The Light Between Us

by Katie Khan

  ‘You’re here,’ Thea says as Ayo walks with her into the house, looking around at the dusty building.

  ‘I am. Strictly in a babysitting capacity.’

  ‘You brought baby Bolu?’ Thea asks.

  ‘I meant you.’ She smiles. ‘Rosy thought you might need some company.’

  Thea is glad to see her, understanding partially why she didn’t take part at the Beecroft, but her mind whirring with ideas of how to utilize Ayo’s scientific skills now she’s here. ‘Where is your little one?’

  ‘With his father, Lord help them both.’ Ayo’s smile is withering. As a young Nigerian mother researching a PhD at Oxford, Ayo has made more sacrifices than any of them. Become a doctor, her family had urged – the scientific one in a nonscientific family. But that wasn’t enough for Ayo; with her DPhil in Particle Physics, she will probably redefine the way future hospitals use technology. Develop the next generation’s x-ray or MRI.

  ‘This is quite a place you’ve got here,’ Ayo says, looking round. ‘Did you say you spent the night in a barn?’

  ‘I like it!’ Rosy calls from the kitchen, where she’s divided the bouquet between pint glasses of water and is currently rustling up mugs and looking round for a kettle. ‘This house is very Miss Havisham.’

  ‘I tried to take most of these down,’ Thea says, pulling the white dustsheet from a huge scrubbed oak table, her nerves aflame, ‘but I got a little distracted. I’ve been working round the clock.’ She throws back some painkillers laced with caffeine, and gestures for the others to sit with her.

  ‘Where exactly are we?’ Urvisha asks.

  ‘Dunsop Bridge,’ Rosy answers unexpectedly, and Thea looks at her in surprise. ‘We used to go hiking near here with Daddy.’ Rosy puts a rusty coffee pot down on the table, and slowly pours out the black liquid.

  ‘And why are we here …?’ Urvisha asks, as Thea pulls a mug towards her and takes a sip, choking on the thick texture, which in turn develops into a coughing fit.

  ‘Because—’

  ‘It’s actually the middle point of the country,’ Rosy says. ‘We’re currently at the dead centre of Great Britain.’

  ‘Isn’t that a bit misleading?’ Urvisha says, also taking a mug. ‘We’re pretty far north. Makes “the Midlands” a misnomer.’

  ‘Maybe the Midlands are the middle of the land if you don’t include Scotland,’ says Rosy, reasonably.

  ‘Lop it off and let’s move this experiment to Birmingham.’

  ‘You know what they say,’ Thea steps in: ‘Don’t discuss money or politics if you want to stay friends.’

  ‘We’re colleagues,’ Urvisha replies, somewhat stoically, and Thea smiles at a typical Urvisha non-joke.

  They sit in companionable silence as Rosy reheats the espresso pot on the stove, though this time the others wisely avoid drinking from it.

  ‘How did you find me?’ Thea asks at last, her voice quiet.

  ‘We’re so sorry about what happened,’ Ayo says. ‘I can’t believe how the college reacted.’

  ‘Isaac told us where you were,’ Rosy says gently, and Thea is surprised.

  ‘Isaac?’

  ‘You know,’ Urvisha says, scratching at the coffee pot’s rust, ‘Rosy’s ex-boyfriend.’

  Rosy looks uncomfortable. ‘He was worried, Thea – he thought you could do with some company.’

  There’s a second of silence as Thea recalibrates her opinion about her friendship with Isaac being five times stronger than Isaac and Rosy’s dalliance six years ago at university, but she avoids saying it out loud. ‘It’s good to see you all.’

  At least two of the group visibly breathe with relief. ‘We thought you’d be mad,’ Urvisha says. ‘Because you took all of the blame.’

  Thea cocks her head. The movement makes her muscles ache. ‘Of course I did. It was my fault.’

  ‘It wasn’t—’

  ‘It was. Anyway, what’s done is done,’ Thea says. ‘I’m sorry you got in trouble, too. How did it go?’

  ‘We’re fine. But we thought you’d be sad,’ Rosy says delicately, ‘because the experiment with the laser didn’t work. That’s why we’re here, for support.’

  ‘We know how you hate failure,’ Urvisha says, more bluntly.

  ‘I do. But we didn’t fail.’

  The other three look at her, and Urvisha leans forward. ‘What?’

  ‘The experiment didn’t work,’ Rosy repeats softly. ‘I was there, remember?’

  ‘Didn’t it? Were you?’ Thea puts down her mug and looks around at her friends. ‘Don’t you want to know what I’ve been doing since I left?’

  Thea pauses in the doorway, looking back at Ayo who is still standing in the kitchen. ‘Ayo?’ she says kindly. ‘Nothing bad will happen just from taking a look.’

  Ayo’s face is uncertain. ‘Just a look? That’s all?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then I’ll come with you.’

  They wait while Ayo shrugs into a large waxed jacket, arranging it about her shoulders like she’s on a country-themed photoshoot.

  ‘Come on, princess,’ Urvisha calls, and Rosy smiles, for once not the focus of her teasing.

  ‘More like a queen,’ Ayo says haughtily as they tramp out of the farmhouse and across the courtyard, past an overgrown kitchen garden with vegetables so gone to seed it looks like an abandoned garden at the end of the world.

  ‘Gosh,’ Rosy mutters, as they step around stinging nettles and rogue cauliflower leaves. ‘It’s quite wild out here.’

  ‘Haven’t had much time to be green-fingered,’ Thea sniffs, her nose streaming in the cold air.

  ‘I know a terrific gardener, if you …’ Rosy trails off as they walk across three large, spaced paving stones – one, two, three – past the dovecote, then round the corner to the outbuildings, where she takes in the scale of the barns. ‘Wow.’

  ‘This one.’ Thea leads the group to the newest barn at the back of the enclosure, two tall storeys of black painted wood, a stack of firewood piled by the double-height door.

  She creaks open the door, pulling it all the way out until it rests against the shingling of the barn wall, letting the October light pour into the outbuilding.

  Rosy walks in first, the most comfortable of the three in the great outdoors. Urvisha, a city girl through and through, keeps eyeing her loaned wellies with disdain. Ayo is shivering inside her waxed coat, balling her hands inside the sleeves of her wool jumper – the autumn chill bites harder up north.

  As they enter the barn, their eyes adjust slowly to the light. ‘Oh, my.’ Rosy turns round and round, looking at the barn’s setup. ‘You’ve built—’

  ‘Your own version of the Beecroft lab,’ Urvisha finishes.

  Around them, workbenches line the long walls of the barn, while in the middle sits the glass house, three photographic lamps, and a box.

  ‘It’s a bit rough and ready,’ Thea says, ‘and I’m still tweaking the laser.’ She points at the box, and Urvisha starts laughing.

  ‘You’re mad,’ she says, ‘completely mad.’

  ‘This is where you spent the night, Thea? No wonder you’re poorly.’ Rosy runs her hand along one of the makeshift workbenches.

  ‘Long-term I’ll need better facilities, but it should do for now. For the next iteration of the experiment.’

  The group look at each other.

  ‘That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?’ Thea asks seriously.

  ‘I’m here in a supportive capacity only,’ Ayo says, holding up her hands. ‘But Thea, I feel I must say … with such basic equipment …’ She shrugs. ‘Even using the most state-of-the-art laboratory in the country, the experiment triggered a campus-wide blackout.’

  ‘Which Thea predicted would happen.’

  Urvisha and Ayo snap their heads over to Rosy, who is leaning against a bench, holding the blue egg timer. ‘Didn’t you, Thea? Otherwise why would you have brought this hourglass with you to the Beecroft?’ Rosy says, waving it around so the s
and runs from one chamber to the next, then back again, as she shakes it. ‘I can only guess you wanted something analogue to keep time, in case the laser knocked the power out.’

  Influenza burns with fire in her veins but Thea still smiles, never failing to be impressed by her friends. That’s why she’s friends with them.

  ‘You knew it would happen!’ Urvisha is close to exploding as Ayo puts a hand on her arm.

  ‘I feared it could,’ Thea says. ‘It was a precaution, a small detail so we could be prepared for any eventuality.’

  ‘You knew the power would cut out.’ Urvisha is not one to hide her anger. ‘When are you going to trust us?’

  Thea has the chagrin to look down. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘So, what,’ Urvisha says, ‘we’re going to try, and fail, again? Here? In a ramshackle barn?’

  ‘Who said we’re going to fail?’ Thea asks.

  ‘We failed at the Beecroft, using a world-class laser.’ Urvisha is talking fast now. ‘What makes you think we’re going to fare any better in the middle of goddamn Lancashire using oven gloves and swimming goggles? It’s dangerous, Thea. We could get hurt.’

  ‘But we’re so close.’ Thea doesn’t elaborate as she walks across to her laptop, unfolding the screen and waiting for it to boot up. Urvisha makes to explode a few more times, her mouth running away with her, but Thea doesn’t rise to it. Very calmly, when the computer is ready, she opens a full-screen video and taps play.

  The group are silent.

  ‘What …?’ Rosy eventually asks, moving closer to the screen. ‘Can you run that again?’

  They watch the video again, then loop it back and watch it once more.

  ‘I’m sorry if I haven’t told you quite everything.’ Thea presses enter again, playing the video without sound over and over. ‘Yes, I feared the power might trip at the lab. I was prepared for that possible outcome, and I’m sorry I didn’t warn you so that you could be prepared, too.’

  All four stare intently at the screen, watching the outline of Rosy standing inside the prismatic glass house, before the picture is whited out with a blinding flash of light, followed by darkness.

  ‘Play it again,’ Urvisha says, her voice very, very low.

  Thea feels the wooziness kick in – the price of remaining highly functioning while suffering the fast onset of the flu. She taps the button once more, and the group lean forward, watching the short video. ‘So no, I don’t think the experiment was a failure. Because I watched the tape. And while we stayed in the lab, the recording contains a few clues about where Rosy went. Or should I say, where Rosy travelled.’

  The excitement in the barn isn’t palpable so much as at fever pitch. There’s the crackle of electricity, the kind produced by humans rather than the National Grid, and the high-pitched frequency of female voices under enthusiastic duress.

  ‘What happened to you?’ Ayo begs, and Rosy lifts her shoulders into a shrug.

  ‘I don’t know!’

  ‘Where did you go? What did it feel like?’

  Rosy holds up her hands, palms out. ‘I’m really not sure. I was standing in the glass house, then …’

  ‘That’s a good idea, actually.’ Thea takes out her notebook. ‘Run through it step by step.’

  ‘Okay.’ Rosy takes a breath. ‘I was in the glass house, and we ran all of the checks. First Visha, then me, and finally Thea. We were ready to go.’

  Thea nods, jotting it down.

  ‘The laser started, and the light was dazzling. I couldn’t see anything. The glass became warm; it got hot in there, almost too hot. Then …’ She scrunches her eyes, thinking hard. ‘I was outside the lab by the atrium.’

  ‘You were gone for five minutes,’ Thea says. ‘Then you were marched back in by Professor Schmidt and the security guards.’

  ‘Those horrors.’ Rosy shudders.

  ‘Here’s a question for you,’ Thea says casually, though she feels anything but casual. ‘When you were out in the atrium, were the lights on?’

  Rosy thinks. ‘Yes. The lights were on, I could see the whole hall – and the lights of the college outside.’

  Thea feels the fizz of triumph alongside the flash of fever.

  ‘That’s great,’ she says, finishing scrawling in her notebook, the margins filled with her interlocking diamond and prism doodles. ‘I think we’ve got everything we need, here.’

  The others look at her in shock. ‘What are you talking about?’ Urvisha demands. ‘Rosy’s just getting started.’

  ‘I think I know what Thea means,’ Ayo says slowly. ‘If I may …’ She reaches for the laptop, again pressing play on the video of Rosy’s disappearance. ‘You see, here –’ she pauses the tape at the white flash – ‘is where Rosy goes, but here –’ she nudges the cursor to the next second of the video, which is the moment the lab falls into black – ‘is where the power cut is triggered.’

  Thea nods. ‘But the lights came back on as Professor Schmidt and the security guards were telling us off, remember?’

  Rosy’s eyes are wide. ‘So if the lights were on when I arrived in the atrium …’

  ‘Then you arrived before the power cut.’ Urvisha smacks the worktop, making them all jump. ‘You arrived before you left.’

  ‘Precisely.’ Thea smiles. ‘You travelled back in time.’

  Six

  Thea tries to calm the group, to no avail. ‘Come on, guys, we can’t just plough ahead – we need to plan. Systematic methodology.’

  ‘Bullshit.’ Urvisha is blunt. ‘We need to do the experiment again, now. Now we know …’

  ‘We know we can do it.’ Thea nods. ‘But if we run it again, and actually succeed—’

  Rosy steps forward. ‘If we do succeed, Thea, then you could show it to the college. You could prove the theory – and they’d have to reinstate you.’

  ‘Oh.’ Urvisha looks as though the proverbial light bulb has gone off over her head, too. ‘They’d have to take you back, with a breakthrough like that.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Thea considers, ‘though you’re not thinking of the bigger picture. If we manage more than five minutes; if we make a breakthrough like that …’ She gulps, and after a beat during which they each consider the magnitude of what they’re talking about, they laugh. ‘It’s good you’re here, Rosy … it looks like we’re going to need a historian.’

  ‘Let’s do it again!’ Urvisha bounces up and down on the spot. ‘I want to do it again!’

  ‘I want to tweak the laser.’

  ‘And,’ Rosy says sternly, ‘you need to take a nap. You look completely washed out.’

  It’s true: flu has knocked Thea for six, and despite the buzz she gets out of working in a group – this group – she can feel the drag of tiredness on her mind, her thoughts not surfacing quite as quickly as they usually do.

  ‘Ayo, I know you’re only here to babysit,’ Thea says, ‘but perhaps you could take a look at the laser with me? I could really use your skills.’ When Ayo nods, Thea continues: ‘then we’ll aim for a late-night setup again. That way, if we do trigger any power outage, most people will be asleep so they won’t notice.’

  ‘Hmm,’ Urvisha says. ‘I might be able to help with that, actually.’ She scowls. ‘Now that I know a blackout might be on the cards, I can plan for it. There’s something I can run on my laptop.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Thea says. ‘We should probably keep things as much the same as last time. Rosy, are you happy to go in the hot seat once more?’

  ‘Yes,’ Rosy nods. ‘Though don’t remind me it can get a little warm in there.’

  ‘Don’t complain,’ Urvisha warns. ‘Or I’ll get angry.’

  ‘And you wouldn’t like her when she’s angry,’ Thea says. ‘We have a plan, then. We’ll work through the afternoon, rest until the evening, then bring about the onset of the apocalypse during the night.’

  The others stare at her.

  ‘That was just a little joke.’

  Their eyes meet, surprised. Bullet poi
nts and lists, yes; things organized neatly, yes; jokes … almost never.

  ‘That cold-flu bug must have gone to your head,’ Rosy murmurs.

  The phone rings on Thea’s nightstand, waking her from a nap at 9 p.m. She looks at the screen and sees that Isaac is calling. It buzzes a few times, but when she tries to answer, the line goes funny – so she cancels the call, and rings him back.

  ‘I guess you’re mad at me for telling Rosy where you are, and now we’re right back to not speaking.’ Isaac dives straight in, and Thea sits up in bed, groggy.

  ‘It’s fine—’

  ‘I knew you’d be like this. I knew you’d be angry. But I didn’t want you to be alone in that house, dealing with this—’

  ‘Isaac? I said it’s fine.’

  ‘You don’t have to deal with the fallout alone,’ he says.

  ‘I know. I’m not.’ She yawns. The paracetamol plus some sleep has worked wonders, and she enjoys the brief reprieve from the pressure inside her head. ‘They’re here – Rosy, Urvisha, even Ayo. They all came.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I can’t believe you’re not mad,’ he murmurs, more to himself than to Thea. ‘I’d planned everything I was going to say.’

  ‘I’m not mad. But I do have to go shortly – we’re going to try something. Tonight.’

  There’s a pause before Isaac speaks. ‘Not the experiment again?’

  ‘No,’ she says quickly, ‘something else. Something fun! A sleepover. With face packs and pyjamas.’ She crosses her fingers.

  ‘That’s good,’ he says, sounding relieved if a little confused. ‘You’d have to be a psychopath to try an experiment like that again.’

  ‘Isaac—’ A deafening echo comes on the line, followed by the sound of a loud tannoy. She waits for the triad of tones ending the announcement before she speaks. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘At the airport,’ he says. ‘I’m on my way back to the UK.’

  ‘Can’t be.’ She stands up, looking out of the window at the dark night sky. ‘You’re a week early.’

  He laughs. ‘Surprise! I changed my plans. I’m getting on a plane in about five minutes – I should be around from tomorrow, if you need me.’