SMALL ETERNITIES

The Aldous Lexicon

Volume Two

June

Being slightly raised, the cemetery was less affected by the flooding than many other parcels of land thereabouts. All graves that were not further elevated were under water, but every stone and monument stood clear save for a few inches at the foot. Naia took some pictures, but when her lens turned to the wall that described the eastern boundary of Withern Rise, she put her camera away. Here, under this weathered old wall, was the grave she spent a lot of time trying not to think about. Much of the headstone was concealed by ivy, and tall weeds had grown around it since her last visit a couple of months ago. Ashamed of herself for neglecting it, she went over and pulled the ivy away; tore the weeds from the water, cast them aside with anger. How dare they grow here? But as she worked to clear the area, anger was displaced by a very different emotion, and when she straightened, her eyes, like the grave, were flooded. Then the tears were spurting, shoulders shaking, as she gave in, as she rarely did outside of her room, to the misery of her situation, the horrible injustice of it all.

For four interminable months she had struggled daily through the creaking aftermath of the fateful quirk that had dumped her in this false reality. False to her anyway. It was as real to everyone else here as her original reality had been to her. There, beyond reach or contact, her mother still lived. Here, she lay beneath this stone, this water, amid eager weeds. The cut-off had been as swift and as total as it had been unexpected, and there was no way to reverse things, no way back. The sheer awfulness of that was bad enough, but she was stung by guilt too. Guilt that, in the final days, she hadn’t shown her mother the kind of affection which, later on, in quiet moments, might initiate a fond smile. At times, the guilt hurt almost as much as the loss itself.

For Naia, these past months, there’d been much private weeping and a deal of public acting in the cause of thwarting suspicions that she might not be who people took her for. The greatest pity of her life here, bereavement aside, was that there was no one to talk to about such things. There were several ready-made friends, some of whom she’d not been remotely friendly with in the old reality. One or two considered themselves ‘close’, as their counterparts had actually been close. She went through the motions with these few, but always with a measure of reserve (occasionally remarked upon) because she knew, as they did not, that until February she hadn’t even existed for them.

It took a supreme effort to regain control of herself, but as she blinked the last of the tears away Naia sensed that she was no longer quite alone. Glancing around, she saw a figure in black, an old man, turn in the water-filled lane below the steps. She knew him. She’d spoken to him once, in this very place, when she had again been in tears. He’d given his name – Aldous, and her own surname – which she’d not quite believed until some time afterwards when she came to terms with the fact that her life had altered beyond recognition, and that anything was possible, anything at all, however previously unimaginable. 

THE UNDERWOOD SEE

The Aldous Lexicon

Volume Three

October

Sometimes there were whispers in the night, and no one there when she opened her eyes or looked round corners. She’d stopped believing in ghosts when she was ten, and at seventeen considered the very idea of them absurd; so, even with her very uncommon awareness of the way things were, she tried to shrug off such incidents as the products of an over-developed imagination.

But even she was spooked by the business of the tap.

She’d woken early, crawled out of bed after a lingering embrace with the duvet, and, shivering because the heating wasn’t yet on, padded barefoot to the window overlooking the river. Condensation blurred the view. She cut a swathe with the edge of her hand. So still out there. State of pause before the world came alive. She tugged her dressing gown on and after a visit to the bathroom, headed downstairs. A bundle of white fur was waiting for her on the half-way platform. ‘Can’t bear to be alone, can you?’ she said, stepping over it. The little creature followed her down, step for step, trying to keep pace. 

Next stop, the kitchen. And that was when it happened. She was about to fill the kettle when the tap turned itself on. Water spurted, spattering her. She jumped back. The tap continued to run for about seven seconds, then the handle turned again and the water stopped. She put the kettle down very smartly and left the room without looking back. The cat followed her.

Across the hall, in the Long Room, she drew the curtains back from the French doors and leant there, trying not to think about the self-turning tap. She already had a theory about it, but did her utmost to put it from her. She was trying to be normal, for God’s sake. Normal people didn’t have ideas like that.

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His childhood at Withern Rise so filled Aldous’s mind these days that he was sometimes hard pressed to separate past from present. He would be strolling around the garden, stop suddenly and close his eyes, smell flowers that were no longer there, hear the squeals of Mimi and Ray scampering nearby, or their laughter as they pushed one another on the swing that hung from the old apple tree. Then – as this morning – the creak of the wheelbarrow, iron wheels on gravel. Opening his eyes, he expected, for a happy second, to find everything as it used to be, as it should be, with him allowed to act like a kid again, run about, climb trees, be as silly and loud as he liked, Maman at an upstairs window, Father chatting to Mr. Knight, the future still waiting its turn.

But no. It was gone. All of it.

The wheelbarrow that crunched by on the path, though the same wheelbarrow, was pushed by today’s Mr. Knight who, uncharacteristically, merely grunted in passing. No Mimi and Ray, no swing, no apple tree, no more childhood.