by Alison Evans
A warmth starts at my knees. It spreads up and down my body slowly, fills me, and this is the warmest I’ve ever felt here. It’s like a hot shower after a too-long day at work and it’s glorious.
I wriggle my toes, I’m that happy, and I can move a little freely; my little finger can almost be lifted from my leg, but nothing else moves.
As I move into the universe, there’s regret. I don’t want to leave this place just yet.
My head pounds from the effort it took to get away from the window. I’m in the backyard but I don’t know if this is the same day or not. I shuffle over and let my back rest against the tree, still recovering from the warmth of the in-between. The trunk is knobbly and digs into my back, but I don’t mind at all. I don’t move further, just let my head continue to throb.
The house has a new paint job, brighter. The garden is much more kept than it usually is, and there’s even a row of neat little rose bushes in front of the windows of the lounge.
The back door opens and a little boy tumbles out, and he’s maybe five years old. He’s running up towards me and he’s half European-something, half Vietnamese, like me. His face is happier than mine, his bright eyes look at me and as he gets closer I realise that they’re my eyes. He’s got my nose, too.
Is he my son? Fuck. I can feel my eyes bulge out as he launches himself at me, hugging me with more force than I’ve ever felt in a hug before. His arms are stronger than I thought a kid’s arms could be.
‘Ida,’ he says as he lets go of me and sits down.
Thank Christ, he’s not my son. My head is light with relief.
As I look more closely at his face, I realise he doesn’t have my eyes at all. They’re Mum’s eyes, Mum’s nose. I look up at the house, the rose bushes.
Mum’s inside that house.
She’s alive and I have a brother. I might have more siblings. Where would they all sleep? Do I share a room? Maybe there are renovations.
‘Ida?’
‘What?’ I say, shaking my head. ‘Yes?’ I say, kinder.
I’m breathing too fast and my head is getting lighter; my head aches. I need to stay conscious. I must stay conscious for this. My pulse is jamming.
‘Mum says to come inside,’ he says, then sprints off and runs back to the door.
I dust off my pants when I stand up, even though there’s nothing to dust off. My gait remains steady as I force myself not to run to the house, trying not to tremble but how can I not? Mum’s not even a hundred metres away.
I can talk to her and hug her and call her whenever I want, I can make her tea and cake, I can get up in the middle of the night and she’ll be there to talk to. My lungs fill up, shaky, and I wipe my palms on my pants. Oh, God. Oh God oh God oh God. I’m going to see her again.
I open the door and the first thing I see is my brother – my brother – standing in the middle of the lounge, pointing at something. As soon as I turn my head to see what he’s pointing at, everything is gone.
Floating in the cold space I try to scream; I want my throat raw and bleeding but the scream won’t come. I wander in the darkness and the light and there is nothing at all, nothing to distract or draw my attention from the fact that my mother was right there and now I can’t go back, I can’t, and I’ll never find her again because it took me five years and it was completely by accident, I’ll never see her again, never, and the coldness takes over.
I’m sitting in the cold air under the same tree. It’s drizzling. I scrunch up my face, blink fast, but I still cry. I’m stuck here with the tea-stained wall that’s growing mould, Pilgrim hating me, my dad not wanting to talk to me. I still haven’t seen him since yesterday.
Was it even yesterday? How could I even know? The calendar’s been blank in the last few houses, and I don’t see the point in updating it because even if I do, I can just be pulled out of that life by a doppelganger at any point, if the window was anything to go by. That was a warning, but I don’t know what for.
I lie down on the grass, sob until my lungs hurt and I start to retch but my stomach is empty and nothing comes out. I heave, feel my stomach try to give me something, anything, to throw up. I heave again, throat tightening, eyes tight, but nothing happens. The constant switching is starting to feel different, draining. I’m used to sleep deprivation, but not like this. It’s taking more energy, and it’s never made me vomit before. This headache is worse than I’ve ever felt.
Of course there’d need to be some kind of payment for switching between these times. I’m just surprised it doesn’t cost more. Something like burning up a sun seems more adequate.
I finally stop retching and I just want to curl up in the grass.
I go to my room, find it as alien as before. It’s filled with rubbish and dust, and the tea stains on the wall are so visible.
It was a pointless thing to do. Why did I do it, anyway? Why were all the others doing it?
My foot brushes an old apple on the floor. The apple. It’s appeared in every version of my room, and I’ve got no idea why.
I bend and pick up the old piece of fruit. Weighing it, I toss the apple at the closed window with as much force as I can. The window pane splits into a spider web and the apple leaves a hole, just a little bigger than the fruit itself. The glass is old and fragile.
I could switch here, but what’s the point? Some other version of myself would have to deal with the hole I’ve made. Someone would have to explain to Dad how it got there. Someone’s going to have to pay to get it fixed. Besides, my body is too wrecked for me to switch right now.
Up close, the fractures turn into slices of rainbow, shining as I move. I put on the shoe closest to me and kick some of the window out. Some glass shatters outside, it tinkles onto the path below.
I take the other shoe, the one that isn’t on my foot, and attack the remaining glass in the window. It smashes all around, cascades down – tiny pieces get caught in my hair and my clothes. I drag fingers through my hair and I come away with tiny cuts on my fingertips.
Wedged
I jerk away from sleep, breathing heavily and not realising where I am. But then I sit up, wipe the drool from my face and I’ve been lying on the carpet of my room, slumped down near the window. The cold is leaking in from outside, and the light shines off the white windowsill paint, highlighting the cracks and brown wood underneath. I look for the clock on the bookcase, but the version of me that lives here keeps its clock on the bedside table. I don’t know what time Dad will be home, probably not for a while. I poke my head out through the window frame, there’s no glass now, and check if his car is there. It’s not, and so I take the dustpan and brush outside.
The ground is a little damp and my socks are soaked by the time I reach the glass. Sweeping it all up, I shuffle backwards and there’s a stab below my knee. I cry out, drop the brush and turn to look at the wedge of glass stuck in my flesh. Goddammit.
I trace the edge gently with a finger, managing not to cut myself with its green-silver razor, and grip it. It’s slippery with blood and it takes a couple of goes before I can pull it out. Holding back a scream, I clamp a hand down on the tiny wound and can feel the blood oozing out.
My blood is redder than I remember, so red it doesn’t look real, like those movies that look super fake with their fountains of blood. My knee drips blood down to my shin. In the sunlight, there are so many different shades of red on this glass that isn’t even wider than my thumb.
The bleeding’s almost stopped after a couple of minutes, so I figure that’s good enough and make my way to the bathroom. Once the blood’s washed away, I see that the cut’s deeper than I thought. The red is too dark for me to look at for more than a couple of seconds. It’s unreal how only a few millimetres below my skin everything is startling scarlet. I widen the cut with my thumb, look at where my skin and flesh meet. Bodies are weird and gross, and I want to vomit but I keep looking, closer, and a dark clot oozes out.
I chuck on some stinging antiseptic and a Band Aid a
nd hear a car pull up in the driveway. A car door is slammed. I freeze, the glass is still outside. Maybe Dad won’t see it; it’s getting a little dark. He won’t go outside at least; the weather is on my side. He might see it through the lounge windows, though, if he gets close enough.
The front door opens, I hear Dad’s heavy boots against the tiled floor. He potters in the kitchen. I hear him moving about. Then the footsteps lighten – his boots have come off. There are a few moments, then the television’s turned on and it’s loud. Probably drowns out everything. I can’t tell what he’s watching, but there’s canned laughter.
I’ll have to wait till he goes before I can clean up all the mess I made. As I make sure I haven’t left any blood anywhere on the sink or anything, I notice one of my socks is dotted with red. I peel them both off and chuck them in the hamper beside the sink. My feet are wrinkled from the water outside, and I dry them with a towel but they’re still cold. Everything is fucking cold here.
I creep down the hallway and peer into the lounge. Dad is sitting on the couch. He’s balding, more than I’m used to. He’s got a big patch of scalp showing and my eyes prick in the corners. As I watch, he runs a hand through his hair, sighs heavily. He’s thinner than he should be.
So I go into the kitchen and make him a cup of coffee, not too white and a half-spoon of sugar. The couch depresses as I sit beside Dad and hand him the mug.
He looks at me for a moment, not saying anything as he takes it. I smile at him and, after a moment, he smiles back. It just makes the wrinkles around his eyes wider, more noticeable. Not in a good way.
Nothing’s said, and we watch the terrible TV show until he falls asleep.
A noise behind the couch makes me turn and Frank is there, his school uniform ill-fitting. ‘Are you two talking again?’
I look at Dad, face relaxed and grey as he sleeps. ‘I guess.’
‘Cool.’ Frank nods slowly. ‘You got rid of the hair dye.’
I keep my face smooth. ‘Yeah, needed … another change.’ I wonder what colour it was.
‘Right.’
‘Frank,’ I say as he starts to turn away. ‘I’m.’ He pauses, looks at me. ‘I’m sorry if I said anything … bad. Lately.’
He looks at me, features drawn in a slight frown as his otherwise smooth face draws together. ‘Well, you haven’t,’ he begins, ‘so don’t worry. But I get it.’
‘Get it?’
He shifts from one foot to the other, gripping an arm with his hand. ‘Yeah. I mean, it was pretty bad.’ He rubs the back of his neck. ‘Anyway, I uh … I got homework.’
The couch sinks around me as I lean back into it. There’s a huge space between Dad and me and I wonder what Mum’s doing where she’s alive. Maybe she’s tucking my brother into bed. His name … What was his name? It was never mentioned. There’s a weight on my chest, crushing me into the couch as I think about him. I have a brother but I’ll never meet him. And I’ll never see Mum again, except in photographs that will fade or burn or both. I found her once, but that was an accident.
It’s late, now. The moon is shining out in the backyard. I nudge Dad and he snorts himself awake.
‘Maybe you should go to bed.’
He blinks at me, groggy. ‘Mmm, okay.’ He groans as he stands. ‘Thank you.’ And he looks at me with a feeling in his face I can’t describe before he leaves the room.
I’m glad of the warmth of the fire. It’s small now, dwindling, but still warm enough. I sit on the edge of the couch and stare into the flames. My eyes start to dry out and I need to look away before they start weeping. My vision shifts and there’s something engraved in the soot on a brick, at the back of the fireplace. Half-lit by the tiny flames. I’ve seen it before, that night Frank was watching the elves movie and we ordered pizza.
I move up and see the symbols scratched on the wall are numbers, rough, barely legible. They could almost be nothing at all, if you didn’t look right. But I am, and the numbers are a date: the fourteenth of July this year.
With this, I realise I’ve got no clue what day it is. I rush upstairs to where I hope my phone is. I find it on the bedside table and check the date. The fourteenth is today. It must’ve had something to do with the window incident.
I sit down on the bed, springs creaking, and shiver in the cold. The window lets the cold leak in, but if I had a tarp I could block it out until I can somehow get it fixed. There’s one in the shed. The shed keys are on the hook next to the door and I grab them, go outside and walk through the wet grass. My feet are freezing and I really need to remember that shoes are a thing.
The shed’s completely dark when I open the door. My hand slaps against the wall, no cobwebs, until I find the switch and it flickers three times before remaining on. The panic that was rising from the darkness recedes, but then the shed isn’t what it’s supposed to be.
Everything should not be this clean. Everything should be covered in spider webs and sawdust and oil, and empty paint cans should be littering the floor. The last time I went in here was when I was about fifteen, and that’s what it looked like then. Neither Dad nor I really use it at all.
But now there are maps pinned to corkboards on the walls, lists and diagrams. All in my own handwriting. They litter the workbench, too. I lean over and pick up the closest bit of paper.
Although it’s my handwriting, there are Ts crossed with long lines, Rs that are curvier than mine, Ls that have more determination than mine do. There are maybe ten different variations on this piece of paper, some written so hard they poke through the paper where they dot the Is. It looks like I’m having a conversation with myself.
I was pushed out for the fourth time today, the first line says. We need to do this soon.
The second continues on. We need to find the dominant one. Then we can stop this.
I let the paper fall to the ground; it rustles as it rests against the packed earth under my feet. My hands are trembling when I think of the window. It was a warning. At the right angle, the fall could’ve done some serious damage.
The papers are everywhere, in boxes under the bench. This has been going on for a long time, the doppelgangers swapping notes. All trying to plot how to get me.
All the near-death experiences, how many were really just accidents?
I riffle through more papers, trying to find anything that’ll help make sense of anything. How did they know about the shed? Is it in every version of my life? Each of the papers is written more hastily than the next; I need something that says why I’m losing control of this. They must know.
The tea – they made me do it. It says right here. There was that weird pressure in my skull that day, was that another me? In my own mind, someone else. I’m not safe.
The doppelgangers on this page talk about how I’m skipping too much, the barriers between the universes are easier to bend. The others are starting to learn how to do it. This isn’t time travel; I’m skipping between different versions of my own life, parallel universes. There are sheds in every universe, some of them look like this, one of them has written. Sometimes the plans are different, or not there. But they find them eventually, wandering.
I put down the paper, don’t look at anything except the blue tarp. I grab it and get out of the shed, locking the padlock on the door with a click that isn’t final enough. Out in the backyard, I’m exposed. It’s windy and the sound of the trees covers up any noise that might come from someone else outside. The moon’s starting to wax so the yard’s still lit. There are too many shadows. Anyone could be watching.
Swallowing, I try to ignore the fact that I could be pulled out of this safe place, right now, any time, any, and be killed. They could kill me and be done with all this. They could do it at any moment. And, of course, I don’t want to stay here. While there’s no danger there’s also no Daisy, the house is so unclean, Dad is so angry. But I’m so tired. My body aches and I’m sick of the lightdark, of not knowing what’s on the other side.
Why’d I have to l
earn what’s in the goddamn shed? That fucking window, I just had to go and smash it. I don’t want to know any of this; take me back to ignorance. I just don’t want to know.
I reach the back door and launch myself into the house, breathing in deep as I lock the door behind me. With the lock, normally I’d feel safer. It’s a solid, real thing. But the doppelgangers can get through anything – they can even get into my head.
I scream when a doppelganger appears in front of me. Clapping a hand in front of my own mouth, we stare at each other and I don’t blink. The doppelganger does the same. It looks around at something I can’t see, says something, then turns back to look at me. It moves and sits on the armchair nearby, watching.
‘Ida?’ Frank comes out into the hallway in his pyjamas. ‘You all right?’
I jump, put a hand to my chest. ‘Frank.’
Dad comes out, too, in his dressing gown. ‘I heard you scream.’ He shifts from foot to foot and won’t look directly at me.
‘Oh.’
Frank watches us, his gaze jumping between our faces.
‘I thought I saw a mouse,’ I say. ‘Trick of the light.’
‘Why have you got the tarp?’ Dad asks, his face returning to the strain he was wearing the other day.
I open my mouth, but the lies don’t come. I’m too tired, my brain won’t cooperate. Deserted, and I can’t think of anything to say. I almost can’t be bothered to switch, just continue to stare at him without speaking forever, but the reflex kicks in and I blink and am senseless.
The light is dark and everything is cold and the tiniest bit of warmth drags me in.
My hand turns the lock. The doppelganger appears in front of me, but this time I don’t look at it. Keep walking, pick up the sheet I left on the stairs and take the steps in my stride. The shivers start as I reach my room and my feet hurt, I realise. With a dirty shirt, I dry them off and slip on some socks.