by Andy Conway
“Are you saying I feel guilty for wanting her to die?”
She asked the question even though she knew she did. She felt guilty now just thinking about it.
“I think so,” he said. “But let’s get back to the recurring characters. There’s this redhead woman too. You saw her yesterday on campus.”
“I don’t know why but I was scared of her.”
“But it’s different to the others,” he said. “Here’s a woman who is real, in this world, and you put her in your dream about 1966.”
“But she knew me yesterday.”
“Of course she knew you. You’re a student and she works at the Central Library. You’ve probably seen her many times. She’s a real person in this world who you’ve had a dream about, just like Danny. Just like me.”
“Yes. I suppose so. Maybe I should talk to her.”
“I wouldn’t do that.”
“Don’t you think it would help?”
“Real people don’t often like to hear that you’ve turned them into characters in your stories, even if they’re dreams you have no control over.”
“Okay,” she said. “I won’t say a word to her.”
“And the others too,” he said. “You cast them as some mysterious cabal of time travel guardians—”
“Stop it. It sounds hokey when you say it like that.”
“This man Mitch, who runs an antiques shop, and Mrs Hudson with her costume hire store.”
“I think she wanted to help me.”
“Have you seen her in your new dream? In 1959?”
“I don’t think so. There aren’t any old ladies in that one.”
“What about this woman who runs the train station café? Renee?”
“Oh no. She’s a thin little thing, like a bird. Mrs Hudson looks totally different.”
“Oh. Good. You’ve not seen her here on campus either?”
“No. Why would she come on campus? She runs a fancy dress shop in Moseley. Do you think I should go and see her?”
“Definitely not.”
His pen was tap, tap, tapping on his pad. Was there irritation in his voice? He must be bored of listening to her nonsense by now.
“I thought it would be therapeutic. Just to see she’s harmless.”
“In your dreams you’ve cast her as part of some strange, secret cult; a woman you’re not sure you can trust. There’s usually a reason for doing that. You’re taking something you unconsciously detect about her in the real world and projecting it into your dream life.”
“But I’ve done the same with you, haven’t I? You’re an evil interfering loner who’s trying to turn us to the dark side. In my dream.”
Fenwick stopped tapping his pen and smiled a big smile.
“I think all students secretly feel that way about their lecturers.”
She laughed and turned back to him. He had a warm, kind face and she felt safer, lighter.
“Look, Rachel. Lucid dreaming is much more common than you think. A few very talented people can experience highly detailed dreams that feel hyper-real. They can be scary at first but in time they learn to treat them as their own psychic adventure playground.”
“You mean I can control the dreams I’m having?”
He frowned again. That little tic in his left cheek again. Was he annoyed? She felt suddenly that she was taking up too much of his time with her delusions.
“I wouldn’t concentrate on that. For now, you need to just go along with it. Be passive. It’s much less stressful.”
She sat up, the blood rushing to her head and stood unsteadily.
“Thank you. This has been really great. I didn’t want to do it but Danny said it would be good for me.”
“And was he right?”
“I think so. Sorry if it took up too much of your time.”
He ushered her to the door, his hand on the small of her back.
“Danny’s a good boy. You can trust him.”
“Yes,” she said, not knowing what he meant. She stepped out into the echoing corridor.
“Oh, and do come again and tell me more tomorrow.”
“I wouldn’t want to bore you.”
“It’s anything but boring,” he smiled. “It’s sort of an adventure story you’re writing in your sleep. Think of it like that.”
“I will,” she smiled.
“Oh, and avoid strange old ladies. They usually turn out to be witches.”
He winked and she turned and walked down the corridor feeling light and free, heading for the exit that promised brilliant sunlight on rolling lawns; boys in cardigans and neatly pressed slacks, girls in Dior dresses clutching books to their breasts. Endless summer.
But she felt a shadow on her back. Fenwick’s eyes on her. And for some reason was too scared to turn and see.
— 14 —
BEFORE HEADING HOME she stopped by the student union building where an information desk held vigil, covered in CND literature, a petition, campaign leaflets, badges.
Students crowded round and discussed the issues with furious seriousness. Rachel pushed her way through and bought a badge.
“I knew you’d see the light in the end.”
She turned to Danny’s bright eyes drinking her in and almost blushed.
“Did you think so little of me that I might not?”
He took her elbow and led her away from the crowd, down the steps to the brilliant sunlight that hit their faces like a blast from a bread oven.
“No,” he laughed. “I know you care about things other than yourself. You see the bigger picture. It’s just... well, you’ve been preoccupied lately.”
She looked at her feet. “Yes. I feel a lot better now though. Nick really helped.”
He gripped her elbow harder in excitement.
“You’ve seen him?”
“We just had a longer talk about it all. It was almost like a psychotherapy session. But it really helped to put it all in perspective, yes.”
“That’s so great! I knew he would. He’s a really nice guy.”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, he is.”
But again that doubt at the back of her mind, a shadow falling on her. It was that he was nothing like the Nick Fenwick she’d known before. But that was a dream, she told herself. That was a delusion. She was back in the real world now.
“I’m so happy for you,” he said.
They stood awkwardly at the foot of the steps, he going one way, she the other.
“I’m heading home now,” she said.
“Can I walk you?”
She smiled. It was kind of sweet how clumsy he was about it. She imagined walking home with him in the sunshine, debating nuclear waste trains and lucid dreaming like a pair of French students in 1968 Paris. Would he try to kiss her or just keep on talking? Someone else inside her barged her hopes to one side and she heard herself saying, “No thanks. It’s okay. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Then he was gone and she was walking home alone wondering why she’d pushed him away.
When she got home, she felt sleepy. She had planned to sleep only tonight, but now she realized she could take an afternoon nap and be back at Kings Heath station for another attempt to stop Deirdre Foster killing herself.
She locked her door, put on a warm coat, black gloves and a scarf and pinned her CND badge to the lapel. She stared at the Artex whorls on the ceiling for a long time, listening to blackbirds singing in the garden, her Nan pottering about down there, a radio in the distance playing a new chart hit.
She thought she wouldn’t be able to sleep, too hot, boiling up in the ridiculous winter outfit, then the world slipped away from under her.
— 15 —
THE PLATFORM AGAIN. The icy cold again. Thick white fog. She knew she was even earlier than before and set off up the steep slope, inching her way up, the frost crackling like fire under her shoes. Within a few yards, she could no longer see the platform behind her.
Kings Heath High Street was up there. The high stre
et as it was in 1959. But she wondered if she would be able to see it at all with this fog. She knew one thing for certain though, and that was Deirdre Foster would be walking through the train station entrance in a few minutes.
Half way up the slope, the fog thinned and she could see the station entrance ahead. She looked back down at the fog that had settled in the valley of the station, like a bowl of cauliflower soup, a thick swirling murky white.
Cars trundled by on the road and she walked out of the station looking both ways. From which direction would Deirdre Foster come?
She decided to stand and wait till she saw her and think of what to do then. She hunched her shoulders against the cold and examined the surroundings.
Gaps in the buildings with nothing but a pile of rubble. Slicks of oil on the streets. The awful hangover of the Blitz still plaguing Britain a decade later.
The air was different. Someone must have been burning something somewhere, but it couldn’t be, because the air was wet. Could someone be burning something wet? That didn’t make sense. It was not so much a fog as a very light mist. You could see clearly but it felt like there was something in the air. It clung to everything and made her want to cough.
It was so much different to 1966. Her dream of 1966, she reminded herself. You could still see the meanness and the poverty that the war had created. Even the air looked like it was still under ration.
She walked up a little way towards the shops, checking back again and again to make sure Deirdre Foster wasn’t approaching from the other end of the street.
The Parade, set back from the road, was a bustling row of shops and a queue of people outside the Kingsway cinema waited to see Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo.
She saw the bright orange shock of Deirdre Foster’s check peacoat approaching through the huddle of grey-coated shoppers further along. She had a good time to observe her, walking in a daze, seeing no one around her, and the closer she got, the more Rachel could see those eyes, bright and alive with euphoria: the insane happiness of a woman who had decided this hour would be her last.
She was smiling to herself as Rachel dived into her and hit her hard. Shoppers scattered as the two women fell to the icy floor. Deirdre let out a cry of pain but it was drowned by Rachel’s moaning. Deirdre jumped to her feet and brushed herself down and only then became aware of Rachel still kneeling on the floor, moaning to herself.
“Oh God, help me.”
Deirdre looked around for someone else to take control but Rachel grabbed her arm and wouldn’t let her go, pretending to choke.
“Are you all right?” said Deirdre.
A few shoppers had stopped. A man helped her to her feet, his hand under her arm.
“Here you are, love. You’ve took a nasty fall there.”
“I’m okay,” she said. Then she looked into Deirdre’s eyes, gripped her arm as if sharing a deadly secret, and whispered. “Help me. Please help me.”
Deirdre frowned and seemed scared and looked around, wanting the man to take over. She was going to leave her here. She was going to walk away from this and walk right into that train station and throw herself in front of the nuclear train. She was already pulling her arm away from Rachel’s grip.
“Please, help me.”
Then Deirdre saw something that changed her totally. She stopped pulling away, her look of fear melted. She saw Rachel’s CND badge.
She pulled Rachel towards her and announced with sudden confidence, “She’s fine. I’ll look after her.”
The man scowled, his manhood offended. He tipped his trilby hat and walked off, casting a glance back before disappearing in the high street traffic.
A gaggle of women clutching shopping bags were openly talking about them, a running commentary and dissection of everything that was happening, even though they were all watching the same thing.
Deirdre looked this way and that and spied the café on the Parade.
“Come with me,” she said.
She led Rachel across the street, threading their way through the cars and buses, and across the open concrete space and into the café.
It was only as she sat down in a wooden chair and felt the warmth embrace her that Rachel realized her knees were burning. Her tights had laddered and each knee was sodden with blood. She’d taken a right fall in her eagerness to stop Deirdre in her tracks. It must have been a rugby tackle.
Deirdre was at the counter chatting to the old dear who was pouring tea into china cups for them. By their worried faces, she could tell that more help was on the way. She brushed the gravel and icy dirt from the heels of her hands and winced, wondering if she would still have the wounds when she woke up on her bed. No, do not think about that. Stay here in this moment.
Deirdre came over with two teacups rattling on saucers
“I’m so sorry,” said Rachel. “Have I hurt you?”
Deirdre Foster sat opposite her and gave her a quizzical look, as if seeing a rare animal she’d never seen before.
“I’m fine.” That glow again in her eyes: the certainty that nothing could hurt her anymore. “She’s bringing some antiseptic.”
The old dear came over with a First Aid tin tucked under her arm and an enamel bowl of hot water.
“Well, don’t you look like you’ve been in the wars.” She pulled up a chair and yanked Rachel’s legs towards her. “Just a bit of blood. No bones broken by the look of it.”
Rachel saw Deirdre’s eyes wander to the clock on the wall.
“This nice girl helped me. I fell right into her.”
The old dear opened the First Aid tin and pulled out cotton buds, drenching them in the bowl of hot water and dabbing at her knees, cleaning off the blood. Rachel winced at the pain.
“This is just the water, dear.” She pulled out a little brown bottle of antiseptic. “This is the thing that’ll really hurt.”
She dunked it against a cotton bud and stuck it straight into her wounded knee. Rachel yelped and gripped Deirdre’s hand across the table. The old dear dabbed the other knee and Rachel tried to suck in the pain.
“There you go. All done. I won’t put a plaster on. Better let the air get to it.”
“Thank you.”
She bustled off and left them alone. Rachel detached her fingers from Deirdre’s.
“Sorry. Thank you again. I feel so stupid.”
Deirdre lit a cigarette and sat a little further back, crossing her legs.
“I’ve never seen you at the local branch.”
“What? CND? No, I’m new here.”
Deirdre nodded, her suspicions dissolving with the wisps of smoke that circled her.
“You must go there. They’re a nice bunch.”
“I will,” said Rachel, frowning with curiosity. “Why go?”
“I’m sorry?”
“You said you must go there. Not you must come. It’s like you’ve decided to stop going yourself or something.”
Deirdre smiled. It was a smile that was more like a wince of pain.
“No. Well, I’m not sure.”
“It’s no good if one drops out and another one replaces them,” Rachel said. “The movement needs to build if we’re going to have a future. Don’t you think?” She smiled, trying to seem friendly rather than confrontational.
Deirdre gazed into the distance, seeing another world entirely in the smoke.
“I don’t know if we have a future,” she said. “As humans.”
“We do,” said Rachel. “It’s not so bad.”
Deirdre looked at her now; looked at her really closely.
“You talk like you’ve seen it.”
“You talk like you don’t want to see it.”
“You’re very forward. I’m not sure I like that.”
“I’m sorry,” said Rachel, smiling again, trying to disarm her. “You’ve been very kind and helpful. I still feel a bit dizzy. It’s making me not very polite at all.” She thrust her hand across the table. “I’m Rachel. Very pleased to meet you.”
“Don’t you think this is... strange, somehow. As if it’s fate, or something. This was meant to happen.”
Deirdre frowned and blew out blue smoke. “How was it meant to happen?”
“I don’t know. I fall over and bump right into you, the only other person on Kings Heath High Street probably who’s wearing this badge. Strange coincidence.”
Deirdre sipped at her tea, her brow knitted in concentration, as if trying to work out a very difficult sum.
“I suppose it is.”
“Sometimes,” said Rachel. “I think Fate steps in and takes over our lives and points us towards people we need to meet.” Deirdre stared into her teacup thinking of something very far away so Rachel ploughed on, trying to keep her attention. “It’s as if we were adamantly set on one path, one destiny for ourselves, and we can’t see any other ending, but then Fate steps in and says Hello, you haven’t met this person yet. This could change everything.”
Deirdre looked up. Her face had gone pale, as if she might be sick at any moment. “Yes. I’d never thought of it like that.”
They both looked at the clock. Five minutes to go before the nuclear train ran through Kings Heath. Deirdre seemed almost apologetic, shamefaced, as if she finally realized how futile it was to end it all.
“I’m sure we’re going to get along very well,” said Rachel.
How would this work? If she stopped Deirdre Foster committing suicide this time, would that be the end of these dreams? Or would she wake up on the platform all over again and have to save her another time?
Deirdre gasped suddenly and looked back at the counter. She shook her head and half smiled.
“What is it?” asked Rachel.
“This song. On the radio.”
It was playing an old sickly sweet accordion ballad from the 1930s.
“What is it?”
“My parents fell in love to this tune. Let’s Fall in Love for the Last Time. It was a dance at Moseley Institute in 1934. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for this song.”