Chasing Stars Page 10

  ‘It’s just a bar. Wear anything you like. There’s no dress code.’

  ‘I don’t know what casual looks like in the twenty-second century.’

  ‘This dress is perfect. Anything like this would be fine.’

  He told me he would pick me up at eight, from my room. I heard him start his car as I crossed the road, but he didn’t pull away until I had thrust my way through the reporters and into the lobby.

  Chapter 9

  It was while I was flicking through my new wardrobe of clothes, looking for something suitable to wear to the pub, that I found Miranda. The com-screen was on, tuned into a lightweight political chat show.

  ‘Admiral Wolfe believes that Admiral Westland knew that his youngest son planned to return to 2012,’ one of the commentators was saying.

  ‘If this was true, what does it mean for the Board of Guardians?’

  ‘If Westland has helped his son break the Temporal Laws, he will be stripped of his title and put on trial for conspiracy. That would lead to an immediate election and almost guarantee that Admiral Wolfe will win the presidency.’

  ‘What can we expect from Wolfe if he’s elected president of the Board?’

  ‘For starters, time missions to the past will come to an end. Wolfe has made no secret of the fact that he doesn’t think there is ever a good enough reason to approve a time mission to the past.’

  ‘That’s bad news for Westland Travel.’

  ‘Absolutely. Admiral Westland’s fortune comes from building ships capable of travelling through four dimensions. If time travel is eradicated, there will be no demand for his ships.’

  ‘Is there any chance that Westland and his son are innocent?’

  ‘Of course. Westland claims his son only broke the Temporal Laws in order to save the life of a girl who had helped the mission and been unjustly eliminated by the mission cleaner.’

  ‘What sort of sentence is Orion facing if he’s found guilty?’

  ‘That will come down to the judge. Sentencing guidelines are very broad – he could be punished with as little as a six-month curfew program, or he could be looking at some serious time on the far side of the moon.’

  I touched a button to turn off the TV show and accidentally brought up a search engine. There was still almost an hour until Pegasus was due, so I decided to look up Miranda. I’d avoided it – pushing all thoughts of her into the deep, dark corners of my mind – because our separation was still so fresh. Less than a week had passed since I left my own time. But from where I was now, she had lived her life and died.

  I had no idea if Facebook still existed, but Ryan had said we all leave a digital footprint – it was how he’d found out what happened to me – so I decided to give it a go. I wasted almost twenty minutes looking for somewhere to type her name. Just before I was about to give up, I stumbled across the voice commands.

  ‘Search for Miranda Honeychurch,’ I said, then squeezed my eyes closed and made a silent wish that she’d had a good life. I didn’t think I could bear to discover that my sudden departure had ruined things.

  There were thousands of results. But the result second from the top of the fourth screen was her. Her photograph was just as I remembered her from 2012, with an icon that said Complete Profile. I touched the icon.

  A three-dimensional hologram of Miranda leapt out of the com-screen. It was life-sized. She was dressed in a red dress I recognised. She had bought it just a few months before I left the twenty-first century. Tears sprang to my eyes as I looked at her smiling face.

  There were four folders on the screen: biography, photographs, blog and messages. I touched biography.

  The hologram shrank back into the screen and a fresh page opened on-screen. It was brief.

  Miranda Williams (née Honeychurch) was born in 1980, the younger of two daughters, to Ben Honeychurch, a teacher and Mary Honeychurch, a shop assistant. A bright child, she excelled in school and went on to study Law at Exeter University. Her legal career was brought to an abrupt halt, however, when her elder sister Beatrice died tragically in an automobile accident orphaning Miranda’s niece, Eden. Miranda raised Eden for ten years. Tragedy struck again when, at sixteen, Eden disappeared without a trace. Miranda completed her legal studies as a mature student and went on to become a partner at Williams and Penhallow, where she married Thomas Williams, a senior partner. They were married in 2016 and had two children, Travis (b. 2017) and Eden (b. 2019). Miranda died from pneumonia following a hip operation in 2075, aged ninety-five.

  Author: Eden Williams 2075

  I made a quick calculation. Eden Williams had been fifty-six when her mother died at the ripe old age of ninety-five. She might even be alive herself. I made another calculation. She would be a hundred and four. Not likely then. But the knowledge that Miranda had had a career and a husband and two children made my heart sing.

  I scrolled through the photographs, poring over pictures of her as an old lady, family photos with Thomas and her children. In later shots she was surrounded by little children again, grandchildren presumably. I must have relatives somewhere. I wondered if any of them had worked out that I was related to them. After the trial, I would look them up. Settle into the twenty-second century, as Westland had suggested.

  I skipped over the blog and touched the folder that said messages. The page opened to a list of subfolders, each with a name: Eden, Travis, and other names I didn’t recognise. I was about to close the page when one of the folders caught my eye. Eden Anfield. My heart thumping against my ribs, I touched the screen. A window popped open.

  Password required. Clue: the name of our feline visitor.

  ‘Katkin,’ I said to the screen.

  The folder opened, revealing a short message.

  Dear Eden,

  Many years have passed since the day I came home and found you gone. Not a day goes by without me thinking of you. But I believe I know what happened to you and I hope that I’m right. They told me you had drowned in the sea off Perran Towans. I never believed it. In my heart I knew you were still alive somewhere. For many years this was nothing more than a belief. But when Nathaniel Westland invented a way to travel through time, I worked it out. Westland was the name of the boy you were with. He was from the future. You followed him home. It’s the only thing that makes sense.

  I’ve had a rich and full life. Although I lost you and Travis, my life has been blessed with a loving husband, two delightful children and five grandchildren.

  Ever since Nathaniel Westland invented time travel, I’ve hoped and prayed I will see you again. Now I am sick and I know I don’t have very long left. It is my greatest hope that one day you will find this message and visit me or my children or grandchildren.

  Whatever happens, I hope it’s been worth it for you.

  With love, for ever,

  Miranda x

  Tears were streaming down my cheeks. I wished so much that I could travel back and wrap my arms around her. I wanted to tell her everything. To say goodbye properly.

  The screen went blank and then the face of the hotel receptionist blinked on my screen. Incoming call. I wiped my face on the back of my sleeve and pressed accept call.

  ‘You have a visitor, Miss Anfield,’ said the receptionist. ‘Mr Pegasus Ryder.’

  ‘Let him up please.’

  I had become so immersed in reading that I had completely lost track of the time. I grabbed a blue dress out of the wardrobe and quickly shimmied into it. There was just time to apply a flick of eyeliner before he knocked.

  ‘Nice dress,’ he said, as I opened the door.

  ‘You too,’ I said, pointing at his sarong. ‘Is that what guys wear in the twenty-second century?’

  ‘It’s not a dress,’ he said, smiling uncertainly. ‘It’s pretty standard for a night out drinking.’

  ‘Did Ryan dress like that?’

  Peg nodded. ‘Is there something wrong with what I’m wearing?’

  ‘No. It’s just not what I’m used to.’ />
  He cocked his head to one side. ‘Are you OK? You look kind of . . . upset?’

  I wiped away a tear. I would not allow myself to cry in front of Peg.

  ‘Hey, what’s the matter?’ he asked.

  I scanned on the com-screen and pulled up Miranda’s profile. He skimmed through her entries.

  ‘Who is she?’

  ‘My aunt. The woman who brought me up after my parents died.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘She had a good life. She figured out where you went. That reads like a pretty good ending to me.’

  ‘It’s a long time ago from where you’re standing. But it’s just days for me.’

  Peg nodded silently. ‘I can’t really imagine what it’s like to go through what you’re going through.’

  ‘I’m just so lonely,’ I said, sitting on the edge of the bed. ‘Everyone I know is dead. Or locked up.’

  ‘I know it’s not much, but you know me. I’m not dead. Or locked up. Not yet, anyway.’

  I looked at him and tried to smile.

  ‘And tonight you’re gonna meet a few of Ry’s closest friends.’

  He helped me with the wig and once again we left the hotel incognito. We drove downtown to a car park close to the water. Although it was early evening, the air was still hot and stuffy.

  As we walked across the car park, Peg put an arm around my shoulder. It was a friendly, non-threatening gesture, but I felt my body stiffen. ‘Let me pay for everything tonight,’ he said. ‘If you use your flexi-card, everyone will know who you are.’

  The car park opened on to a narrow alleyway with bags of rubbish piled up beside overflowing bins, and posters stapled to telegraph poles and doorways.

  ‘Short cut,’ said Peg. ‘It will save us five minutes.’

  We stopped for a moment by a machine at the end of the alley, so that Peg could top up the credits on his port-com. He slid the port-com into the machine and tapped a code on to the screen. Although the alley was deserted, it was just the sort of place I always avoided, the sort of place you were warned about as a child.

  ‘Is Lakeborough a safe city?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s one of the wealthiest cities in the Federation,’ he said. ‘Crime is low. But like any city, there are parts best avoided.’

  The credit machine beeped and pushed the port-com back out through its mouth.

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Peg, thrusting the port-com into his pocket.

  With every step that brought me closer to the door of the inn, my heart squeezed harder. I was going to meet Ryan’s friends. I knew nothing about them. Apart from Peg, he’d never told me anything about them. They would all be older than me. What if they didn’t like me? What if one of them was Ryan’s ex, the girl he’d dated before me?

  ‘Hey, Albert,’ said Peg to the bouncer at the door.

  The bouncer nodded at him.

  ‘They’ll all be out the back,’ said Peg.

  Once inside, Peg dropped my arm. In single file we squeezed through the crowded bar. Music – an eerie, hypnotic combination of heavy drums and violins – blared from two huge speakers over by a raised stage. At the back of the bar was a sliding glass door that opened on to a large deck that extended over the lake. All sorts of boats, from small sailing boats to large ferries, floated across the water. Peg looked around, spotting his friends at a table right by the water’s edge.

  ‘Hey, everyone,’ he said when we reached the table. ‘This is Eden.’

  There were three of them: two girls and a boy. The boy and one of the girls were pale-skinned and strawberry blonde. They were obviously brother and sister; later, I found out they were twins. The other girl was olive-skinned with long dark hair. All three of them stared up at me. And then the boy, who had a long thin cigar hanging out of his mouth, stood up to shake my hand.

  ‘Antoine,’ he said. ‘Delighted to meet you.’

  The fair girl stood then and held a pale hand out for me to shake. ‘Isabelle,’ she said. ‘My friends call me Belle.’

  The other girl was stunning. She had high, pronounced cheekbones and large, green eyes that reminded me of a cat.

  ‘Hello, Eden,’ she said, remaining seated. ‘I’m Lyra.’

  ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you all,’ I said stiffly. ‘Thanks for letting me join you tonight.’

  ‘You can all stop staring at her now,’ said Peg.

  He pulled out a chair for me and took the one right next to it.

  ‘Is beer OK?’ asked Antoine. ‘I ordered a bucket of them. Dad said that was the popular drink back in your day?’

  ‘Beer is great,’ I said.

  Antoine passed me a bottle from a bucket in the centre of the table. I gulped it quickly, glad for something cold. When I looked up, they were all still staring at me.

  ‘I thought you had red hair,’ said Lyra.

  Automatically, I reached up and touched the soft fake hair on my head. ‘It’s a wig,’ I said.

  ‘We had to disguise her to get away from all those journos outside her hotel,’ Peg explained.

  ‘How’s Orion?’ asked Antoine. ‘I can’t believe he didn’t get bail.’

  ‘I don’t really know how he is,’ I said. ‘I haven’t been able to see him since we landed.’

  ‘Have they set a date for the trial?’ he asked.

  ‘According to his father, it should be in the next few days.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘How did he get caught?’ asked Lyra. ‘When he said goodbye, he seemed pretty confident he knew how to cover his tracks.’

  ‘I’m not sure how the cleaner found us,’ I said, reddening.

  ‘Are the stories true then?’ Lyra asked, arching her eyebrows. ‘Are you and Ry a modern day Romeo and Juliet?’

  ‘Stop interrogating the girl,’ said Antoine, nudging Lyra.

  ‘It’s so romantic,’ said Belle. ‘The two of you travelling through time to be together.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Lyra, with a half smile.

  ‘So what’s life like back in the twenty-first century?’ Antoine asked, a little too loudly. ‘What do people do on a Saturday night? Do they sit around the pianoforte and sing songs?’

  I laughed. ‘They go out drinking and dancing and to parties. Saturday night where I’m from looks a lot like this.’

  ‘Really?’ said Antoine. ‘I thought you all wore corsets and had chaperones.’

  Belle smacked Antoine’s arm playfully. ‘That’s the nineteenth century, dumbbell.’

  ‘I’m disappointed. I imagined that people from your time were different from us.’

  For a second I considered telling them about Connor and me playing endless games of chess and Scrabble, but the thought made me so nostalgic that I decided against it.

  ‘What do you think of Lakeborough?’ asked Antoine.

  ‘It seems cool. I haven’t seen much yet. Although it was beautiful up in the mountains yesterday.’

  ‘Which mountains?’ asked Lyra.

  I shrugged. ‘I don’t know what they’re called. Peg took me there.’

  ‘I took her to Twin Falls,’ said Peg.

  ‘Really, Pegasus?’ said Lyra. ‘You took Orion’s girlfriend to Twin Falls.’

  Peg drained his beer and slammed the bottle on the table. ‘Yes. I wanted to take her out of the city, away from the reporters. And Twin Falls is one of Orion’s favourite places.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Lyra with a smirk. ‘That’s why you took her there.’

  ‘I love the way you always assume the basest motives in everyone,’ said Peg. He stood up abruptly, tipping his chair back towards the floor. He pushed it up with the toe of his shoe. ‘Looks like we’re getting low on drinks. Beers again?’

  He didn’t wait for an answer.

  ‘I’ll give him a hand,’ said Belle, standing up. ‘I’m not letting him pay for beer.’

  A shadow fell across my face as someone approached the table from behind me. He leant over and plucked the last bottle of beer from the buck
et.

  ‘Beer, huh? So, what’s the occasion?’

  I turned and saw a tall boy with light blonde hair. He untwisted the top with his hand, tilted his head back and poured half the bottle into his mouth.

  ‘Hey, Clarence,’ said Antoine.

  Clarence nodded at Antoine. ‘You gonna dance with me tonight, Lyra?’

  ‘I don’t dance any more.’

  ‘I would hold you.’ He turned to me. ‘I don’t believe we’ve met.’ He passed the beer to his left hand and held out his right hand to shake.

  I accepted. He shook my hand vigorously and then sat in Peg’s chair. He leant close. ‘Clarence Wolfe. And you are?’

  I hesitated. Was he a friend? He seemed to know the others, though Lyra hadn’t been especially warm to him. ‘Eden Anfield.’

  He smiled. ‘Do I detect an accent?’

  ‘British.’

  ‘Are you vacationing in Lakeborough?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  His eyes lit up. ‘You’re that Eden. I didn’t recognise you. Your hair is different.’

  ‘It’s a wig,’ said Lyra in a bored voice. ‘Now you’ve had a look at her, why don’t you go bother someone else?’

  Clarence stood up. ‘Come on, Eden, it’s time for you to learn how to dance twenty-second century style.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ I said. Back home I liked dancing, but the way people here were dancing was very different. ‘It looks complicated.’

  ‘I’m a great teacher.’ He stood up and held out a hand to me. ‘What do you say? Just one dance?’

  Lyra rolled her eyes and Antoine looked away. Unsure whether I was about to commit a major faux pas or whether it would be rude to say no, I stood up and let Clarence lead me to the dance floor.

  ‘Are you friends with them?’ I asked.

  ‘I’m in the same class as your friend, Antoine. Orion too before he left.’

  ‘And Lyra?’

  ‘We used to date. I think she still has a thing for me.’

  ‘I kind of got the opposite impression. Anything else I should know?’

  We were on the edge of the dance floor. I could feel the music vibrating through the wooden floor.