Step Back in Time

by Ali McNamara

  Can’t Buy Me Love

  Twenty-One

  Slowly I open one eye. There’s the sky, that’s one thing that never changes, and as always it’s bright blue. As I open the other eye and watch the white clouds float slowly by for a few seconds, I realise that, as always, I feel warm too. And now the all-too-familiar stranger’s face bending over me, with the usual look of great concern in their eyes, appears in my line of vision. When they see me open my eyes the concern changes to relief.

  ‘She’s alive!’ this one calls. ‘Her eyes are open.’

  ‘Thank the Lord for that,’ another voice says.

  I look up at them both. They don’t look too weird this time. The man is wearing jeans, maybe a little on the tight side, though, and at the angle I’m viewing them, a tad short too. The young woman who stands next to him has on ankle-length suede pixie boots, and a short skirt full of ruffles.

  Hmm… I’ve seen a skirt like that somewhere before. But now is not the time to be thinking about fashion.

  ‘Yes, I’m fine,’ I say, sitting up.

  ‘Be careful, you hit that car pretty hard!’ the man says. ‘Like something from Dempsey and Makepeace you were, rolling off that bonnet. Bloody hit-and-run drivers.’

  ‘Never mind TV detectives. Has anyone called the real police?’ the girl asks. ‘I think there’s a phone box down the road.’

  So I can’t be back in 2013, or at least four people would have pulled iPhones from their pocket, dialled 999, then probably Tweeted photos of my accident by now!

  ‘I have a phone,’ a calm voice says from the back of the usual mob that’s assembled to see whether I live or die on the zebra crossing.

  Through the sea of legs I spy a pair of black leather shoes, so shiny the sun is virtually glinting off them as they walk towards me. My eyes follow the shoes up a charcoal-grey trouser leg, to a white shirt, a red tie, and a face that looks remarkably like Harry’s.

  ‘Harry! You’re here,’ I say with relief.

  Harry looks down at me in surprise.

  ‘I’m sorry, young lady, do I know you?’ he asks, lifting a huge monstrosity of a phone from his pocket. He pulls the aerial of the phone up and prepares to make his call. The phone looks more like one of those huge two-way radios you see cops in US TV shows using.

  ‘No, stop, I don’t need the police calling, or an ambulance or anything. I’m fine, really.’ I look up at Harry again. Does he not know me this time? Actually, I hardly recognise him either. He’s wearing a sharp charcoal-grey suit and his hair is slicked back with gel. He’s much older this time, too. I hazard a guess at thirty, maybe?

  ‘If you’re sure,’ he says, his dark brow furrowing. He puts his phone back in his jacket pocket, which is a ridiculous place to keep something so big, and holds his hand out. ‘Let me help you up, though.’

  I take his hand and look him in the eyes as I become level with him, but there’s still not a flicker of recognition, and I’m quite disappointed.

  Harry lets go of my hand immediately.

  ‘Here, I believe these are yours too,’ he says, passing me up a pair of football boots. Why have these come with me again, just like the Beano did last time? ‘So if you’re OK,’ Harry continues, as I still stare at the boots hanging in my hand, ‘I’ll be on my way.’ He pulls a black Filofax from his other jacket pocket and begins to walk towards the pavement.

  ‘We’re in the eighties!’ I suddenly exclaim.

  Harry stops and looks up at the sky. ‘It is pretty warm today, yes. I’m not sure it’s quite eighty degrees though.’ He gives me a terse nod, and turns away again to examine the pages of his Filofax.

  ‘Is George still in the record shop down the road?’ I call to him. The others are beginning to move away now, to continue with their own business, and I’m aware I’m holding up the traffic by standing in the middle of the zebra crossing. So I wave my hand up at the waiting cars by way of apology, and follow Harry to the pavement.

  ‘What?’ he snaps.

  ‘George. Do you know if he owns the record shop down the road – Groovy Records, it used to be called.’

  Harry thinks about this for a moment.

  ‘I used to spend a lot of time in that shop when I was younger,’ he says, sounding a little wistful. ‘But I have no idea if it’s still there now.’

  ‘I’m sure it will be – George’s been in that same shop for fifty years.’

  Harry’s eyes narrow a little as he studies me. ‘Are you sure you’re OK? That would make George about seventy at least and the last time I saw him he couldn’t have been more than forty-something.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say hastily, ‘I must have got a little confused there. Maybe it was the accident…’ And then I do something I never do. I feign weakness in front of a man to get what I want, and I rock a little from side to side.

  ‘Hey, careful!’ He holds out his hand to steady me. ‘Look, would you like me to walk you there? I think I remember roughly where it is.’

  ‘Would you?’ I continue, still in eyelash-fluttering mode. ‘That would be very kind.’

  ‘Of course,’ Harry says in a matter-of-fact way, as though rescuing damsels in distress is part of his everyday life. ‘What sort of gentleman would I be if I didn’t?’

  Together we walk slowly towards George’s shop.

  ‘So, you’re sure you’re all right after your accident?’ Harry asks after a few moments of silence. ‘No injuries whatsoever?’

  ‘Yes, perfectly all right. I don’t think the car can have hit me that hard.’

  ‘Do you think?’ Harry asks in a mocking voice.

  ‘You know what I mean. Maybe I just fainted or something when I saw it coming so close, and it didn’t actually touch me?’

  ‘It’s possible, I suppose,’ he says. But he doesn’t look very convinced. ‘I didn’t actually see the accident. I’d just come out of a shop when I saw all the commotion in the middle of the road, so I wandered over to see if I could be of assistance.’

  ‘Ah, I see. Thanks.’

  ‘Not a problem,’ Harry says, not looking at me.

  ‘So why did you stop going to George’s shop all those years ago?’ I ask, forgetting that Harry and I don’t know each other at all this time. The trouble is he seems so familiar to me now, and I feel so comfortable with him, even though he looks so different again. Twice before Harry was wearing a suit when we first met, but he does seem much more formal this time.

  ‘Is it any of your business?’ Harry replies abruptly.

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.’

  As we continue walking together in silence, Harry uneasily adjusts his red tie, and places it back down on his shirt in exactly the same place it was resting before.

  ‘I’m the one who should apologise,’ he says at last in a stiff voice. ‘I snapped at you, and for that I’m sorry.’

  ‘That’s OK, I’m just a bit too nosey for my own good sometimes.’

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ he agrees. ‘Here, is this the place?’

  I look up at the shop we’ve paused outside, and yes, it’s Groovy Records. It never seems to change that much: except for the window displays and the music on sale inside, the shop always looks as if it’s just jumped from one time zone to another. A bit like me I guess – the heart of us both remains the same whatever year we’re in, it’s just external influences that change the way we appear to others.

  Talking of which, I take a look at my reflection in the window. Oh my days, what do I look like? I’m wearing a turquoise green jumpsuit with huge shoulder pads, purple wool leg warmers, and, like the woman at the crossing, tiny ankle-length pixie boots. But where hers were black leather, mine are purple suede. And my hair – it’s just so big! It’s cut in a long bob to my shoulders, but it’s blow-dried to within an inch of its life to enable it to permanently flick back at the sides.

  ‘Bloody hell, I look like Krystle Carrington,’ I exclaim. I had a flatmate once who was obsessed with the TV show Dynasty, and watched all th
e re-runs on one of the cable channels constantly. Actually, he was obsessed with everything eighties and I was glad when he moved out to live with his boyfriend – Wham, Bananarama and Culture Club on repeat twenty-four hours a day was not good for my mental health.

  There’s a chuckle next to me.

  ‘Sorry,’ Harry says, trying not to smirk. ‘But I think I’d know if I was standing next to Linda Evans right now. And you,’ he says, looking down at my jumpsuit, ‘are definitely not her.’

  ‘Are you coming in?’ I ask tersely. I’m not warming to this version of Harry much. I’m trying to, really I am. It’s Harry, and I’ve got used to him being around me over the last couple of decades and I kind of like it now. But this version of him… he’s beginning to be quite irritating.

  Harry hesitates and looks up at the shop front. ‘I guess it couldn’t hurt.’

  I push open the door and, as always, the bell rings above my head.

  ‘George, are you there?’ I call.

  ‘Well, hello again, Jo-Jo,’ George says, appearing from the back of the shop. ‘I wondered when you’d be back. And you’ve brought a friend, this time.’

  George is wearing a loose-fitting pale grey suit, and a baby pink T-shirt. He has the sleeves of the jacket rolled up to his elbows so you can see the lining, and a pair of sunglasses protrudes casually from his top pocket. On his feet are strange white cotton slip-on shoes with hessian fabric soles. Are those what they call espadrilles? I wonder, trying not to laugh at this Miami Vice-inspired vision that stands before me.

  I know all about the American TV programme Miami Vice from my flatmate’s obsession. He used to wear something similar to what George is in now when he went to his eighties theme nights. He thought he looked just like Don Johnson, one of the lead actors in that show, which I guess he did a bit, until he got his moped and put on his bright pink crash helmet, then the effect was somewhat lost.

  ‘Good afternoon, George,’ Harry says uneasily from behind me. ‘It’s – it’s good to see you again.’

  ‘Well, well, if it isn’t Harry Rigby,’ George says, without a hint of awkwardness. ‘I didn’t think I’d see you in here again. How have you been?’

  ‘I’m well thank you, George, and yourself?’

  ‘Never better. So what brings you back?’

  Harry looks at me. ‘Just giving this lady directions. She wasn’t sure where your shop was. Perhaps you should make her one of your infamous cups of tea though, she had a bit of a shock earlier.’

  ‘I’ll do just that. Will you stay for one too?’ George asks hopefully.

  ‘I won’t, no. But thank you,’ Harry adds when George looks disappointed. ‘Perhaps another time – I have some urgent appointments to get to.’ He goes to leave the shop but pauses for a moment and picks up a record. ‘Sergeant Pepper?’ he asks, looking back at George. ‘An original?’

  ‘Hardly! Do you know how much one of those things is worth these days?’

  ‘Always worth a shot.’ Harry smiles briefly at George.

  ‘Indeed,’ George agrees.

  Harry turns to me. ‘Goodbye, it was nice meeting you.’

  ‘Yes, likewise, I hope we meet again.’

  Harry looks surprised at this. ‘Perhaps we shall. You never know.’ He inclines his head towards George. ‘It was good to see you again.’

  George nods and watches as Harry leaves the shop, closing the door behind him.

  ‘I’m back again!’ I announce, without formalities this time. ‘Why am I, George? And why doesn’t Harry know me this time? It’s weird.’

  ‘Tea,’ George simply says. ‘We need tea.’

  Twenty-Two

  I sip from George’s Choose Life mug and listen to the clock behind the counter tick steadily on.

  ‘So, what’s the story this time, George?’ I ask as we sit on the wooden chairs once more.

  George shrugs. ‘Your guess is as good as mine, Jo-Jo.’

  I roll my eyes. Great.

  ‘It can’t be like the other times; Harry doesn’t know who I am. I don’t know who I am, even, where I live, or what I do.’ I’m panic-stricken for a moment. This is what it must feel like to wake up from a coma and have lost your memory. Except at least you normally wake up in the same decade. And if you’ve been unconscious so long it’s not the same decade when you awake, at least time has moved forward, not back.

  ‘Just relax, Jo-Jo,’ George says calmly.

  ‘I know we’re in the eighties, George. But I think I preferred it when you quoted the Beatles, not Frankie Goes to Hollywood.’

  George smiles at my attempt at a joke. ‘What do you have there?’ he asks, noticing the football boots lying on the floor beside me.

  ‘Those! Ah yes, I forgot to tell you last time so much else was going on, but I travelled from the sixties to the seventies with a Beano comic too.’ I open up the huge clutch bag that I was passed after the accident and, as I suspected, there’s the Beano tucked away inside. ‘Why would I bring it with me again, and why the boots too, this time?’

  George examines the comic, and then the football boots. ‘Who gave them to you?’ he asks.

  ‘You did! The boots, anyway. The comic I picked up off the crossing just before I got hit in 1963.’

  ‘When did I give you the boots?’

  ‘Just before you left for the Silver Jubilee street party in your car.’

  ‘And what happened after?’

  ‘Harry and I had to walk back because you only had a two-seater sports car – look, don’t you remember any of this?’

  George shakes his head. ‘It’s hazy.’

  ‘I don’t remember anything else because then I got hit by the white car and bam! woke up here in – what year are we in, by the way? I’m guessing it’s the eighties because of the horrendous fashions and the big phones.’

  ‘1985,’ George says, still thinking. ‘So you always get given these items just before you get hit by the car?’

  ‘Yes, it would appear so.’ But I’m thinking now too. ‘1985, you say? That means there’s a little me running around the place somewhere. I was born in 1983.’

  ‘Maybe, on another page,’ George reminds me.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The missing page we talked about last time? All these new lives you keep finding yourself in, they’re like pages from different stories, but they’re being bound together right now into one new book. Some of the characters are the same – they just don’t always fit in with the way we want the story to be.’

  I look at George for a few seconds, then I shake my head.

  ‘One,’ I point out, ‘last time you said it was a page of figures I’d lost from an accountancy book, and this time you’re saying it’s a novel. And two, how come you remember telling me that, but you don’t remember giving me the boots?’

  ‘Ah, my memory isn’t what it used to be,’ George says, rubbing at his forehead.

  ‘George,’ I growl, ‘you can’t keep doing this!’ I’m about to press him further when the shop door flies open, and in bursts a whirlwind of lace, net skirts, beads and bangles. Topping it all off is a big floppy black bow holding back a mass of blonde curls. And underneath it all is Ellie.

  ‘There you are, Jo-Jo,’ she pants. ‘You’ll never guess who I just saw walking up the road, only Neil bloody Tennant!’

  I stare at her blankly. For two reasons; one, I can’t place the name Neil Tennant. It seems familiar, but nothing is instantly springing to mind, and two, I’m trying desperately to think who Ellie reminds me of.

  ‘Madonna!’ I suddenly exclaim.

  ‘Where?’ Ellie says, darting to the window. She pulls a camera from her bag as she does so. ‘She’s not in the country, is she? Bloody hell, I thought the Neil Tennant spot was good.’

  ‘No, I mean you look like Madonna. Your outfit does.’

  Ellie turns away from the window. ‘Oh,’ she says, sounding disappointed. ‘I mean thanks ’n’ all. But getting a shot of Her Greatness would
have been terrific to go back into the office with tomorrow morning. Still, Neil Tennant’s not bad, although both the Pet Shop Boys together out on the King’s Road would have been better, but no one ever knows what the other fella looks like, do they?’

  Ah, that’s why I knew the name.

  ‘He’s often in here,’ George says, ‘that Neil Tennant. Nice fella; I think he has a flat along here somewhere.’

  But Ellie’s lost interest already. ‘So, do you have anything we can hand in?’ she demands, looking at me. ‘Any juicy gossip?’

  ‘Er…’

  ‘I thought not. We’ll have to dream something up if we don’t find a story before our deadline.’ She sighs impatiently. ‘What have you been doing all afternoon anyway?’

  ‘She got hit by a car,’ George says. ‘Give her a break.’

  ‘What!’ Ellie cries, rushing over. ‘Are you OK? What happened?’

  ‘It’s nothing. I don’t actually think it hit me anyway. It’s possible I just fainted in the road.’

  ‘How did you get here, then?’ Ellie asks.

  ‘A guy called Harry brought me. Didn’t he, George?’

  George nods.

  ‘Ah, OK,’ Ellie says, accepting this. ‘Wait! You don’t mean that bastard Harry Rigby, do you? I just bumped into him outside Peter Jones and he nearly bit my head off, and I don’t mean verbally.’

  ‘Yes, that was him,’ I say quietly. ‘Why, what’s wrong with Harry? He seemed OK to me.’

  ‘Jo-Jo McKenzie, have you lost your mind? You must have been hit by that car. Harry Rigby is the biggest pain in the ass since that curry house down the road had an epidemic of food poisoning!’

  ‘Nice analogy,’ I say, screwing up my face. ‘But why have you got a problem with Harry?’

  Ellie shakes her head. ‘George, tell her.’

  George opens his mouth to speak but Ellie continues. ‘Actually, no, I’ll tell you, otherwise George will only soft-soap it. He has a tendency to see the best in everyone, don’t you, George?’