I moved onto my knees, my eyes boring into hers. How could I convince her? “It’s not cute, Chris. I’ve been stuck over four hundred and fifty years in the past, in Blanche’s body. You can’t bathe there every day. You have to pee and crap in a chamber pot or in a stinking little closet suspended over a pit on the ground below. Drinking water is contaminated by all the shit, literally, that runs into the Thames, so everyone drinks wine and ale and is almost always a little drunk.”
Chris sat up now, frowning in anger. “Look, I know you don’t think much of my interest in neurobiology, or in Dr. Raj’s interest in locating our consciousness and perhaps transporting it someday, but that’s no reason to make fun of us like this.”
I threw up my hands. “I’m not making fun of anyone. This is the truth. This really happened.” I told her about the London I’d seen, about Ray Lexvold locked in the Salt Tower, about meeting Harriet and finally having a friend. I told her about the food, which I hated, and the beds, which were uncomfortable, and about little Vincent adopting me as his own.
Chris folded her arms. “You’ve just read all of this last week in one of your books.”
“No, I’ve been living it, Chris.”
With a grunt, Chris rolled out of bed and grabbed her pillow and a blanket from her chair. “Look, life has been pretty great this week, and now the old Jamie has come back to spoil everything, and I don’t appreciate it. You sound like a crazy person so I’m going to sleep on the sofa.”
Stunned she didn’t believe me, I pounded my pillow. No, wait. I tried to put myself in her situation. Of course it sounded crazy. She just needed a little time, but eventually I’d be able to convince her. I sprang off the bed and paced our small room until I saw my cell phone on the dresser and called Ashley. She could always make me feel better no matter what.
“Hey, Ashley, it’s me,” I said when she answered.
“Yeah, I know. The only reason I answered was so I could do this.”
“Do what?” The line went dead. “Hello? Ashley?”
I stared at the phone. She’d hung up on me.
* * *
I left Red Lion Square without saying a word to Chris. I wasn’t ready to talk to her yet because she slept on the sofa, because she didn’t believe me, and because the sex with Blanche had been so great.
When he opened his door, Dr. Rajamani didn’t look surprised to see me. “Ah, Jamie. How are you feeling?” He opened his door and welcomed me into the chaos of his office.
I took the closest chair, a wide wooden number that looked more like torture than comfort. “Dr. Rajamani, I think you’d better sit down.”
The man sat and folded his hands gracefully over his belly. Sun filtered in through his dusty window, turning his purple tunic into a soft gray. At least I didn’t have to worry about a thunderstorm today. “I am glad you are here,” he said. “I have just gotten off the phone with Chris and she spoke to me of some disturbing physiological changes from the accident you suffered last month. I am most concerned and want to reassure you that I will find out what is causing your brain to create worlds that are not real. Your brain might have been shocked a bit too much, so I will need to take a few more scans.” He smiled weakly. “Chris assures me you have no plans for a lawsuit of any kind.”
I snorted. “Dr. Rajamani, you need to know a few things. First, I refuse to have any more of your scans, ever. Second, the world that Chris described to you isn’t a fantasy. There’s nothing wrong with my brain chemistry.”
He tapped his chin thoughtfully. “You think it is psychological then?”
Boy, this was slowgoing. I leaned forward. “Chris thinks my brain is broken and that what I told her isn’t real. But remember that you said you were hoping to one day locate a person’s consciousness and then transport it?”
Rajamani nodded, smiling serenely. “I have been working toward this my entire life.”
I leaned forward. “Well, you succeeded.”
The man frowned. “I do not understand.”
“That little accident in your lab, the one that Chris thinks damaged my brain, did something entirely different. You sent my conscious mind back in time four hundred and fifty-seven years. My mind, and that of one of Queen Elizabeth I’s ladies-in-waiting, traded places. I’ve been living in 1560 since the accident. Blanche Nottingham has been living here, in my body, during that same time.”
Rajamani chuckled. “Chris tells me you have a sense of humor.”
I didn’t smile. “I ran into Ray Lexvold. Remember Ray? He disappeared after his first session with you a year ago.”
Rajamani straightened in his chair. “I do not remember that I shared the names of my other—”
“You didn’t. I had no idea who else had participated in your experiments, except for Chris. Yet I know that man’s name. He’s now Hew Draper, locked in the Tower of London for practicing sorcery against one of Queen Elizabeth’s friends.”
The professor shook his head and shot to his feet. “You are telling me lies.”
“No, I am not telling you anything but the fire trucking truth. I was there. My body wasn’t, but my mind was.”
“And now you are back?”
“Thanks to another thunderstorm. I don’t know how you transported my consciousness, but it’s definitely connected to thunderstorms, with lots of lightning.”
Rajamani’s hands began to shake as he paced. “You are not telling me lies? This is truth?” His brown eyes blazed with hope.
“Scout’s honor. You did it. And even though I really want to sue your scientific ass, I need your help.”
The man collapsed against a wall of books. “But I do not know how I did it! How can I duplicate what I do not understand?”
“I don’t know, Doc, and I don’t care because you shouldn’t duplicate your experiment ever again. Hear me? Ever again. My life has, quite frankly, been hell, and I have no clear idea what Miss Blanche Nottingham, the 1560 chick who’s put all this weight on my body, has been doing to my life. My best friend hung up on me last night, and this morning my older brother sent me a Fire truck You text. Lovely way to start the day.”
Raj rubbed his eyes. “I have done it. I have really done it.”
I stood and squeezed his arm to bring him out of his personal celebration. “Doc, here’s the thing. You have to figure out a way to make sure that I don’t go back there again, that I stay here. Can you do that? Can you shut off the GCA that’s still in my system? Give me some sort of antidote? If your success is going to be real, you must control your results. You must be able to stop me from flipping back and forth between times like a goddamned Ping-Pong ball.”
He clasped my hands. “Yes, yes, I hear what you are saying. You are right. Completely right.” He began pulling at one wooly eyebrow.
“Think, Dr. Raj. What do you need to do first?”
He pressed his lips together. “Your intralaminar nuclei are oscillating at an incorrect speed. I must take a blood sample to determine the level of GCA still in your system.”
“Let’s do it.” That a needle was involved no longer bothered me. Funny how wearing someone else’s body can put certain fears in perspective. At least this was one less thing Chris could list as proof of my cowardice.
Raj hesitated, then leaned closer. “Did you meet the Queen?” His voice quavered with excitement, which I totally understood.
“Dr. Raj, she’s amazing,” I whispered. “Strong and powerful and clever, yet still as vulnerable as you or I would have been at that age.”
He squeezed my hand. “Come to my lab. I will solve this problem for you before any thunder booms again.”
Chapter Fifteen
Leaving Dr. Rajamani bent over some sort of blood analysis machine, I checked my watch. Bradley would be at King’s Cross Station in St. Pancras about now. It was just as quick to walk as negotiate the subway, and I needed to reconnect with London, my London.
Soon the beautiful red and white St. Pancras appeared ahead. It was both a
Victorian railway station and a gingerbread-like neo-Gothic hotel. The station connected trains arriving from Europe with the London Tube. I hurried inside and began scanning the bland tiled platform for Bradley. Had he noticed I’d been gone?
I heard him before I saw him. “Do you walking zombies know that this is the largest interchange in the entire Tube system? And do you know that King’s Cross was originally known as Battlebridge because the invading Romans fought Queen Boadica right here? She was so distraught she committed suicide and is believed to be buried beneath either platform nine or platform ten of this very station.” I loved how Bradley always found the juiciest bits of historical gossip.
I walked up, tossed a pound coin in his hat, and smiled. Annie was sleeping in the crook of his arm. But he avoided my eyes and, in fact, turned to the side so he couldn’t see me. What? I shifted as well, forcing him to swing back again as he talked about the Roman martyr of St. Pancras, who was only fourteen years old when he was beheaded for converting to Christianity.
Confused, I backed away, then found a bench. I would wait. Hundreds of people scurried past, faces blank, cells pressed to their ears or thumbs busy texting as they walked. A few tossed coins into his hat. A homeless woman cowered against the far wall, lifting her head now and then to watch Bradley.
He finally ran out of words half an hour later, then quickly gathered up his life’s possessions, but I was quicker.
“Bradley, how are you?”
His grizzled face was defiant but sad. “Oh, so now you care?”
I shook my head, sick to my stomach. “I don’t understand.”
“You’ve got the shortest memory on record, then. I saw you yesterday at Holborn. I called out but you glared at me and kept right on going.”
“Bradley, let me buy you a cup of coffee and a biscuit. I need to explain.”
Suspicious but lured by the offer of free food, Bradley nodded. “If you buy one for Mouse as well.” He motioned to the woman sitting against the wall, and she shot to his side. “I met Mouse in Trafalgar, and she seems quite taken with me.”
I sighed. “Bradley, you can barely take care of yourself and Annie. You really can’t afford to take on another burden, although it’s commendable.”
“I call her Mouse because she’s as quiet as one.’” He chuckled. “Don’t try talking to her directly, though, ’cause she’ll hop off faster than Annie could.”
Mouse hung right at our heels, clutching herself as if desperate to keep her insides from spilling out. I could understand why Bradley felt so compelled to take her under his wing. She looked utterly lost. Her jeans and hoodie were torn and muddied, her snarled brown-blond hair hung listlessly down her back. Her pale eyes were the color of soft moss. I loved Bradley’s generosity. Why did it seem that people with very little were more willing to share what they had than people with much more?
Bradley, Annie, and Mouse waited outside while I slipped into the British Library Café and bought us something to eat. I joined them out in the library’s circular plaza, where the concrete benches were warm in the sun.
Mouse sat away from us, close enough not to lose sight of Bradley but far enough she didn’t have to interact with us. She inhaled the cookie in two bites and guzzled the entire bottle of water in one go.
“What’s her story?” I asked. Now I had two people and one rabbit to find homes for.
Bradley shrugged. “Can’t get a word out of her, other than she came to London last month.” He lifted the last of his biscuit. “I appreciate you giving her a bite to eat. Feeding everyone is hard on my salary.”
We smiled.
“Okay, Bradley, I need to explain why you thought I wasn’t being friendly yesterday. It’s going to sound totally insane, but it’s true, every word. That woman that you saw, who looked just like me? The body was mine, but the person inside, the consciousness? That wasn’t me.”
He waited, so I plunged ahead. By the time I was done, Mouse was asleep sitting up, and Annie had pooped on the concrete at our feet. I watched Bradley’s face as he sat back and considered all I’d told him.
“Life is a constant battle not to lose yourself,” he finally said.
“Do you believe me?”
He nodded. “I do. Living on the street, I’ve heard some real whoppers, but yours is the craziest. It’s too crazy not to be real.”
I slumped back against the concrete wall lining the green hedge behind us. “God’s blood, I needed to hear that.” I told him about Chris’s opinion of my ambition, and how she wished I were bolder, braver, and hungrier for something outside my reach. Somehow telling Bradley this wasn’t as humiliating as telling Ashley or Mary, both of whom loved Chris. It felt shameful, somehow, to admit that the woman who supposedly loved me more than anyone outside of my family thought me flawed and weak.
“Sounds like you can lose yourself in a relationship as easy as you can lose yourself in a war.” He sniffed. “I’ve been single all my life, so I’m just guessing, of course.”
I nodded, suddenly unsure of everything going on between me and Chris. Would we be able to weather my disappearance and the reason for it? It didn’t help that she was enjoying life with Blanche.
I checked my phone for Bradley’s schedule. “Look, I know where you go next….Wait, what’s this?” I opened a video I didn’t recognize.
Bradley leaned over my shoulder. “I gotta get me one of those someday.”
I pressed play. The video was me, looking into the camera, wearing a deep purple shirt I didn’t own.
“Hi, Jamie. It’s me, Blanche. I thought I’d do the modern thing and leave you a video message. Writing notes is so sixteenth century, don’t you think? I assume if you’re watching this that you’re back in your body, and I’m back in mine.”
“Bloody hell,” Bradley muttered. I shifted so we could both see the video.
“But, Jamie, that’s not going to be permanent. I will find a way back, and when I do, I’ll make sure I stay here. I love this life. I’m not wild about your body—skinny as a sick cow, with the fashion sense of a prison inmate—but it’s been adequate.”
I growled at the screen.
“Here’s the thing. There is so much that is wonderful about this time period, of course, but I only need one word to describe the best: Money. I know what it’s like to be poor, and I’m not going back there again. You probably don’t know this, since there’s no one at the palace who could tell you, but by the time my father died he had spent all our wealth. I lived with my best friend for a while, but then her parents decided I needed to leave. Do you know what options a sixteen-year-old unmarried woman has in 1555? None except marriage or servitude or prostitution. I had no choice but to travel to a town where I was not known and take a job as a servant in a “great house,” one so pathetically small that the entire house could have fit inside my father’s stables.”
Blanche sat back and licked her lips, pain darkening her gaze…or rather, my gaze. Her eyes were harder, the lips thinner, but it was still my face. “My only chance of escape came when I realized I wasn’t far from Princess Elizabeth’s home at Hatfield. I stole a gown and went to see her, throwing myself at her mercy and pouring out the terrible state of affairs. I amused her, so she took pity on me and brought me into her circle.
“All those lovely gowns in my trunk? The queen’s castoffs. I know the others laugh at that behind my back. My jewelry? Made with paste and dye for a few quid.” She leaned closer to the camera. “I will never experience poverty again, and I will not marry just for money. Here in this time a woman has unlimited options for earning her keep that do not involve servitude or shame or selling oneself in marriage.”
She smiled. “I will return to claim your body.”
The video ended.
Bradley let out a huge breath but I kept holding mine.
“That wasn’t you, was it?” Bradley said.
I finally exhaled. “Thank you for noticing that.”
“Freaky, freaky. Too frea
ky.” He stood. “Mouse, let’s get going,” Bradley said softly, and the woman roused instantly.
“You believe me, right?” I asked. “Blanche made this video, not me.”
He gave me a weak smile and motioned for Mouse to follow. I stepped back and watched them leave. Annie peeked at me over the edge of Bradley’s open backpack while Mouse hugged herself and dropped in behind Bradley.
I stood there for a second, wondering why the day’s warmth seemed to have left with my friend. Then, since I had research to do, I entered the library, presented my card, and signed up for database access. The cool air felt good after baking in the sun on the plaza. I did a search on “Blanche Nottingham” and found a mention of her as one of Queen Elizabeth’s ladies. I printed off the page—proof for Chris. I then expanded my search from 1558-1563 to include any “Blanche.” Found a Blanche Shepherd, a Blanche Walton, and a Blanche Maddox.
Huh. Jamie Maddox. Blanche Maddox.
What the hell had happened in 1560 after I left?
Shaking off my discomfort, I then did a search on Raymond Lexvold. Most of the entries were for a high school wrestler from Minnesota, but I did manage to find a London entry that sucked the air right out of me: Raymond Lexvold killed by double-decker. I checked the date: May 14, one year ago.
According to the article, Mr. Lexvold, appearing confused and agitated, stepped out in front of a double-decker bus as it came barreling down Kingsway. He was killed instantly.
I sat back, my heart pounding. No wonder Ray had been unable to return to his own body, his own time. No amount of lightning or GCA could reunite a consciousness with a body no longer alive. That meant Ray was truly trapped in the sixteenth century. The thought made me so tired I could barely sign out.
On the long walk back to Red Lion Square, I resolved to make sure I never returned to 1560 again. For if I did, and Blanche was careless with my body, I might never return.
Chapter Sixteen
By the time I wandered back to the flat, it was late afternoon. The sky was still a bright, cloudless blue, which was such a relief. If I never heard another clap of thunder, saw another flash of lightning, I would be perfectly content.
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