Given Time

by Anthony Burn

  We had time to make a brief perusal of the bronze statues that surrounded Apollo, and seven resin sculptures on top of ten-metre poles lining either side of the tram lines that ran through the centre of the Place, but then reluctantly I found a taxi to take us back to the airport.

  ‘Are you going to come and sit on my lap again?’ I asked Lauren as we levelled off at cruising altitude.

  She got up and stood in front of me, but instead of sitting she glanced towards the open entrance to the cockpit. She turned back to me, biting her bottom lip as though she was trying to make a decision. She looked to the front of the plane again and I asked her what was the matter. She said nothing, but reached up under the hem of her dress and quietly dribbled off her knickers.

  I pressed a button on the console next to my seat and the cockpit door slid closed.

  ‘What’s that?’ she asked.

  ‘Privacy button,’ I told her. ‘The crew won’t disturb us, even if we’re crashing headlong into the Alps.’

  ‘That’s reassuring,’ she said, and I laughed at the echo of my words from my first private flight.

  Her inhibitions faded, and she helped me with my shorts while I reclined the seat. Then with a delighted smile she straddled me.

  ‘Welcome aboard,’ I told her.

  She lay comfortably across my chest with her head on my shoulder, her eyes closed and her breathing even as I gently stroked her hair. After our exertions, she had gone to the small room at the back of the plane to tidy herself up, while I did the same in my seat. She had come back with jubilation on her face and settled down into her current position.

  ‘I can’t believe I’ve joined the mile-high club,’ she said. ‘I always thought it sounded sordid.’

  ‘I’m sure for the majority of people who join in the economy class toilets, it probably is.’

  ‘Yuck. I don’t even want to think about that. Although, I wouldn’t have minded in this one.’ She pointed to the rear. ‘It’s really posh. It’s got a leather seat, a proper washbasin and fluffy towels. And I’ve never been in an aircraft toilet with a window.’

  I laughed. ‘I hope you drew the curtains so the neighbours couldn’t see in.’

  We fell into companionable silence, and it wasn’t long until she dozed off. I watched the subtle movements of her breathing and thought about how my life had changed for the better, and it finally occurred to me that I knew what had been absent when I’d been travelling: I’d loved my time in New Zealand, and often thought back to the places and people with fondness, but I’d left there with the unsettling feeling that something had been missing. At the time, I’d put it down to homesickness, but now I saw exactly what it was. Even though I’d made friends along the way, I hadn’t had someone to share the experience – someone with whom to make collective memories. Someone special.

  I’d originally thought I could spend my life travelling, and I’d been dismayed when the shine had worn off after only a few months. Now the allure was back, and with a vengeance. I could happily devote my life to showing Lauren the world, looking at art in far-off places and sharing adventures, while all the time creating reminiscences to look back on together.

  A small bump of turbulence brought her out of her slumber, and she nuzzled against my neck. ‘You know, a girl could get used to this,’ she said dreamily. ‘It’s a shame we have to go back to work tomorrow.’

  ‘We don’t have to,’ I said. ‘We could close down the gallery and spend all our time doing this instead.’

  She bolted upright, looking at me in dismay. ‘No! I love my gallery. We can’t close it down.’ Her voice was plaintive, and then her face reddened. ‘Oh my God! I meant your gallery, Kee. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I told her. ‘With all the work you’ve put into creating and running it, I think of it as your gallery too. After all, there’s a reason I named it the way I did, remember? I really don’t mind if you call it your gallery.’

  She smiled, but she didn’t look reassured. ‘How about if we say our gallery? But Kee, you wouldn’t really close it down, would you?’

  ‘No, not a chance. I love it too. We can do this at weekends and holidays, yeah?’

  She half-smiled and nodded, and rested her face back on my chest. She was quiet for a long time, and I thought she might have gone back to sleep, but then I felt a tiny spot of dampness through my shirt and heard an almost imperceptible sniff. I pulled her up to face me, and tears were spilling down her cheeks.

  My thoughts turned from concern to trepidation. ‘What’s wrong?’

  She sniffed a couple of times and wiped her face with the back of her hand while she thought about how to answer. When she did, it was obvious she was trying to choose her words very carefully. ‘Kee, I don’t want to say the wrong thing… Oh God, I don’t know how to put this. I mean, I know it’s only our first date, and we shouldn’t be thinking about this… but I don’t know if I should be worried now.’

  ‘I promise you won’t upset me, whatever you say,’ I reassured her. ‘So, tell me what’s worrying you and we’ll work it out.’

  ‘Okay. Well… please don’t think I’m asking about your money, because I’m not. It’s just that when you spent so much on building the gallery, I thought it was here to stay, you know, like you’d need to get your investment back. And I know you just said you won’t close it down… but now I’m wondering, if you’re so rich… Oh God, I’m not putting this well. I mean, I’m wondering if it’s like a plaything for you, and if you get fed up with it… or with me… then you’ll just close it down anyway, and I’ll have done everything for nothing and be out of work.’

  She buried her head in my shirt again and began to sob. I stroked her hair while I thought about how to respond. I could feel my temper rising because I’d told her I wasn’t going to close the gallery, but then I looked at it from her point of view, and my negativity subsided when I understood her anxiety. She had given up a steady job to become a part of my dream, and while I’d thrown my money around like a rich brat, I’d never given her any true indication of how much she meant to me. My careless suggestion had raised the possibility that she could be a temporary playmate, to be casually and callously discarded once I’d had enough of her.

  I pulled her up to face me and kissed away some of the tears. It was time for me to choose my words carefully. ‘Listen, Lauren, this is important. I can’t begin to tell you how much I respect you for not asking about my money, but it was going to come up sooner or later so it might as well be now.’

  ‘Please don’t tell me how much you’ve got, Kee. I think it might frighten me.’

  ‘I won’t, but I have to tell you that if I closed the gallery and lost all the money I’ve invested, it wouldn’t hurt me in the slightest. If I closed it and lost you, it would hurt more than I could put into words. But that doesn’t mean I opened it just to get you into bed. Everything I told you about my reasons for having the gallery is true. It’s also true that I’ve wanted you in my life since the first day we met, but I never expected you to go out with me. The last couple of days have been beyond my wildest dreams.’

  ‘I’ve wanted you since day one too,’ she said, and the smile returned to her wet face. She found a tissue in her bag, and I took it from her to gently dab away the tears. I kissed her, and then continued, ‘I know it’s only our first date, and I don’t even want to think there may be a last, but if anything did happen between us, I promise you this: for as long as you want to run the gallery, it will stay open. I’m never going to close it without your agreement. And yes, you can have that in writing.’

  ‘Seriously?’ she asked, her eyes welling up again.

  ‘Yes, I’ll make it my first job tomorrow, to get your contract changed so I can’t ever close it down without your permission or force you out.’

  She hugged me. ‘Thank you. I’m sorry I’ve been such an idiot. I should never have doubted you.’

  ‘When I said about closing down, I just meant I want to keep doi
ng this as well. You’ve opened up a whole new world for me, so I want to share the rest of it with you.’

  ‘Oh my God… I mean wow, really?’

  ‘Yes, really. We can go wherever you like, looking at art or just sightseeing. So, maybe you’d better start thinking about where you’d like to go next weekend.’

  ‘Kee, my feet haven’t touched the ground since the day I met you.’ She sighed. ‘This is wonderful but I think I could do with a rest.’

  ‘What, you mean like staying in my bed all day?’

  ‘Now you’re talking,’ she said.

  Twenty

  Lauren was standing beside the desk in a linen trouser suit when I arrived at the gallery the following morning. As soon as I got through the door, she raced towards me and launched herself into my embrace, wrapping her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist while she kissed me long and hard. She had done the same thing the previous evening when I’d gone down to see her off in her taxi, and hadn’t stopped until the driver complained about the wait and suggested we get a room.

  She broke off from the kiss, but made no attempt to unlock her limbs. ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you,’ she breathed. ‘I had the best weekend ever. I was on the phone all last night to my mum and dad and all my friends. They’re sick with envy.’

  ‘You need to be careful about how jealous you make them,’ I warned her, but she was so excited that it barely registered.

  ‘No, it’s fine. They’re really happy for me. I can’t thank you enough, you wonderful man.’

  ‘You said that last night,’ I reminded her, ‘and I thought you said no kissing at work.’

  ‘I did and I did,’ she confirmed as she reluctantly climbed down, ‘but yesterday was so magical that you are allowed one kiss… or two.’ She laughed, and quickly pecked me on the lips before turning away.

  ‘Hey, that wasn’t a kiss,’ I said, and chased after her.

  She giggled as we ran to the desk, but as we reached the entrance she turned and stopped me. ‘Seriously, Kee, no,’ she said in a tone that told me that the games had finished.

  It felt like a stupid rule, but in reality it worked well. I found myself missing her, even though she was less than a metre away, and I longed to touch her, but the one time I tried she slapped my hand.

  She arrived at my apartment at six-thirty on the following Saturday evening. We’d been out several times during the week and I’d stayed at her flat on Wednesday night, but we had both been looking forward to the weekend. She was bringing clothes for Monday, so she could stay both nights, and we’d laughed all week about staying in bed all day on Sunday.

  ‘Why don’t I cook for you on Saturday evening?’ I had asked.

  ‘Great. What can you cook?’

  ‘Takeaway pizza.’

  ‘Lovely. Maybe I should cook for you.’

  ‘Okay. What can you cook?’

  ‘Frozen chips.’

  We’d dissolved into laughter but she turned up with a bag full of groceries as well as her holdall full of clothes, and we would discover later that we could both hold our own in the kitchen.

  I poured her a glass of wine, but after taking a sip she put it down in favour of a long embrace. She eventually pulled back from me with a slightly puzzled expression on her face.

  ‘Kee, can I ask you something? Have you got a stone or something in your pocket?’

  I laughed. ‘Or am I just pleased to see you?’

  She groaned at the ‘dad joke’ and said, ‘I’ve felt it a few times, when we’ve kissed. Can I ask what it is?’

  I was glad she asked, because I wanted to tell her about the time device anyway. I envisioned us having adventures in time together, being able to see more than we could in a normal day, being able to travel further and being able to repeat days so we could have extra time with each other.

  I pulled the gadget out of my pocket. ‘I was going to tell you about this. But you need to sit down, because you’re not going to believe me.’

  She sat on one of the stools at the kitchen worktop and said, ‘Okay, astound me.’

  ‘Lauren, what I’m about to tell you is completely true, but you’ll need to keep an open mind because it will sound like the craziest thing you’ve ever heard.’

  She laughed, and I guessed I was probably being a little over-earnest.

  I took a deep breath. ‘Okay, I’m just going to come out with it. This is a time device. I use it to travel back in time.’

  The smile hadn’t left her face and she laughed again. ‘Yeah, sure it is. That’s exactly what I thought you were going to say.’

  I stopped smiling. ‘I’m telling you the truth, Lauren.’

  ‘Yes, of course you are.’ She noticed my expression and became serious too. ‘Okay, if you don’t want to tell me what it is, I don’t mind really. I was just curious.’

  ‘I do want to tell you, but I said you wouldn’t believe me. I just need to give you a demonstration.’

  ‘Er, okay.’ She had looked dubious, but now she was anxious.

  ‘It’s nothing to worry about. I’m just going to show you a trick. I want you to count to three.’

  She did as I asked and I paused in front of her, then I walked around her and off towards the far end of the room, checking the time as I did so. She swivelled in her seat to watch me.

  ‘Nothing happened,’ she said, looking confused.

  ‘That’s because I haven’t done anything yet.’

  She laughed. ‘It’s not the most impressive trick I’ve ever seen.’

  I turned to face her from the far end of the room. ‘Okay, prepare to be amazed… Oh, actually, I should have said that before I got you to count, but it doesn’t matter.’

  I rotated the dial to go back to when she had just finished counting, and in that instant she was no longer facing me, but was looking back towards where I had been. I saw her body stiffen and heard her gasp.

  ‘Over here,’ I called out, and she spun round with her eyes bulging to find me grinning at her.

  ‘What the fuck…? Oh my God, Kee. You just totally disappeared into thin air and now you’re over there. It’s not possible.’ She started to sound a bit panicky. ‘How…? I mean where did you…? No, I mean how did you do it? You said it was a time machine, but you just went from here to there, you didn’t go through time…’

  I explained what had happened as I walked back towards her. ‘We even had a conversation. You said that you didn’t think it was an impressive trick.’

  I was hoping she would be excited, but she was looking more and more frightened. ‘I don’t remember saying that,’ she said.

  ‘That’s because I turned back time to before you said it, and now we’re having this conversation instead.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’ Her voice was shaky, and her eyes were beginning to well up.

  ‘Look, I’ll show you. We’ll go back in time together. I'll need to carry you.’ I moved towards her, but she flinched away, shaking her head.

  ‘Don’t worry, it’s perfectly safe. We’ll just go back a few seconds.’

  ‘No, I don’t want to, Kee,’ she said.

  I tried to reason with her, but she wasn’t looking at me. She was staring at the device, her eyes filled with fear and tears beginning to roll down her cheeks.

  Her reaction reminded me of how scared I’d been when I first found the device, so I quickly shut it away in a drawer and said, ‘It’s okay, we don’t have to.’ I pulled her into my arms to comfort her. She was trembling. I rubbed her back until she calmed down, but then she pulled away still looking troubled.

  ‘Why, Kee? Why have you got it? Where did it come from?’

  I told her about how I found it, and that I didn’t know how it got there.

  ‘But what do you use it for?’ she asked.

  ‘I use it if I want to do something again, or if I’ve made a mistake or want to do something differently.’

  ‘Have you used it to do stuff differently with me?’
r />   ‘No,’ I said, hoping she wouldn’t notice that I wasn’t being completely truthful. ‘I’ve never wanted to do anything differently with you.’

  I sensed she was going to argue with me but changed her mind. ‘How does it work? I mean, what happens? How does it make the time go backwards?’

  ‘I have absolutely no idea. I just know it does. But only for twenty-four hours. You can’t go back further than that.’

  ‘I don’t know, Kee. I don’t think you should mess about with stuff you don’t understand.’

  ‘It’s completely harmless. You don’t feel anything. You don’t even know you’ve gone back until you check the time. Please, let me show you. You’ll see.’

  She became angry. ‘No, Kee, I’ve said I don’t want to, and I don’t think you should either. I’m sure it must be dangerous. Can’t you just get rid of it?’

  ‘Come on, you’re just being silly…’

  ‘Don’t you fucking dare call me silly,’ she shouted. ‘You don’t know what the fuck you might be doing with that thing, or what it might be doing to you. Are you going to keep it?’

  ‘Yes, I am,’ I said, no longer able to keep the temper out of my voice.

  She burst into tears. ‘I think I want to go home now,’ she said, her voice faltering.

  I softened immediately. ‘Please don’t, Lauren. I know you’re scared, but can’t we talk about it?’

  ‘Too fucking right I’m scared, and I think you should be too. I’m sorry, Kee, I want to be with you more than anything in the world, but I can’t if you’ve got that… thing.’

  ‘Okay, if it really means that much to you, I’ll get rid of it.’ I took it back out of the drawer.

  ‘Seriously?’ she asked.

  I turned the dial, and she vanished before my eyes. ‘Maybe,’ I said to the empty chair.

  I’d gone back far enough to give myself time to think, before Lauren was due to arrive. I was angry and disappointed that she didn’t want to join in with my adventure, but the anger quickly dissipated into regret at having caused her anguish. She was the most precious thing in my life, and I never wanted to cause her heartache. I would definitely make it up to her, even though she wouldn’t know I’d upset her.