I look out of the window towards the shop. I can’t see inside it properly from here, but as I think about George and Harry being reunited again after all this time, a deep, warm feeling spreads right through me, and I turn back towards Ringo to tell him what I’ve just felt, but he’s gone.
What? How could he have?
I look all around the café, but I’m definitely the only customer in here now, with two cups of coffee on my table, one full where I haven’t touched it, and the other empty. How on earth did he leave without me hearing him? And he’s left me to pay, too – charming! I’m about to get up and settle our bill, when I notice something sitting on the table in front of me; it’s a tiny brooch in the shape of a four-leaf clover.
How very odd
, I think, picking it up to examine it.
Why would Ringo leave me a brooch, of all things?
I put the brooch in my purse and leave a couple of pound notes on the table for the coffees; our waitress is still too involved in the concert to even notice what I’m doing. Taking a quick glance down the road towards the shop again, I can now see Harry and George at the window, probably looking for me to come and unlock the door and let them out now they’ve done their part, made up and become friends again. So I hurriedly leave the shop and rush out on to the zebra crossing, confident, on this exceptionally quiet day on the King’s Road, that there’s unlikely to be any traffic coming.
As I get about halfway across, I can just see Harry peeking through the glass window of the shop door. He waves, so I lift my hand to wave back, and it’s then that it happens. The white sports car appears from nowhere, screeching around the corner as it always does.
The last thing I see is the look of horror on Harry’s face as he watches me – and then, as always, it all goes cold.
I open my eyes, knowing what will greet me before the daylight even has time to hit my pupils.
There they all are, as always, the small crowd that has gathered above me to see whether I’m alive or dead.
The question I have to ask myself as I see the relief on their faces as they assume from my movement that I’m alive is: am I?
I mean, yes, I’m moving, breathing and living like a normal human being, but what sort of human being travels through time? Is this real? Is it a dream? Or is it my latest theory, that I’m a type of angelic being, spending a short time in people’s lives, steering them back on to the right path, then moving on to another lifetime and another set of lives that need shaking up a bit?
The ice-cold water suddenly cascading down my face suggests that going with option one might be the best course of action right now. After all, how many angels get a glass of water thrown in their face?
‘Sorry!’ Ellie apologises. ‘I thought it might help.’
‘If I’d fainted, maybe it might have,’ I say, wiping the water away with my hand. ‘But I’ve been hit by a car.’
‘You remember?’ she asks, amazed. ‘I thought you might have lost your memory in the accident, and we’d have to play Take That songs at your bedside on a twenty-four-hour loop, and maybe get the band to visit you at the hospital to try and get you to remember.’
I look up at Ellie now. She’s wearing green jogging bottoms and trainers, and on her top half is a Take That tour sweatshirt with the band’s faces emblazoned across the front.
‘No, that won’t be necessary, really. I’m fine.’
‘Are you sure, love?’ a man next to me asks. ‘That was quite a tumble you just took. Bloody driver didn’t stop, did he? I tried to get his registration, but he took off like something from that movie –
Speed
.’
‘
Speed
was about a bus, not a car, you muppet,’ Ellie says, shaking her head.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say to the man, apologising for Ellie. ‘I’m fine, really. I know how to fall,’ I improvise, ‘I do martial arts.’
‘Like Jean Claude Van Damme?’ he asks.
So they know who
he
is now. ‘Yeah, something like him.’
‘I love his movies, I do.’ The man, who’s wearing a Lonsdale sweatshirt and a very tight pair of black and white stonewashed jeans, tries to do a karate kick up in the air, but fails miserably when his jeans prevent him from raising his leg over knee height.
Mmm, maybe Ellie was right about the muppet bit…
‘Anyway…’ I say, making a move to stand up. Ellie grabs my arm, and I assume she’s trying to help me, but then she lets go and grabs a Woolworths carrier bag that’s been lying next to me on the zebra crossing. She immediately whips it open and looks inside.
‘Phew,’ she says, looking relieved. ‘You didn’t squash them.’
‘Squash what?’ I ask, brushing some dirt from my hooded sweatshirt. As I look down at it I notice a bright yellow double TT insignia printed on the front.
‘The limited edition posters we got with the CDs this morning, dummy! Look,’ she says, pulling two rolled-up tubes of paper from the bag, then to my horror she actually kisses one. ‘They’re still pristine!’
It’s my turn to grab Ellie’s arm now. ‘Thanks for your concern, everyone,’ I announce to the few people who have gathered on the zebra crossing. ‘But I’m fine, really. Please continue with whatever you were doing.’ Then I drag Ellie on to the pavement.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ I ask. ‘Kissing a roll of paper? Have you flipped?’
She looks at me with a puzzled expression. ‘Are you having me on? We’ve been waiting
weeks
to get these posters; the last thing we wanted was for you to flatten them. Much as I’d like to see Robbie doubled, a crease down the centre of his face splitting him in two would not look good on my wall.’
I watch her put them carefully back in the Woolworths carrier bag. Ellie doesn’t look much like a teenage girl to me, the type I’d expect to be screaming at concerts and kissing posters of pop stars on her bedroom wall. She looks older than that, maybe in her late twenties, early thirties? She still has the same long blonde hair she’s always had, but this time it’s not curly, it’s just really… big. It’s like she’s gone a bit mad with the mousse, and blow-dried her hair upside down until it’s as full as she can possibly make it.
I glance at myself in the reflection of the nearest shop window.
I’m hardly what you’d call a teenybopper, either. I’m a similar age to Ellie, maybe a year or two older, and in addition to my Take That hoody, I’m wearing plain black trousers and sensible flat black court shoes. I pull open my hoody at the neck and take a peek inside, nearly blinding myself at the neon that glares back up at me from a pink, blue and yellow checked black shirt.
‘What are you doing?’ Ellie asks. ‘Have you got something stuck down there after your fall?’
‘Only a bad taste in fashion,’ I moan.
‘Bloody hell, is that the time,’ Ellie says as she glances at her watch. ‘We need to get back to school, afternoon lessons will be starting in a minute and we’re gonna be late.’
I’m torn by my ever-present urge to speak to George as soon as I arrive in a new decade, and by my loathing of being late for whatever it is I’m supposed to be doing right now. I take a quick look to make sure Groovy Records is still further along the street, and then at Ellie already speeding up the King’s Road.
I choose to follow Ellie.
She’s usually the link that helps me discover just what type of life I’m living in each new year I find myself in. Without her I haven’t a clue. I’ll just have to pop back later and catch up with George after I’ve discovered what I’m in for this time.
As we run together along the road and then duck down a couple of side streets – a short cut, Ellie insists – I wonder if I’ve got this all wrong. Maybe we’re younger than we look? Maybe it was the fashion of the nineties to dress older? I’ve quickly worked out that’s where I must be this time – from the fashion and Ellie’s obsession with Take That. Plus it would make sense; each time when I jumped through time so far I’ve moved on a decade, so it ought to be. But what doesn’t make sense is this age thing; if we’re on our way back to school, carrying Take That posters and wearing Take That merchandise, we must be teenagers, surely? But then why aren’t we wearing school uniform? Perhaps we’re sixth formers – yes, that must be it.
‘Afternoon, Miss Williams,’ a caretaker wearing a brown overall says as we dash through the school gate. ‘Cutting it a bit fine, aren’t you? The bell went five minutes ago.’
‘Thank you, John,’ Ellie calls, pulling her sweatshirt over her head as we dash across the playground, ‘we’re quite aware of that!’
‘Proverb 19:2,’ John calls as we dash past him. ‘“It is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the way”.’ He gives me a meaningful look as I pass. ‘It’s good to see you again, Miss McKenzie.’
‘Yes,’ I smile. ‘It’s good to be back. I think.’
‘Quick!’ Ellie hisses as she holds open a door. ‘Let’s get away before he quotes the whole Bible to us. Plus we need to get to the staffroom and get changed as fast as we can – I’m supposed to be in a bloody Year 2 assembly now.’
‘We’re teachers?’ I gasp as I follow her down a hall with a notice that clearly states ‘No running’ even though we are.
‘I know,’ she giggles. ‘Doesn’t set a very good example, does it?’ She holds open another door and I find myself inside a teachers’ staffroom. It’s clear that’s what it is by the copious amount of empty mugs and open packets of biscuits that are scattered in amongst the armchairs and copies of the
Guardian
and
Cosmopolitan
magazine. ‘What a start to the second day of a new school year!’
Ellie runs over to some lockers, twists hers open, and pulls out a bright green and pink tracksuit top to match the jogging bottoms she’s already wearing. Then, while I watch, she pulls it on, zips it up and slings a whistle round her neck. ‘You’re lucky,’ she says, ‘at least you only have to change your sweater. Why did I ever agree to teach PE this term?’
You’re wearing a shell suit, Ellie!
I think as I pull my hoody over my head and hang it in the locker next to hers, which luckily for me has my name on the front.
You’re actually wearing a shell suit!
I try and keep a straight face while I smooth down my neon shirt, which I guess isn’t that much better, turn around, and follow her as we dash out of the staffroom again.
‘Catch you later,’ Ellie says as we pass a classroom door and she rushes ahead. ‘Lucky for you, your new lot don’t look like they’re causing too much aggro in there.’
I turn and look through the glass panel of the wooden door. Inside there’s a classroom filled with children of about seven or eight years old sitting at and on tables. I turn back to say something to Ellie, but she’s gone hurtling off in the direction of the assembly hall.
‘Right then,’ I say quietly to myself. ‘How scary can a class of kids be?’
I take a deep breath and push open the door. And wish I had Ellie’s whistle to try and restore some calm, as the wave of noise that hits me upon entering the room almost bowls me over.
‘Hey!’ I call into the sea of voices. ‘Hey, can you all be quiet for a moment?’
It’s like throwing a pebble out into the Atlantic.
So I try again. ‘Quiet, you guys,
please
!’
Nothing.
I walk to the front of the classroom, picking up a metal waste paper bin as I do. Then I empty out the contents on top of my desk, turn it upside down, and bang hard on top of it, like a drum.
If David Beckham had walked into the room, he wouldn’t have got a more stunned reaction than the one on the faces in front of me now. I think for a moment: is David Beckham famous yet? I’m guessing he might just have been playing for Manchester United, so he might have had less impact. I smile at the thought of a non-famous Becks.
‘What’s so funny, miss?’ a small girl with blonde pigtails asks.
‘Nothing. I’m just pleased I’ve got your attention, that’s all. Now,’ I say, walking round to the front of the desk. ‘When I call for quiet in here again, I shall expect quiet, understood?’
There are murmurings of agreement from a few of the children.
‘I said,
is that understood
?’
‘Yes, miss!’ The majority now speak up.
‘Now, I’d like a volunteer to come and clear the rubbish from my desk.’ I look sternly across the room as everyone tries not to catch my eye.
A young boy with brown curly hair pushes back his chair. ‘I’ll do it,’ he says, standing up.
‘Thank you,’ I say, and as he passes me I see his name is scribbled on a sticker on his sweatshirt. ‘That’s good of you to volunteer, Paul.’
‘Now,’ I announce, as Paul begins sweeping screwed up bits of paper and pencil shavings back into the metal bin, ‘who can tell me what we were doing in the last lesson?’
I’m quite surprising myself at how easily I’m slipping into this new teacher role. As I look around the classroom now, the children actually seem to be listening to me.
‘Them awful things with lines in the middle,’ a little girl on the back table speaks up. I squint to see her name tag – thank goodness it’s the beginning of term and they’re wearing them, otherwise I’d have no chance.
‘Can you be more specific, Beatrice?’ I ask.
‘The ones with numbers on the top and the bottom.’
‘Do you mean fractions?’
‘Yeah, them things.’
Wow, I’m teaching them maths – my specialist subject. This is great!
‘Except you was talking about percentages as well,’ another boy – Lee – now helps out. ‘And then you said we’d talk about probably this time.’
‘I said we’d talk about
probably
?’
‘Yeah. That’s right.’
My desk has now been cleared and Paul goes back to his seat. ‘You said
probability
, not probably!’ he mutters as he passes.
‘Probability! That makes more sense! ’ I ease myself on to the edge of my desk. ‘Now, who can tell me something about probability?’
They all gaze back blankly at me.
‘Let me think of an example then.’ I rack my brain for something I think they’ll understand. ‘Imagine you have a shopping bag and in it there are three bananas and nothing else. The probability of reaching into the bag and pulling out a banana is one; that’s certain because there is nothing else in the bag. But the probability of reaching into the bag and pulling out an apple is zero; it’s impossible, because there are no apples in there. Does that help?’
They still stare up at me blankly.
This teaching lark might be harder than I first thought
.
‘Does anyone have a coin?’ I try.
They all shake their heads, so I feel around in the pocket of my trousers. I pull out a collection of coins, and in the middle of them is the four-leaf-clover brooch that Rocky gave me. So
you’ve
come with me this time, have you? I think, strangely unfazed this time, as I pop it safely back in my pocket, just like the
Beano
and the football boots before it.
‘Now,’ I say, turning my attention back to the class, ‘can anyone toss a coin?’
Three hands are raised. ‘Jason, would you like to come up and toss a coin for us, please?’
Jason comes up to the front of the classroom and spins a ten-pence piece high in the air, then catches it deftly on the back of his hand.
‘Heads or tails, miss?’ he asks.
‘I’ll go heads,’ I choose. ‘But just wait a minute before you take a look at the coin. Now, what are the chances of it being a head?’
A few hands are raised.
‘Mary?’
‘Half and half, miss.’
‘Yes, but what’s half and half expressed as a fraction?’
‘A half, miss,’ she answers without thinking.
‘Good, now what’s a half expressed as a percentage?’
Mary thinks about this one. ‘Fifty per cent?’
‘Yes, that’s right. So if the chances of me getting a head are half or 50 per cent, what is the probability?’
Mary pulls a face.
‘Yes, Stella?’ I respond to the raised hand.