‘Can I ask a favour?’
‘Anything,’ I whisper.
‘Please don’t push me directly into the airport buggy this time. I’m getting a real complex about it.’
It takes me a whole second for these words to sink in. For the full force of what they mean to hit me square in the face.
And then, I spend the final few moments of my life, before it is tragically cut short, screaming: ‘WHAT THE FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK?’
SIXTEEN
Callum is looping too. Callum is … looping too?IsCallum looping too or did I dramatically mishear what he had to say to me shortly before we were both cut down in our prime.
Because I swear he asked me not to push him in front of the buggy and told me he was getting a complex about it. Which would be an understandable reaction to my recent behaviour. I have, after all, shoved him into the line of fire twice these past few Mondays. What’s not understandable is how he knows that. He could only know if he’d been with me this entire time, for each and every repeated day.
Looking back, shoving Callum into an oncoming vehicle hasn’t been my finest moment(s). It’s amazing how just a few trips around the same twenty-four hours have turned me into a stone-cold killer. Oh hell, the regret! Truth is, I’ve felt compelled to do it, just so I can start the day over and somehow make amends, with the ultimate goal of getting the heck out of here. And, possibly because I truly have found him very irritating, too.
If I wasn’t already in it, I’d be going to hell.
I shake my head, trying to think clearly as I reach across to silence Hot Chip’s ‘Over and Over’ again.
The more I rethink it, the surer I am that I did not mishearCallum as Monday number five came to a close. He is looping too, I’m almost certain. It absolutely explains his reaction to me blurting out my current conundrum. He didn’t seem remotely surprised, or ask any questions, after I’d told him that I was on my fifth Monday of the week. And looking back, he definitely appeared grumpier when he turned up at the airport on Monday Two. He looked how I felt, dishevelled and confused.
Frankly, I’ve got questions, and I’m sure as heck going to be asking them as soon as Callum gets to Heathrow. Maybe I’ll place myself back by the salmon sperm moisturizers as a test to see his reaction?
I swing my legs out of bed, mind racing.
‘OUCH!’ I yelp, foot landing on something crunchy.
That’s odd. Usually I’ve ‘woken up’ from my death nap in the cashmere sleep socks I’ve been wearing since I hit thirty. I love my sleep socks. They’re extra soft and you slip them on after moisturizing the heck out of your feet before bed, waking up to beautifully soft skin.
Today, my feet are bare and in pain.
I peer down in the gloom. I’m standing on … a discarded condom wrapper. What the heck? Who the hell was I sleeping with last night? Please tell me ex-boyfriend Nice Neil hasn’t made an unwelcome reappearance in my life for Monday Six. I could do without that added complication, that’s for sure. And also, why did I not put that in the bin? Am I feral now?
Bleary-eyed, I make for the shower, staggering towards my bedroom door and walking face first into a wardrobe.
I ricochet back, crunching over the condom wrapper once more and landing back on my bed. Although these are not my bedsheets.
‘What?’ I mutter.
It’s at this point that I notice I’m wearing a thong in lieu of the silk Olivia Von Halle pyjamas I found for a steal on Vinted, whichrings major alarm bells. I haven’t worn a thong in years because, honestly, no one needs that kind of discomfort.
Also, why is there a wardrobe where my bedroom door should be? Who sanctioned this frankly disgusting duvet cover? And what the heck has happened to my thirty-year-old body? How are these breasts of mine so goddamn perky?!
These are the breasts of my twenty-year-old self.
HANG ON A MINUTE.
Another look round and everything comes into terrifyingly focus. I haven’t woken up on Monday. I’ve woken up a decade ago.
This time, I very much do scream.
Hamish comes bouldering in wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his wet hair. I cover my eyes.
‘Nee, what is it? Have you been shot?’ he asks.
‘What is happening?’ I screech, peeping out through a gap in my fingers. ‘Why are you here and why are you naked?’
