Why is he so different when he’s so familiar?
“Look around,” he says, and I realise how caught in the moment I am—that I’m staring at him in the middle of the street like he’s… like he’s my date.
It’s the hot flush in my cheeks that makes me turn away even faster than his suggestion, but the second I do… there are the streetlights, bright and electric. There, the driveways and cars. The road beneath us is paved, and the winter wind rips through me like shards of ice.
“We got spring for a few hours,” he says, watching me wrap my arms around myself. “But now we’re back in a London winter.”
“We are.” A stupid comment from an overwrought mind. I didn’t even notice the change. I was too busy looking at August.
It’s August now, who—so much more intelligent than me—says, “Keep warm.” And when he reaches both arms around my neck, when he moves closer, I don’t feel like I’m on the street at all. I feel like I’m floating. I feel like I’m disparate particles in the air, nothing but electrical currents holding me together, pushing me apart, pulsing every atom, as I wait.
And hope.
August pulls the hood of my sweatshirt up, then runs his hands down my arms, rubbing my biceps for nothing more than warmth.
I could die.
I think I’d like to die now.
“Your place is just around here.”
I know that. I know where I live. Sort of. Yet I follow him like a lost lamb. Just as quiet as one.
The shift back to my time is another sort of magic. A reassuring one. But a cold one. No spring air, no scent of horses, no taste of malty caramel ale from a copper tankard that probably doesn’t exist anymore. And soon, no intimacy. Nothing but the frigid reality of my flat and my life.
The thought grips me at the throat, and I’m sinking, trying for some conversational lifeline, when he throws out, “Would you come do maths with me tomorrow?”
Yes!
But overriding my overkeen response is the truth. “I’m not good at maths.”
He palms that off with a light, “Then will you hold my Coke while I do it?”
Good lord, I think I actually giggled.
Shoot me now.
“Uh, yeah. Sure. I’ll hold your Coke.”Fucking idiot.
“Can I get your number?”
“My…” We’re in front of my place already. It’s dark and miserable, and the wind out here is bone-chilling. I can’t even explain how badly I want to be back in eighteen forty-four, walking the streets with… me.
Instead, I mechanically pull out my phone, ready to text the digits to him. But he says, “I don’t have a phone.”
“Really?” My mind’s fumbling to put the pieces together about what exactly his situation is. We haven’t even talked about it. I know so little about him. I’ve just let this all fall into place, as though it’s any shade of normal. “How can I get in touch with you if you don’t have a phone?” Obvious first question to ask.
It makes him smile a little wider, and I realise he’s barely stopped smiling all evening. Not since the time slip. “I’ll call you. From the place I’m staying. There’s a landline.”
“Where are you staying?”
He looks away, and that weird feeling repeats on me. Like he’s keeping something from me. But he says, “I’ll take you there. Tomorrow.”
And just like that, the worry evaporates. Again. “Alright.”
“Then maybe somewhere tomorrow night? A change of scene after all the maths.”
Stop it.
