Chapter Eight
JESS
I tip-toe down the hallway of my mother’s house and pull the front door shut as quietly as I can, before creeping down the garden path.
Once I’m out of the gate, I start sprinting, and I don’t stop until I’m well around the corner of the next road.
My heart is thudding, and not just from the unexpected exercise.
What on earth is happening to me? Yesterday, I was thinking my life was a little mundane, that I wanted ‘more’, but the last twenty-four hours have been more than I can possibly handle. What do I do now? Where do I go?
Before I can make a plan, my phone dings in my back pocket.
I pull it out, and it’s only then that I take a good look at it, and that’s when I realize it’s not my phone at all, although I used to have one just like this years ago.
I turn and look in the direction I’ve just come from.
Did I pick up someone else’s and, if so, where’s mine, and why was this one charging in my old bedroom?
But then I spot the slight crack in the screen in the right bottom corner.
My old phone was damaged in exactly the same place.
In fact, it had an identical clear case too, although I see these everywhere, so that doesn’t mean anything.
On instinct, I press my thumb to the button at the bottom and my fingerprint wakes it up.
It is my phone. Just not my current one.
Why would Mum be charging up one of my old phones? I suppose it’s possible she’s lost or smashed hers – again – and desperately needed a replacement, even if only as a stopgap.
I really ought to go back to her house and post it through the front door or something, but it’s making me feel itchy just thinking about walking in that direction.
And, technically, it is my phone … but if Mum needs it she can have it.
I’ll just put it in a padded envelope and send it back to her via Royal Mail.
The notification at the top of the phone screen says I’ve got a message from Priya, one of my work friends from when I used to do a boring admin job before I retrained as a physiotherapist. I haven’t heard from her in ages.
However, it now occurs to me that maybe it’s because she’s messaging me on my old number and I forgot to give her the new one when I switched.
I open the message, intending to apologize and send her my current contact details, but what I read makes no sense: Where are you? Janine is on the warpath this morning but hasn’t noticed you’re not here yet. If you’re sick, you’d better call in quick!
I frown. What is she talking about? I left Dobson’s over a decade ago. Why does boss-from-hell Janine care where I am?
I text back: Great to hear from you. We must meet up for coffee sometime. It’s been too long.
A few seconds later, I get a reply – a crying with laughter emoji followed by: Very funny. Just get your butt in here asap. I’ll try to cover for you.
I have no idea how to respond to that, so I decide I’ll wait until I’m sitting on the train to save her number and put it into my actual phone …
Only, I can’t, can I? A thorough search of the bedroom at Mum’s didn’t even throw up my clothes from last night, let alone my clutch with my phone and keys in it.
My stomach sinks. Well, I suppose that makes my mind up about what I do next.
I don’t want to go home, but I don’t think I’ve got much choice.
There’s only about ￡40 in this old purse of mine, and the debit cards expired over a decade ago.
I’m hoping my bag is still in the house and that I somehow got to Mum’s without it.
I’ve got to find my phone. I need it for work, if for nothing else.
And Luke might have left you a message …
I want to shut the lid on that thought, push it to the back of my brain and not think about it. Even just picturing his face brings back the crushing, soul-devouring feeling of loss when I heard the words ‘I’m out’ last night and watched him walk out the door without looking back.
No, I think, as I mentally map out the route to Orpington station in my head. I can’t fall apart now. I just need to get home … I just need to …
I don’t know what I need. But I’m too tired and emotionally exhausted to process anything at this moment, so I focus on the practicalities: the ten-minute walk to the station, fiddling around with notes and coins at the self-service ticket machine – something I haven’t done in a long time – and then finally plopping myself down on an empty seat in a commuter train heading towards London in eight minutes’ time.
Orpington is the start of this route, otherwise I’d have been standing, and the rest of the seats fill quickly.
It feels like hours before the packed train finally pulls away.
Thankfully, It’s only a handful of stops to Beckenham Junction and I should be there in under twenty minutes.
As the train rumbles out of the station, I stare blankly ahead.
My brain is stalled and I have no idea how to jump-start it again.
I’m vaguely aware of train doors opening and closing, of people getting on and off.
Somebody trying to edge their way down the aisle whacks me in the side of the head with their massive tote bag but all I do is blink slowly, then keep staring.
Eventually, my gaze is snagged by the front page of the newspaper the man opposite me is reading.
Ferry sinks off coast of South Korea, the type at the top announces.
There’s a picture of stormy seas and rescue boats.
My gaze drifts to another picture down to one side – the Princess of Wales greeting crowds and accepting a bouquet from a child, but the headline causes me to do a double take.
The mistake I spot is only amusing enough to warrant a gentle huff but I burst out laughing, and then I find I can’t stop.
A couple of people narrow their eyes at me, but the woman sitting next to the guy with the newspaper smiles back. ‘What’s so funny?’ she asks.
I shake my head, knowing I should clamp my lips together and try to keep it in, but it’s as if the absurdity of my life has finally caught up with me. ‘It’s stupid, really … but you’d think The Times would get it right, wouldn’t you?’
The guy with the paper realizes we’re discussing his reading material and gives me a quizzical look as he closes the paper and inspects the front page.
‘What did they get wrong?’ he asks me, and I get the impression he’s about to be offended if his daily paper has let him down. I almost don’t want to mention it.
‘The Royal tour in Australia – they’ve called William the Duke of Cambridge.’
Both of my travelling companions frown. ‘What else are they supposed to call him?’ the woman says.
‘The Prince of Wales, of course.’
Newspaper Guy looks at me from over the top of his reading glasses. ‘But that’s Charles’s title.’
Now it’s my turn to frown. ‘Not anymore.’
‘Oh, my God. Has old Queenie given her son the boot and said Wills is going to take over next instead?’ she says excitedly. ‘I always said she should do that! Those poor boys … especially losing their mother in that way.’
Newspaper Guy rolls his eyes at both of us and opens up the paper again, clearly done with any form of commuter chit-chat.
I’m about to open my mouth and point out the obvious, but then I spot the date under the name of the newspaper. He’s reading a newspaper from 2014?
Well, I suppose it makes sense of what I thought was a factual error.
The woman next to him starts talking with the older lady across from her about how she went up to Kensington Palace with flowers when Diana died.
I tune her out and study the man sitting across from me instead.
He looks like a normal City type, no hint that there’s anything unusual going on there.
But what does he do? Read the same old newspaper every day on the train into work?
You’d have thought, after twelve years, he might have been in the mood for some fresh material.
But then I think again about how I’ve been turning the doom and gloom on the breakfast news off recently, and I realize he might be on to something.
A pregnant woman gets on at Shortlands, so I offer her my seat and squeeze myself into the mass of bodies in the area near the doors. It’s one more stop until I reach my destination, so I’ll only be stuck in the crush for a couple more minutes.
Another newspaper is sticking out of the narrow bin next to the door. It’s one of the tabloids but I notice that it, too, is sporting the wrong date. Even weirder, it’s exactly the same date as The Times Newspaper Guy was reading.
I snatch it up to check my weary eyes aren’t playing tricks on me.
No, I was right the first time: 14 May 2014.
Perhaps I judged the guy sitting opposite me too harshly.
Has this become a thing since I last commuted into London more than eight years ago?
If it has, I have no idea why. I look around the carriage in confusion, feeling that something is off.
I can’t quite put my finger on what – people are listening to their headphones or staring out the windows, just as they would do on any ordinary morning commute.
But then I catch sight of someone’s phone over their shoulder. The calendar app on the home screen is also showing a number fourteen as today’s date.
What is going on? Surely it should be fifteen? The fourteenth was yesterday.
Another message alert sounds on my phone and I realize I still haven’t replied to Priya and it sounds as if she’s getting a little desperate.
R U on ur way? Not sure how much longer I can make up excuses for ur empty chair!
What is she talking about? On my way where?
I’m about to reply, asking her what she means, when I get the instinct to check something first. I pause, scroll out of my messages and return to my home screen.
What the … ?
My calendar icon also says ‘Wed 14’.
And Wednesday? The anniversary party was on Thursday. Today is Friday.
Isn’t it?
I’m still puzzling what this all means when the doors beside me open.
It’s my stop. People inside the carriage start jostling, getting ready to squeeze through the bodies and get off.
More are waiting to cram themselves into the already stuffed and humid carriage.
I angle my shoulder, allowing myself to squeeze between two people, and step down onto the platform.
I weave in and out of the crowd until I’m standing at the barriers. After pulling my ticket from my pocket, I pause before feeding it into the machine and look around, catching the eye of the railway employee on duty. ‘What day is it today?’ I ask.
‘Wednesday,’ the woman says.
‘And the date?’
‘Did you bring an old ticket?’ she says, scowling. ‘Because you’ll need to buy a new one if you can’t prove you’ve paid your fare.’
I shake my head. ‘Just … ’ I clear my throat ‘ … need to check something.’
She looks at me as if I’m an idiot, but says, ‘May the fourteenth.’
My stomach drops to the soles of my feet. ‘And the year?’
She gives her colleague standing a short distance away a ‘we’ve got a right one here’ kind of look and then adds, ‘2014.’
It’s as if a warm and violent wind rushes not just past me but right through me as I register her words.
I’m shaking as the barrier eats my ticket and then spits it out again.
I’m carried through the ticket hall by the steady stream of people, all heading off somewhere with determination and purpose.
Eventually I stop walking and they just tut and flow around me.
The only thing I can do is stare at my phone. My phone but not my phone.
And the stories in the newspapers are all from years gone by.
And Priya is texting me from a job I left close to a decade ago.
I pull up the camera on my phone, flip it to selfie mode and take a really hard look at what I see.
The face staring back is me but, like my phone, it is also not me.
At least, not who I am now. I look very much like I did twelve years ago, which means I was wrong about my skin looking as if I was still twenty-five.
If this really is 2014, I’m actually twenty-three.