“Tidy up this mess, Tom,” ordered Holly. Although she spoke in hushed tones, Holly willed Tom to hear her.
Tom made not the slightest sign that he had heard her speak, but still he answered her. “I can’t. I can’t even wipe away the dust, because I keep imagining your fingerprints there on every surface, on everything you might have touched, and I can’t bear to wipe them away just like you were wiped away out of my life.”
Holly gulped back her pain and was torn between running toward Tom and running away from him. Instead she did neither. She stood transfixed to the spot as he carried on talking to her ghost. “I should have been an actor. I’m so good at making people believe I’m OK. I’m back at work and as long as someone’s there to watch me put on my act, I’ve got the stiff-upper-lip thing down to a tee. But that’s not the real me, Holly. Only you could see through to the real me. Oh, Holly, God, how I love the sound of your name. You wouldn’t believe the lengths people go to just to avoid saying it. They must think I’ll turn into a blubbering wreck if they say your name. Me, blubbering? Now that’s a joke.”
Tom laughed but it sounded hollow. Holly had edged closer to him as he carried on talking, as he tried to reach out to her. She sat down gently beside him and put her hand on his shoulder, moving her fingers to gently stroke the back of his neck. His neck felt rigid with tension and as she tried to soothe away the pain, Tom leaned fractionally toward her hand and his body relaxed.
He closed his eyes. “I still won’t cry,” he told her, gulping back his words, and then a faint smile trembled on his lips. “You know how that feels, don’t you, Hol?” The smile was fleeting and the despair quickly returned to his features. “I won’t let go. I can’t let go.” He leaned forward, almost as if he was trying to curl himself up into a ball. His head rested against the glass in his hand and he rolled it across his forehead as if trying to soothe his thoughts. “No,” he whispered through clenched teeth. “No!” he repeated, his words coming out as angry sobs. “I won’t cry.”
Holly wrapped her arms around Tom tighter and tighter, holding on to him, willing him to feel her next to him. His whole body shuddered and the first tears fell, softly, silently marking the breach in the dam that he had built against his grief. Then the heaving torrent of tears came, tears that even Tom couldn’t hold back.
His body was wracked with pain and the untouched drink in his hand slopped around him, spilling onto the floor. “I can’t even drink myself into oblivion!” he cried, discarding the glass on the floor next to the bottle.
“You’re going to be all right, Tom,” Holly told him, but she too felt a huge wrenching in her chest. She could feel the pressure of a lifetime of tears building inside her and each of Tom’s sobs felt like a hammer-blow against her own emotional walls. “Let out the pain; don’t hold on to it. Let it go,” she said, giving Tom advice that she had refused to take herself.
“I love you, Holly,” Tom stammered. “I never told you enough how much I love you. I wish I could go back and tell you how much I love you just one more time, just once. I still love you, Holly. I always will.”
As the sobs slowly subsided, Tom’s grief spent for now, there was the sound of a ticking clock echoing across the room. Tom rocked gently back and forth and Holly continued to cling onto him as if he were the baby that she hadn’t been able to hold. Her chest felt heavy and her body felt drained. Then Tom’s body froze as another sound cut through the air. Libby was crying. She had been woken up by her father’s sobs.
Holly felt her heart tug at the sound of Libby’s cries, but the wrenching in her chest was also the moondial pulling her backward in time. Her precious baby’s cry echoed in her ears until all that was left was the soft whisper of a summer night’s breeze.
6
In the days that followed the full moon, Holly surprised herself at how well she managed to function. She was so completely overwhelmed by the raft of emotions after her latest vision that she was numb with shock. She couldn’t begin to make sense of her implausible and impossible journey into the future, so she didn’t even try. Phone calls with Tom were as sweet and carefree as they had ever been, and for once Holly felt no guilt. She was in utter denial and, if she was lying to anyone, it was to herself. She was doing fine and she didn’t need to make sense of what had happened to her; she had her five-year plan and one day she would have the list completed and would look back and laugh at her brush with insanity.
For the most part, Holly was left to her own devices. Billy had already finished the main construction of the conservatory and had moved on to other jobs while the plasterwork dried out. Sam Peterson had been in touch, desperate for Holly to complete the art works she had promised him for the gallery, and she assured him she could supply him with new stock. In fact, Holly was more than willing to spend time in her studio, concentrating her mind on her work and especially work that didn’t have anything to do with motherhood. Mrs. Bronson’s commission was left untouched.
It was only on the Sunday morning after the full moon that Holly’s blessed isolation came to an end. Jocelyn was due for their usual brunch date. Holly didn’t even consider putting her off and instead went out of her way to make the morning picture-perfect. She decided to bake Jocelyn a cake. What could be more normal than baking a cake? she thought to herself with a fixed smile that was starting to make her cheeks ache. Holly suspected she wore this false mask even in her sleep.
Half an hour before Jocelyn was due to call, the cake was in the oven and Holly was making the toffee sauce. She had made this cake before under the watchful eye of Tom’s mum and, if Holly were being honest, Diane had done most of the work. It had looked simple enough, but as soon as Holly took her eyes off the stove, the toffee sauce began bubbling over and after that, all hell broke loose.
By the time Jocelyn was supposed to arrive, Holly was cowering in a corner of the kitchen with her knees drawn up to her chest and her head buried. She had spent days retreating from the future and now she couldn’t even deal with the present, so she withdrew even further into the past.
Memories of her childhood came flooding back, taking her to a time when cowering in a corner had been the norm. Sometimes it was to block out the alcohol-fueled arguments between her parents, but there were other times, too. Holly had learned quickly to hide away once one of her mother’s parties was in full swing, but sometimes the parties lasted days and she would have to leave the safety of her bedroom to sneak downstairs to find something to eat. Mostly she was lucky, but if her mother caught sight of her, the party atmosphere would freeze around them and she would lurch drunkenly toward her daughter. To her guests she would appear the caring parent, taking her daughter to one side to check on her welfare, but the loving hands she placed on Holly’s arms dug deep into flesh and the inquiring look on her face could not hide the scowl. In a barely audible snarl she would hurl abuse at the terrified child while Holly begged to be released. But her mother wouldn’t let go, not until Holly was crying like a baby; only then would she leave her daughter to shrink into the nearest corner. Her mother would walk away laughing, telling guests that her child had broken, that it had sprung a leak and could she send it back for a replacement. The room would erupt into laughter and Holly would curl herself tightly into a ball and try to staunch her tears. There she would stay until someone would take pity on her—usually a stranger, never one of her parents—and take her hand, giving her a brief escape route from the crowd. Holly would scurry upstairs to her room where she would bury her head beneath her pillows in an attempt to block out the noise, especially the laughter.
It wasn’t laughter she heard now but the sound of a familiar, friendly voice as a hand reached out to her to help her to her feet.
“Holly? Are you all right? What happened in here?” Jocelyn asked anxiously.
Holly looked up helplessly and as she met the older woman’s eyes she couldn’t help but feel safe, at least for the moment, and she brought her thoughts back to the present. She even managed a s
mile as she looked at the proffered hand, knowing that the gesture was more likely to result in Jocelyn being pulled down with her than helping Holly to her feet.
She stood up without assistance and took a deep breath. “I burned the cake,” she told Jocelyn. Her hands were curled into fists and her fingernails dug deep into her palms. Tears sprang to her eyes but she refused to let them fall.
Jocelyn frowned but then gave Holly time to collect her thoughts by turning to the kitchen door and opening it wide to drive away the smell of smoking sugar and incinerated sponge cake.
“Well, it’s a good job I brought some scones from the tea shop with me,” Jocelyn said, once the room had cleared of acrid smoke. She picked up her shopping bag and took out a cake box before turning back to Holly. “What happened?” she said, repeating her question but expecting a proper answer now.
Holly lifted a dishcloth up from the kitchen table to reveal a circular scorch mark.
“Oh, I see,” replied Jocelyn cautiously. She knew even this disaster wasn’t enough to justify Holly’s near-catatonic state, but she said nothing else. Instead she bided her time and busied herself tidying away some of the mess left in the aftermath of Holly’s culinary disaster. With the ease of an expert homemaker, Jocelyn managed to clear away the chaos and brew up a strong pot of tea in a matter of minutes.
Lifting a trembling china cup to her lips, Holly took a sip of the sweet tea. She looked at Jocelyn over the rim of her teacup and wondered not just where to begin but whether she had the guts to begin at all. How was she going to explain why a scorch mark on the table had filled her with such terror?
“I need Tom to come home,” whispered Holly.
“You’re missing Tom? Oh, sweetheart, he’ll be home soon. He is due home soon, isn’t he? Or has something changed? Is that why you’re upset?”
Holly shook her head. She had so far refused to allow herself to make sense of her visions. Every time something in her present life created a link with her visions, she had explained it away. The conservatory, Tom’s haircut, the doors changing position, even the pink teddy bear—she had dismissed them all as coincidences and mind games. But the scorch mark was something else. The scorch mark, it would seem, was the final nail in her coffin. Amid the chaos of the burning toffee sauce and the thoughtless act of transferring the hot pan from the stove to the table, Holly hadn’t changed her future; she had confirmed it.
Still trying to push away her thoughts, there was only one constant. “I just need Tom with me right now,” she told Jocelyn.
“His traveling won’t last forever and you’ve said yourself how it will help his career. It’ll be worth it in the end when he’s got a good job based back in London. You’ll have the rest of your lives to make up for lost time then, and you’ll look back and long for the peace and quiet once you’ve got a house full of kids,” added Jocelyn with a jovial laugh, which was meant to lighten Holly’s mood but sent it spiraling down further into the murky depths of despair.
As Holly went to put her teacup down on the saucer with trembling hands, it slipped from her grasp, splashing remnants of her tea across the table. “Why do I make such a mess of things?” cried Holly, leaping up to grab the dishcloth before the spillage reached Jocelyn’s side of the table.
As she turned back around, Jocelyn was already standing there beside her. She took the cloth from Holly’s hand, discarded it on the table, and then wrapped Holly in her arms.
“Tell me what’s wrong,” Jocelyn pleaded.
“I can’t,” whispered Holly. “I’m so scared, Jocelyn! I’ve never been so scared in all my life.”
Jocelyn squeezed Holly tighter to her as she felt her friend’s body shaking with fear. She started to rub her back. “It’s all right. I’m here. Whatever it is, it’s going to be all right. I promise.”
Holly looked up at Jocelyn. How different her life would have been if she’d had a mother like Jocelyn. But at least Jocelyn was with her now, and Holly didn’t have to deal with her living nightmare on her own, not anymore. “I’m going crazy, but I know if I say it out loud it’ll just make it real and I don’t want it to be real,” she explained, fighting the suppressed tears that were burning the back of her throat.
“Oh, sweetheart, tell me what’s wrong. You can’t keep it all to yourself. I promise you I won’t judge.”
Holding her breath in an effort to bring her shaking body under control, Holly hiccupped back a suppressed sob. She looked into Jocelyn’s eyes and the steeliness in her gaze gave Holly the strength to speak the unspeakable. “I’m going to die,” she whispered. “I’m going to die and I don’t want to. I don’t want to leave Tom in such a mess. I don’t want to leave Libby without a mother.”
Finally she took a breath, but as she paused, she noticed that Jocelyn had tensed her body. Jocelyn released her grip and took a step back to look Holly in the eye.
“How do you know all of this?” she asked hesitantly.
“I’ve seen it. I don’t know how,” Holly hiccupped. “I don’t know how it works, but it has something to do with the moondial. It isn’t broken at all. It works and I think it showed me my future. I’m going to die in childbirth on September twenty-ninth next year.”
“You need a glass of water for those hiccups,” Jocelyn said as she unraveled Holly from her arms and turned toward the kitchen sink.
“Did you hear what I said? I’ve either gone completely crazy or the moondial has helped me travel forward in time and it showed me that I’m going to die,” whispered Holly, horrified that she might have just made a fool of herself. Of course Jocelyn would think she had lost her mind. What else was she supposed to think?
Jocelyn’s hand trembled as she handed Holly a glass of cold water. Holly was too upset to notice. She took the glass but rather than sip it she put it to her forehead to cool her brow. She couldn’t look Jocelyn in the eyes.
“Would it help if I told you that I died, too?”
The glass in Holly’s hand slipped between her fingers but she saved it just in time to prevent the table from being damaged further. She sat down again when she felt her legs about to give way. “I don’t understand,” she said, stumbling over her words, but in her heart a spark of hope ignited.
“I used the dial, too, Holly.” Jocelyn sat down on the chair next to her and grabbed her hands. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I should have said something when I saw that you’d resurrected the dial, but I hoped you wouldn’t work out how to use it, that you wouldn’t need to use it.”
“You saw your own death and you changed it?” Holly squeezed Jocelyn’s hands, holding on to the hope that was now glowing brightly. It was almost enough to know that she wasn’t going mad, that the whole thing wasn’t just her mind unraveling. Yet Jocelyn wasn’t simply telling her that the moondial really did have the power to look into the future, but that the future could be changed.
Jocelyn nodded and Holly felt a sense of control she hadn’t felt for days. “Tell me. Tell me what happened.” She bit her lip and waited for Jocelyn to explain.
Jocelyn let go of Holly’s hand and visibly sagged in her chair. She was quiet for the longest time and Holly wasn’t sure if she was going to speak. When she did, it was in a barely audible, trembling whisper.
“I’ve already told you about Harry, what he was like and why I left. Well, that was only partly true. Harry was bad enough, but it was only through the moondial that I saw how things would get worse, so much worse …” Jocelyn’s head was bowed down and she sat staring at her hands as she recalled her time in the gatehouse. “That was why I left him, you see, to avoid the trouble that would come.”
Holly sat mesmerized as she watched Jocelyn lift her eyes toward the kitchen window. It may have been the height of summer, but it seemed a cold, mournful day outside. Jocelyn couldn’t see the moondial from where she was sitting, but she obviously felt its presence bearing down on her.
“It’s been such a long time and I tried to convince myself it was just a weird
and complicated dream,” offered Jocelyn. “It was so much easier than living with the guilt.” Jocelyn glanced at Holly and gave her a weak smile before returning her gaze to the window.
“What happened?” Holly asked.
“I was horrified when Harry plonked the dial in the middle of the garden, which was just what he wanted. The garden was my escape, the only part of my life that I felt I could control, and he wanted to destroy that, too.”
“Why did you stay with him?”
“I was an unskilled, unloved housewife and Harry had spent more than enough years eroding my self-confidence. I just didn’t believe I could fend for myself and, more importantly, provide for Paul.”
“And the moondial showed you that you could?” Holly asked.
“No, the moondial showed me what would happen if I didn’t.” Jocelyn paused, still trembling with fear. “To cut a long story short, I saw a future where I hadn’t been able to endure any more of Harry’s mental and physical torture. I took my own life, Holly. It was the ultimate act of selfishness, not least because without me to deride and humiliate, Paul became Harry’s new target.”
Despite the horror of the story Jocelyn was revealing, a story that had been played out in this very house, Holly felt her heart lighten. “So you can change the future that the moondial shows you?” Holly was aware that she was repeating herself, but she had seen a flicker of hope and she needed to hold on to it.
“It’s not easy; everything comes at a price.”
Holly shook her head, dismissing Jocelyn’s warning. “I’d do anything to change what I saw. In my vision, I walked into this house and had to watch Tom suffering so much, grieving for me. The worst part about it was that I was standing there, right in front of him, and he couldn’t see me. The thought of him looking straight through me still sends a shudder down my spine.”
“Ah, reflection is the key, remember. That’s how the moondial works. The light from the sun is reflected onto the surface of the moon and it’s this borrowed light that is reflected further into the future through the moondial. But you are a reflection; you’re not really there.”
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