‘Hello.’ The Doctor put a friendly arm around the guard’s shoulders. ‘You’re probably wondering where those six new statues have come from.’
The guard nodded dumbly.
‘Well, I shouldn’t worry about them if I were you, they won’t be here in the morning,’ said the Doctor. ‘But until we’re all safely out of the building, let’s not let them out of our sight, eh?’
Mark coughed to get the Doctor’s attention.
‘Oh,’ said the Doctor, remembering. ‘But first you might
like to pop down to the Tabularium. I think there might be two people locked in down there…’
12 August 1998
Mark lay in bed, woken by the morning sunshine. He pulled on his glasses and the rest of the room fell into focus. The pillow from the centre of the bed lay on the floor where he’d thrown it the night before.
Rebecca perched on the balcony in a summer dress, gazing out into the street whilst thumbing through her copy of The Beach.
‘Rebecca?’ said Mark.
‘Oh, you’re awake now, are you?’ she said, putting down her book. The morning sun shone in her hair like a halo and gave her skin a golden glow.
‘About last night.’
‘Yeah?’
Mark swallowed. ‘Just checking. It wasn’t another mistake, was it? Another “one-off”?’
Rebecca raised an eyebrow. ‘Is that what you want it to be?’
‘No, no, I don’t,’ said Mark hurriedly.
‘Me neither,’ said Rebecca. ‘In fact, I hope it’s going to turn out to be the complete opposite.’
Mark climbed out of bed, his feet slapping on the tiled floor. He wanted to rush over and kiss Rebecca, but looking at her sitting in the window, he changed his mind.
‘Wait there.’
‘What?’
Mark picked up his camera and focused on Rebecca.
‘Hold on, don’t move, I just want to capture this moment.’
As she turned to gaze out into the street with her impossibly blue eyes, he pressed the button and the camera shutter clicked.
Chapter
10
29 October 1999
Now 42 years old, Mark paused outside the office block and gazed up at the familiar concrete facade. This was where he’d worked for over ten years, starting out as a junior assistant, gradually taking on more and more responsibilities until eventually they’d made him a partner.
Or rather, this was where his younger self would be working for the next ten years.
The reception area was just as he remembered; OK, so the walls were a different colour, and the sign above the desk read ‘Pollard & Boyce’, but Ron sat at the desk leafing through a copy of the Daily Mirror as usual. The only difference was that he now had a full head of hair.
Mark approached the desk. ‘Harold Jones to see Mr Pollard, five o’clock.’
Ron nodded and informed the relevant office on the phone. ‘They’re sending someone down.’
A minute later, the internal door opened and Siobhan
emerged.
‘Mr Jones, nice to meet you at last,’ she said, shaking his hand.
Mark couldn’t help but smile. Siobhan was still in her early thirties, bright-eyed and fresh-faced.
Siobhan took him up the stairs to Pollard’s office. Mark caught a glimpse of his reflection in the glass door. He’d taken great care not to look like his younger self. He’d grown a beard, dyed his remaining hair black and, as a finishing touch, wore a pair of tinted sunglasses.
Although he’d spoken to Frank Pollard on the phone numerous times, this would be the first time they’d met in person. Over the last year Mark had divided his time between New York and Edinburgh but now he’d decided to move to London, and had purchased a flat in Highgate.
He wanted to be nearer to his younger self. Oh, he wouldn’t try to speak to him or anything like that but it wouldn’t hurt to keep an eye on his progress, from afar.
And, more than anything else, Mark longed to see Rebecca again.
‘Mr Pollard is ready for you.’
Mark discovered Frank Pollard at his desk, beaming with pride. Even he looked younger than Mark remembered, his cheeks plump and ruddy with health.
Harold, Harold,’ said Frank. ‘Overjoyed to finally make your acquaintance, in the flesh, as it were.’
You too,’ said Mark, taking a seat I would’ve visited earlier, but my business keeps me out of the country.’
‘Understand entirely,’ Frank helped himself to a boiled sweet. ‘Why visit Croydon when you could be basking in
the manifold delights of “the big apple”, so to speak? Can I get Siobhan to make you anything? Coffee? Tea?’
‘No, I’m fine thanks. You’re probably wondering why I’ve come to see you.’
‘I must confess to being a little intrigued. Your last “electronic mail” was most mysterious.’
‘I’m here to ask a favour.’
‘A favour?’ Frank leaned forward onto his desk. ‘And what variety of favour might that be?’
‘I believe you’ve recently advertised a vacancy, for a junior assistant.’
‘We have.’
‘But you haven’t filled the position yet?’
‘We have not, as yet. We have whittled the candidates down to a shortlist, as it were.’
‘I was wondering if I might make a suggestion. A recommendation. You see, I’m, er, acquainted with one of the applicants, and would be extremely grateful if you’d consider giving them the position.’
‘Hmm. That is quite a favour to ask.’
‘I realise that.’
‘May I ask the name of this person with whom you are, shall we say, acquainted?’
‘Mark Whitaker.’
Frank opened a file on his desk and skimmed through the papers. ‘Mark Whitaker. Mark… Whitaker. Ah, here he is. We interviewed him earlier this week. A personable enough young man, if a little lacking in confidence, but not really in the same league as the other candidates.’
‘But I think if you were to give him a chance, he’d
prove himself more than capable.’
‘Hmm,’ said Frank, inspecting the application. ‘I suppose he may have potential.’
‘Look, I’m not asking you to take on someone who can’t do the job. I’m just asking you to take him on for a trial period. If it doesn’t work out, then you’re free to get rid of him. And I’m not suggesting you do him any special favours. Treat him exactly as you would any other member of staff. And in return 111 continue to put as much business your way as I can.’
‘This is most unorthodox. But bearing in mind how highly we regard you here at Pollard & Boyce, it would be injudicious, if not unprofessional, of us to overlook such a… glowing character reference.’
‘So you’ll give him the job?’
‘Yes. For a trial period.’ Frank made a note on Mark’s application with a dramatic flourish.
‘There’s one other thing.’
‘Yes?’
‘My involvement in this has to remain confidential. As far as Mark Whitaker is concerned, he got this job entirely on merit.’
‘I see.’
‘You mustn’t mention my name to him. It’s vitally important he never finds out about this.’
‘Discretion is, of course, assured,’ said Frank. This lad, is he a relative of yours?’
‘Something like that. Let’s just say I have great expectations for him.’
‘With you cast in the role of Magwitch?’ chuckled
Frank. ‘Was there anything else?
‘No. That’s everything.’ Mark made his farewells and left, having ticked one more item off the list.
31 October 1999
‘No milk I’m afraid,’ said Mark, handing Rebecca a mug of tea. She was too tired to care. Her back ached, her fingers ached, her feet ached. But at least it was all over.
Well, the actual moving part of the move was over. In terms of furniture, all their new front
room had to offer was a battered leathered sofa, an Ikea chair and Mark’s portable television. Cardboard boxes filled the floor, piled four high, leaving only a narrow route from the sofa to the door. They’d all have to be unpacked, but that could wait.
For now, Rebecca just wanted it to be over.
Oh, it was exciting. Not just moving to London’s glamorous Camberwell, but moving in with Mark. It made things official in some way. For the last year they’d basically been living together anyway, but then she’d got the job at Imperial College, so since September she’d been sleeping on a futon at Lucy and Emma’s, with Mark coming down at the weekends to go flat-hunting.
And now here they finally were. Drinking black tea in their own flat. Rebecca leaned back in her chair as she watched Mark fiddle with the aerial. It was the last episode in the second series of Cold Feet, and it was vitally important they didn’t miss it.
Mark’s mobile phone bleeped. ‘Hello, yes? … Yes, that’s right.’ He winced apologetically to Rebecca. ‘No, it’s fine,
I wasn’t in the middle of anything. Um…’ He fell silent as the person on the other end of the line spoke for several minutes. ‘Thanks. Thanks for letting me know… Yes, and you too. Goodbye.’ He switched off the phone and looked at Rebecca.
‘What was that?’
‘I got it,’ Mark replied at last. ‘I got the junior assistant job, with Pollard & Boyce.’
‘You got it?’
‘I’m on a trial period for the first three months, but…
yes.’ Mark sounded like he could hardly believe his good fortune. ‘I start on the eighth.’
Despite all her aches, Rebecca hauled herself off the sofa and hugged him. ‘I knew it, I knew they’d take you on. What did I tell you? Oh ye of little faith. Well now we have a second reason to celebrate!’ Rebecca headed into the kitchen and opened the fridge. It was empty apart from the bottle of champagne she’d placed there earlier. She couldn’t find any glasses so she rinsed out a couple of chipped mugs before returning to the living room.
‘Champagne in mugs, I’m afraid. Truly we live the life of decadence.’
‘Start as you mean to go on,’ observed Mark drily.
Rebecca peeled off her jumper, wrapped it around the bottleneck and popped the cork. Then she chugged the wine into the mugs and passed one to Mark. ‘There you go,’ she said, lifting her mug. To our new flat and your new career as a top-flight city lawyer.’
Hardly that’ said Mark. ‘God. Our new flat! Moving in together.’
‘Yeah. Serious stuff.’ Rebecca sipped the champagne, feeling the tickle of the bubbles on her tongue. ‘All grown-up and everything.’
‘Well be getting married next,’ said Mark light-heartedly.
Rebecca snorted with laughter. ‘What?’
‘Well, it is, isn’t it? The next logical step.’
‘Is this you proposing to me?’
‘No,’ said Mark. He took a small box out of his jacket pocket and knelt before Rebecca on one knee. He opened the box to reveal a glinting diamond ring. ‘This is me proposing to you.’
A section of the TARDIS console exploded in a shower of sparks. The floor jolted and shuddered, threatening to throw Amy to the ground. ‘Doctor!’ she yelled, holding on for dear life. ‘What’s happening?’
They’d only left Rome ten minutes earlier, and had barely taken off before the TARDIS had started making a warping, grinding noise and everything in the control room that wasn’t fixed in place fell over.
‘More wibbliness in the space-time continuum, right?’
suggested Rory, picking himself up.
The Doctor danced around the console, flicking switches, his forehead furrowed in concentration. ‘More wibbliness. Yes. The fourth of November. The year 2000.’
‘Another one of the items on Mark’s list?’ suggested Amy.
‘There wasn’t an item on his list for November 2000.’
‘But that means…’ said Rory.
‘It means our friend isn’t behaving himself.’ The Doctor banged the console and whooped as it began to make the familiar materialisation sound. ‘Trouble, here we come!’
Chapter
11
4 November 1999
Pressing her lips together to remove any excess lipstick, Rebecca studied her reflection in the mirror one last time, looking for flaws. She couldn’t find any. Amanda, the beautician, stood behind her, smiling proudly. ‘Oh, you look perfect.’
Rebecca checked her hair, which had been painstakingly curled into ringlets and pinned, then, as though balancing a book on her head, she stood up. She desperately wanted to take a deep breath, but the corset of her wedding dress wouldn’t allow it. Everything had been squeezed and tightened for maximum effect.
She turned to look at Lucy and Emma in their identical, peach-coloured bridesmaid outfits. She’d rather enjoyed the idea of forcing Lucy into something feminine for once.
There was a knock at the door. ‘Respectable?’ called Rebecca’s father.
‘No, but come in anyway,’ replied Rebecca. Her father walked in with an embarrassed smile, resplendent in his
morning suit, and paused as he took in his daughter’s transformation.
‘My little girl,’ he said. For a moment she thought he was going to say how proud he was of her, but in the way he was looking at her, there was no need. ‘Feeling nervous?’
‘No. I’ll be glad when it’s all over, though, if only because then people will stop asking me that. Because if there’s one thing guaranteed to make you nervous, it’s people asking you if you’re nervous all the time.’
‘I won’t pay any attention to that,’ said her father. ‘That’s just the nerves talking. The, um, cars are outside, if you’re ready?’
‘Here goes, then,’ said Rebecca. Once again she wished she could take a deep breath. She turned to go, then halted in the doorway. ‘Bouquet!’ She grabbed the bunch of lilies from the dressing table.’ Would’ve been a complete disaster if I’d forgotten that.’
A harsh wind blew across the graveyard, whirling up the leaves as it went. Fearing it would damage his meticulously tousled hair, Mark retreated into the church porch.
Mark’s task, along with his best man Gareth, had been to greet the wedding guests as they made their way up the path to the church. It had been very disconcerting to see his colleagues from work, his friends from university and his mates from the pub quiz all in their finest suits and dresses. It felt like he was starring in a romantic comedy.
‘Wassup?’ said Gareth, slapping Mark on the back. ‘Still
not too late to do a runner.’
‘Very funny,’ said Mark, wishing, not for the first time, that he’d chosen a different best man.
Gareth checked his watch. ‘Twenty minutes. Time you were heading inside, just in case they get here early.’
‘Yeah,’ said Mark, rubbing the fingers of his right hand.
They were beginning to tingle.
‘Well?’
‘He’s here, Amy,’ said the Doctor, absorbed in his wibble-detector. ‘ Somewhere. Somewhere close and getting closer all the time.’
Amy brushed her hair out of her eyes. The TARDIS
had brought them to Chichester, a well-preserved city with enough Georgian buildings, Roman walls and leafy parks to look picturesque; every other shop seemed to sell antiques or cream teas. Despite the gusty weather, the pavements bustled with shoppers, mostly families and slow-moving pensioners. It reminded Amy of Leadworth, but with more traffic.
The Doctor halted, spun on his heel, then ran back the way they’d come, bounding towards the cathedral, bounding like a gazelle with rubber legs. ‘Quick!’
Amy and Rory exchanged glances and chased after him. The Doctor stopped again, shook the detector, then gawped at the approaching traffic. An SUV sped down the street towards them. It took Amy a few seconds to recognise the driver; it was Mark, his face half-hidden behind a beard and sunglasses.
‘Stop!’ yelled
the Doctor, striding into the road in the
path of the car, his hands raised. The SUV screeched to a halt. This was followed by a second screech, a loud crash and the tinkle of broken glass as another vehicle slammed into the back of the SUV.
Old Mark emerged from the car, slamming the door angrily behind him. ‘What the… what are you doing here?’
‘I could ask you the same question,’ said the Doctor. ‘In fact, I am asking you the same question. What are you doing here?’
‘Driving along quite happily until some maniac ran out in front of me.’
Amy studied Mark’s face. He looked like he was hiding something. ‘We’re here because the Doctor detected wibbliness. Are you trying to make contact with your younger self?’
‘No,’ protested Mark. ‘No, of course not.’
‘Interesting,’ said the Doctor. ‘Because the wibble-detector never lies. Unless it’s malfunctioning, which is always a possibility. But not in this case. I can feel the build-up of potential time energy. Makes all the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. And tastes of lemons.’
‘So where were you going?’ asked Rory.
Before Mark could explain, the driver of the car behind him walked up to them. He was an overweight, colonel-ish man dressed in a chauffeur’s regalia. Behind him Amy could see a limousine with shattered headlights and a crumpled bonnet.
‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at?’ yelled the driver.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Mark. ‘It wasn’t my fault, this-‘
The doors of the limousine opened and out stepped a man of 60 in a grey morning suit with neatly combed white hair, followed by the blonde girl Amy had seen in Rome, now impeccably made up and wearing a stylish bridal gown.
The bride marched towards them, huffing with the effort, holding her high-heeled shoes. ‘I don’t believe it. I don’t chuffing believe it!’
‘What? What’s the matter?’ the Doctor asked her, then his eyes widened. ‘Wait! Are you getting married?’
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