by Chris Dolley
The train jerked forward, accompanied by creaking metal and carriage lights that weren't sure if they were supposed to be on or off. Graham closed his eyes and sank deeper within himself. He wasn't on a train, he was in Brenda's room, it was twelve o'clock and everything was going according to plan. He held onto that thought, breathed life into it, gave it form and substance. The train wouldn't be late, couldn't be late, because he was already there, his foot wedged in time's door pulling the two realities together.
An age later, he felt a tug on his arm. A disembodied voice. Annalise. The train had arrived.
He walked; one foot in reality, one squelching half-asleep through a liquid realm of fear and possibility. The closer he came, the more nervous he became. There was so much at stake. So much that could go wrong. How could any plan of his have any credibility?
They left the station, walking arm in arm down streets that barely registered in his mind. He couldn't concentrate. His mind was cycling though his plan, replaying strategies, recasting roles.
He shivered outside the door to the DTI. He stretched, he took a deep breath. He felt terrible. Nerves, stress, emotion, the feeling that everything was about to unravel any second.
They went in, produced their passes, waited for the lift. Annalise forced a smile, her face looked strained. He could only guess what his looked like.
Graham started to count. The lift took forever.
A bell sounded, the lift arrived, people tumbled out. Graham stood back, staring at his shoes while the lift emptied.
He stepped inside, his legs feeling heavy, the lift doors refusing to close, Annalise pressing the button for the fifth floor over and over again.
They ascended in silence, taking it in turns to check their watches, their arms rising and falling like a conjoined slow-motion drummer. Graham counted the floors, timed the intervals between each light flickering on and off.
The fifth floor. Nearly there. People trickling into 501. The sound of laughter and conversation from inside.
Graham and Annalise waited outside—two, three yards away from the entrance. Graham knelt down to tie a shoelace—anything to make him feel less visible.
He stood up and adjusted his tie.
"Are you okay?" Annalise asked and immediately put her hand to her mouth. "Don't answer that!" she hissed through her fingers. "Sorry."
Graham swallowed hard. His hands were starting to shake, his stomach churned. Every fiber of his being screamed at him to turn and flee.
He took a deep breath, turned to Annalise and whispered, "Are the girls all here?"
She closed her eyes. Graham checked his watch—11:56—could he survive four more minutes? More people arrived. Graham avoided eye contact, keeping his head lowered and his mind counting down the seconds.
"They're all here," whispered Annalise. "Except Twelve and Fifteen."
Graham could guess where Twelve was—watching over her sleeping Graham. He hoped he knew where Fifteen was.
Graham took a deep breath and tried to steady his nerves. You don't have to do this, his little voice said. Wait until tomorrow or the next day. Work on the plan, don't rush it.
He turned in the doorway and whispered to Annalise.
"Remember, it's up to you and the girls to keep this going. Stay in contact the entire time. Impress upon the Grahams that this is the only way to stop the world unravelling. Tell them that the world changes because they let it. Tell them to interact and choose and talk and do whatever they have to do. The world will spin for a while, maybe an hour, maybe a day, but when it stops, it stops for good. Tell them that. They'll listen, they know what's happening."
"You're crying, Graham."
"Am I?"
She wiped a tear from his face with her finger and wished him luck. He took a deep breath, checked his watch for the final time and stepped into the room.
Fifty-Four
He slipped in unnoticed as he'd slipped in so many times before. There were twenty, maybe thirty people in the room. Not a crowd but enough to make it difficult to walk between the desks. Brenda was in the far corner, thanking people for coming. It was a typical birthday drink. Good-natured heckling, friendly banter, alcohol in plastic cups.
Graham pushed his way close to the front. Holly was at her desk, a party hat on her head and a cup in her hand. Red wine, thought Graham as he pushed closer. Holly always drank red wine.
It was time. He was in place, he was ready. He . . . he couldn't do it. Not here, not now, not with these people! He had a history with them. Seventeen years of silence. He was Graham Smith, weird but harmless. He couldn't break that spell. The weight of time was too great, too powerful. In this building he'd never be anyone other than the old, silent, invisible Graham.
He felt a hand rest gently on his right shoulder. He felt Annalise's breath against his neck.
"You can do it, Graham," she whispered. "We believe in you."
He closed his eyes and thought of another Annalise, the one from Boston, the one without a number. She'd believed in him. She'd dragged him out of his silent world. Could she do it again? He tried to imagine the entire room in their underwear. And quickly released the thought—Brenda was like a sister and Annalise . . .
He summoned other images instead. Annalise Seven and her cardboard box. Annalise One by the fridge, Fifteen on the roof, Tamisha's face in the attic window. So many sacrifices by so many people. People he'd barely known, people he'd never know. All of them working towards this one moment.
He couldn't let them down, he couldn't let anyone down. He was the key.
"Holly," he said, his voice shaking and throat tightening. He coughed and tried again, louder, his voice rising to a shout. "Holly, listen to me. Holly!"
Holly glanced towards him, her face smiling, not a care in the world.
Graham swallowed hard. Holly's eyes widened in surprise. Other faces turned towards him. People close by stopped talking.
"How's your mother, Holly?" Graham said, maintaining the level of his voice—one notch down from a shout, several notches above that of every other voice in the room.
"She's fine, Graham," Holly said, regaining her composure and waving a plastic cup. "Do you want a drink?"
"You have to ring her now, Holly. It's important."
All conversation in the room ceased immediately.
Holly looked confused. "Did she give you a message for me?" She looked towards Brenda. "She didn't ring earlier, did she, Bren?"
Brenda shook her head. She looked stunned.
"Ring her now," Graham continued. "Ask about her headaches."
Holly's face dropped. She started to speak and then grabbed the phone.
Graham waited. He had to be right. And even if he wasn't, Holly's mother had to have a checkup. She had to be made aware of the risk.
A few giggles from the back of the room broke the silence. A silence reimposed the moment Holly spoke.
"Mum, is everything okay?" Holly's voice rose half an octave. There was a gap while her mother replied. Graham strained to make sense of the low buzz of conversation. He could feel the entire room lean collectively towards Holly's desk.
"What headaches, mum?" Holly's voice took on a growing panic. "You never said anything about headaches before."
"She needs a brain scan," said Graham, keeping his voice as loud as he dare. "Tell her she'll be fine. It's operable. You've caught it in time."
"Mum, stay where you are! I'm coming home now!"
It had begun.
He shut out the gasps and the rush of confused conversation and focused on Brenda. It was her turn now. He walked towards her, slow and purposeful, not glancing left or right, blinkered, her face filling his vision. She stared back, her eyes wide, her lips slightly parted.
People moved out of his way, a desk scraped along the floor. Holly grabbed her belongings and fled. Graham held out his hands and laid them gently on Brenda's shoulders. She didn't move. He looked into her eyes.
"Bren," he said softly. "Your fu
ture is with Bob. I've seen the two of you together. I've seen your children. You complete each other. Go to him."
She dropped her cup. Someone at the back gasped. Brenda swayed for a second and then rushed forward, pushing past Graham. He turned and watched. Brenda was in the middle of the room, her eyes darting from face to face.
"Bob!" she cried. "Bob!"
A nervous Bob appeared in the center of the aisle at the back, half-pushed by his neighbor. Brenda walked up to him. The two of them stood a foot or so apart, looking at each other. Seconds passed and then they fell into each other's arms, locked together, rocking from side to side.
Graham scanned every face in the room. They were all people he'd known for years—some for five, some for ten, some for seventeen. He knew them all. Their lives, their histories, their likes and dislikes. He'd seen them on a thousand worlds. He'd observed, he'd listened. He'd overheard their lives—snippets of conversation from rooms and corridors, from queues and lifts. Regurgitated stories from Sharmila and Michael, from Brenda and others.
He'd seen them when they were happy and seen them when they were sad. He knew which relationships worked and which never could.
He knew them better than they knew themselves.
Because he'd been there. He'd seen their "what ifs." The lives they could have led. Their befores and afters. He'd seen the triumph and the tragedy and all that lay in between.
And he could tell them.
He went amongst them. A strange mixture of silence and tumult, awe and expectation. What was he going to do next? He could see it in their eyes. The pleading looks, the shake of the head—no, not me, go to someone else.
He noticed a middle-aged man standing near the back, his head down, trying to be invisible. A state of mind Graham knew all to well.
"Colin," Graham said. The man's head snapped up as though he'd been stung. A path opened up in front of him as people moved aside. Someone fell over a desk in their haste to get out of his way.
No one laughed.
"How's Terry?" Graham asked, part of him hoping that Colin had reconciled his differences with his estranged son.
Colin shrugged, sadness mingling with fear in his eyes. And then panic. "He's not ill, is he?" he shouted, his hands flying to Graham's lapels.
"No," said Graham as soothingly as he could. "I've seen the two of you together. The problems between you can be bridged. It takes time but I've seen it happen. Ring him now. He's waiting."
"Thank you," said Colin, his eyes misting up. He hugged Graham, almost rocking him off his feet, he thanked him again, broke down and then hurried out of the room.
More people appeared in the doorway. Shouts came from the corridor.
Graham spun in the center of the room, looking for the next person to help. Annalise came up to him, tears streaming down her face.
She placed a hand on his shoulder. "Are you still here?" she whispered.
He was. A fact that worried him. He was changing people's lives. He should have flipped by now. Perhaps he wasn't in the right place? He started spreading out from the center of the room. People stepped out of his way.
Except one. Frank Gledwood. He walked over and placed a hand against Graham's chest.
"Are you drunk?" sneered Frank, looking into Graham's eyes, imparting his usual mix of ridicule and contempt. "Just what the hell do you think you're playing at."
"Leave him alone, Frank," said a voice from the back. "He's got messages for us. He's seen the future."
"Ah, the future, is it?" said Frank, his eyes sparkling, looking like a cat with a fat paw on the tail of a struggling mouse. "And what message have you got for me?"
Graham looked him in the eyes, held him there for two seconds, and said, "Take an AIDS test."
There was a collective gasp. Frank spluttered, shaking his head. His hand fell from Graham's chest. "It's a mistake," he said. No one listened. Graham moved on and a wall of people moved with him.
Annalise pushed her way alongside Graham. "Frank has AIDS?" she hissed into his ear.
Graham shrugged and threw her a smile. "No harm being careful."
The room changed in that instant. People were spread out. They were laughing, talking, drinking. He'd flipped.
He pushed through to the front, looking for Holly. She was talking to Brenda in the corner.
"Holly," he began, "how's your mother?"
Deja vu. The same tearful phone call home, the same headaches, the same shocked silence.
But no matchmaking for Brenda this time—Graham saw Bob's arm wrap around Brenda as soon as Holly rang home.
Graham moved from person to person, asking questions about their lives, their partners, looking for the ones he could help.
"Don't get back with that man, Rosie. I've seen what he does to you."
"Kath, have your son tested. He may be allergic to nuts."
"Jo, he never leaves his wife."
He flipped again.
Annalise One appeared in front of him, unmistakable with her long black hair.
"You can stop the world unravelling, Graham," she said. "It's not easy but you can do it. We believe in you. Look at all these people around . . ."
Graham put a finger to her lips and smiled. "I know," he said. "Thank you for everything, Annalise."
They hugged, a brief interlude before he went in search of Holly.
Within a minute he'd flipped again.
And then again and again.
Sometimes he saw Annalise, sometimes he didn't. Sometimes she had red hair, sometimes black, blonde, orange or blue.
He hugged them all. And moved on.
He checked his watch. Fourteen minutes gone. Many more to go. He had to keep the momentum going to generate the charge. Continued flipping in the same spot. Starting with the one Graham and spiralling out. Two hundred Annalises keeping it going. Persuading each new Graham to take up the challenge. The two hundred Grahams becoming three then five then a thousand.
Keep it going, he'd begged the Annalises. The Grahams will help and if they don't—ask them a question, force them to make a choice. And with each flip the choices will come easier. A resonance would develop. A resonance that would accord with the Grahams' desire to end the unravelling. A resonance greater than their desire to hide and retreat and withdraw from the world.
One came from hope, the other from fear.
He flipped again.
A sea of faces; expectant, reticent, hopeful, terrified. Was it his imagination or were they growing in number? He moved amongst them, darting in and out of the crowd, selecting people, changing their lives.
What did they see? These people, his colleagues. An idiot savant, a prophet, a miracle? A nobody who'd walked in their midst for seventeen years, silent, deaf and retarded? But who could now speak, who came to them with visions of the future, with messages from God?
Were they frightened of him? They moved back whenever he walked towards them. But they didn't run. The room was filling up, more were outside in the corridor. The phones were ringing continuously.
Were they in awe of him? Frightened and attracted in equal measures? Not sure what he'd do next?
He moved to the other side of the room. So many faces. Some he hadn't seen for years. A girl's face caught his eye. Her face so familiar but not from this building. He'd seen her somewhere else. In another context. He stared. She stared back. More deja vu. He'd seen that face staring back at him before.
From the side of a bus.
She was an actress. Josie someone . . . Josie Nelson? She was in a West End play. Her face was everywhere.
He beckoned her over. She obeyed instantly.
"Josie?" he said. "Josie Nelson?"
She nodded.
He laid his hand on the top of her head. "You don't belong here. You're a talented actress. Go."
He removed his hand. She left. Without a word, she spun towards the door and kept walking.
Someone at the back applauded.
He flipped and continued fli
pping. The interval between the flips diminishing with each exchange. Most times he materialized at a party. Most times he began by finding Holly. But sometimes he flipped to worlds where the party spirit had been replaced by a religious fervor.
Sometimes he didn't even have time to deliver a message. Sometimes the mere fact of selecting a person was enough to send his consciousness streaming from one world to the next. Or his touch on their head enough to send them crashing to the floor. It was like a religious revivalist meeting; he'd touch someone and they'd faint. Overcome by the anticipation, the moment, the belief that something miraculous was about to happen.
The room flashed before him, at times stroboscopic in the speed of change. He closed his eyes, tried to step back and remove himself from the furious pace of change.
He checked his watch—12:28—and blinked. Where had the time gone? He'd barely started. His hand changed before his eyes. A different watch.
He had to leave! He had to run! He had two minutes to get to the third floor. He headed for the door, the crowd so dense, he could barely move.
"Give him some room," someone shouted. "He's coming out."
A man struggled through the door towards him. "Graham," he shouted. "Have you got a message for me?"
The crowd parted and Stephen Leyland threw himself on his knees before Graham.
"Help me," he begged. "My son Jason. Do you know where he is?"
Graham tried to focus on the door, tried to push past but Stephen grabbed his legs. The man was desperate. Graham understood loss and he understood the pain of not knowing whether a loved one was alive or dead. He looked at the door, he looked at Stephen, he looked at the door again.
He couldn't leave.
He pulled Stephen to his feet. "There's a hostel in Camberwell," he said quickly. "I've seen him there before."
"Thank you, thank you so much. Thank . . ." Stephen broke down. Graham caught him before he fell and pulled him towards him.
He flipped again, Stephen Leyland morphing into an Annalise with braided, honey blonde hair.