, I race through the email. Callum Bang will be joining me for this actual trip to Australia today. Cross and confused (not a great combination) my brain scrambles to make sense of what’s happening.
This can’t just be déjà vu, can it? I’ve experienced that sense of familiarity in the unfamiliar before and it has always been fleeting, temporary.
By the time you feel like you’ve lived a moment already, that sensation has gone again.
I once read that it is something to do with different parts of your brain being temporarily out of sync. This is definitely not fleeting.
Now that I think about it, I’ve been feeling this way all morning. From the trip on the Underground, and the vague notion that I recognized those passengers, to my irritation that I’d downloaded a podcast I’d already listened to. Had I heard that in my dream last night, too?
I’m also wearing the same clothes, I realize anxiously, although that’s perhaps less surprising as I had already laid them out last night.
What is weird is that my body feels compelled to go through the motions of last night’s reverie, too.
It’s like I’m on autopilot. I find myself calling Kat as soon as I’m through security, trying to persuade her not to let Callum join me on this trip.
I hear my boss’s words on the other end of the line, swirling together in an unsettling reverberation of things I’ve already heard her say before.
‘I know that you and Cal don’t get along.’
‘That weird atmosphere after the Christmas party.’
‘I want you to be best friends. Sympatico.’
‘Capiche.’
My head is both cold and clammy as I hang up.
I pace around the shops in duty-free with the distinct impression that I’m looking in a mirror.
It goes above and beyond a familiarity in the things I see, like the expensive chocolates in Harrods.
It’s the people in this airport, too. I’ve seen these strangers before.
The way they move through the space, the clothes they wear, the sounds they make.
I gape at everything and everyone in my line of vision and am struck again by the sensation that I’m looking into a pool of water, staring at a Monday I have already lived reflected back at me.
A shimmering, glassy reprint.
That’s when it hits me like a sucker punch.
I have been here before.
That wasn’t a dream, it can’t have been. There’s no way I could have dreamed an exact carbon copy of my journey to Heathrow, could I?
Engulfed by the feeling that I’m bottoming out, I sink to the floor right there outside Harrods.
I didn’t wake up this morning.
I woke up yesterday.
The last thing I remember is Callum and I walking through Perth airport and being hit by a luggage buggy.
The nauseating thud as my head hit the floor.
The sound of someone screaming for an ambulance.
I squeeze my eyes shut as flashes of memory come back to me like dappled light through a tree.
Blood pumps loudly in my ears as I recollect somebody saying: ‘I can’t find a pulse.
’ I remember feeling like a television being turned off.
Only it wasn’t a TV, or a dream, it was me.
Jesus H, did I die at Perth airport?
And have I travelled back in time?
Nope. Can’t be. I’m just tired, that’s all.
It’s the stress of getting this job right, isn’t it?
I must be having the kind of sustained déjà vu that scientists have never heard of before.
People don’t time-travel, I remind myself shakily as I scramble up and off the airport floor, dusting myself down.
Silly Nina.
I just need to crack on and try not to worry.
I’ve got myself all worked up over nothing, I decide, migrating towards Accessorize and browsing the sunglasses.
But that unsettling feeling doesn’t shift as I find myself having the exact same conversation with Penny, in which she admires my hair down and then claims I’m still not over Hamish.
‘Look at you, you’re literally wearing rose-tinted glasses.’ She pouts on screen.
This pulls me up.
This is new.
‘I … I’m sorry, what?’ I stumble. This is definitely not something Penny said in last night’s dream, and I know that for sure because for the shortest period, the swaying sensation that’s been making me feel dizzy all morning stops.
A brief respite where for a moment, everything feels fresh and new again.
‘The sunglasses you’re trying on?’ She tilts her head and looks at me like I’ve lost the plot. Which tracks. ‘The lenses are pink!’
I stare at the thumbnail.
She’s right, these sunglasses are rose-tinted.
‘They’re cute, you should get them,’ Penny adds, and I’m back to swaying again.
But I do feel more positive. There’s a glimmer of hope.
For the first time today, something new has happened.
Maybe this has just been a glitch, after all.
Which is a relief, because the idea that I woke up yesterday was very silly indeed.
What is this, a time warp?! For a start, I could have picked a better moment for it.
As far as reliving past events go, I’d happily recreate my meet-cute with Hamish every day for the rest of my life.
Or, better still, the night we went out for dinner and he painted this beautiful picture of our future selves, pottering around in a cute house by the sea with a dog.
And then there’s the whole time-warps-don’t-exist thing.
‘Lose the hat,’ Penny’s saying. ‘It’s giving grandad-goes-to-Panama.’
‘Pen,’ I say suddenly, wondering if maybe she’s going through whatever this is too. ‘Are you okay?’
She frowns at me. ‘Fine, why d’you say it like that?’
‘I don’t know. Everything feels a bit off today, that’s all.’
‘It’s Monday, love. They’re the worst.’
‘You love Mondays!’ I reply.
She pulls a face and I bring my phone closer to study her, concerned.
‘Pen, what is it? You seem upset.’
‘I’m not sure I do love Mondays anymore. I reckon I’m having an existential crisis.’
‘What? Since when! Why haven’t you said anything before now?’
‘It started literally moments ago, when you woke me up.’
‘Oh crap,’ I say. ‘I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to crank up a crisis.’
‘Not your fault, love. I’m just feeling a bit meh about work today, that’s all. I’m sure it’ll pass.’
This is so unlike Penny, who adores her marketing job and is generally perkier than a children’s TV presenter.
I frown down the phone at her. ‘Keep talking to me, please,’ I say.
‘Don’t look so worried! No doubt it’s just Monday blues. I’ll be fine. Now you go and vanquish that work enemy of yours, while I go and get a shower. Okay? Love you, byeeee.’
I bumble towards the till to buy my new sunglasses, thoughts full of Penny. This is the first I’ve heard of a dissatisfaction with work and I vow to keep my beady eye on her while I’m away as much as I can.
What is up with today?