Ashโs gangly handsome boyishness had only been modestly dented by fatherhood. If anything, he looked healthier than he had done on her doorstep and, like then, he was wearing running gear โ though here the clothes seemed a bit fancier and more expensive, and he had some kind of ๏ฌtness tracker attached to his arm.
He was smiling and holding two cups of co๏ฌee, one of which was for Nora. She wondered how many co๏ฌees they had shared together, since the ๏ฌrst.
โOh, thank you.โ
โOh no, Nor, did you sleep in here all night?โ he asked.ย Nor.
โMost of it. I meant to go back to bed but Molly was in a state. I had to
calm her and then I was too tired to move.โ
โOh no. Iโm so sorry. I didnโt hear her.โ He seemed genuinely sad. โIt was probably my fault. I showed her some bears on YouTube yesterday before work.โ
โNo worries.โ
โAnyway, Iโve walked Plato. Iโm not in the hospital till midday today. Itโs going to be a late one. Are you still wanting to go into the library today?โ
โOh. You know what? I might give it a miss.โ
โOkay, well, I got Mol some brekkie and will drop her o๏ฌย at school.โ โI can take Molly,โ said Nora. โIf youโve got a big day.โ
โOh, itโs an okay one. A gall bladder and a pancreas so far. Easy street. Am going to get a run in.โ
โRight. Yes. โCourse. For the half-marathon on Sunday.โ
โWhat?โ
โNothing. It doesnโt matter,โ Nora said, โIโm just delirious from sleeping on the ๏ฌoor.โ
โNo worries. Anyway, my sister phoned.ย ๎ขey want her to illustrate the calendar for Kew Gardens. Lots of plants. Sheโs really pleased.โ
He smiled. He seemed happy for this sister of his who Nora had never heard of. She wanted to thank him for being so good about her dead cat, but she obviously couldnโt so she just said, โ๎ขank you.โ
โFor what?โ
โJust, you know, everything.โ โOh. Right. Okay.โ
โSo, thank you.โ
He nodded. โ๎ขatโs nice. Anyway, run time.โ
He drained his co๏ฌee and then disappeared. Nora scanned the room, absorbing every new piece of information. Every cuddly toy and book and plug socket, as if they were all part of the jigsaw of her life.
An hour later, Molly was being dropped o๏ฌย at her infant school and Nora was doing the usual. Checking her emails and social media. Her social media activity wasnโt great in this life, which was always a promising sign, but she did have aย hellย of a lot of emails. From these emails she divined that she was not simply โstoppingโ teaching at the moment but had o๏ฌcially stopped. She was on a sabbatical in order to write a book about Henry David
๎ขoreau and his relevance for the modern-day environmentalist movement. Later in the year she planned to visit Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts, funded by a research grant.
๎ขis seemed pretty good. Almostย annoyinglyย good.
A good life with a good daughter and a good man in a good house in a
good town. It was an excess of good. A life where she could sit down all day reading and researching and writing about her all-time favourite philosopher.
โ๎ขis is cool,โ she told the dog. โIsnโt this cool?โ Plato yawned indi๏ฌerence.
๎ขen she set about exploring her house, being watched by the Labrador from the comfy-looking sofa.ย ๎ขe living room was vast. Her feet sunk into the so๎ย rug.
White ๏ฌoorboards, TV, wood-burner, electric piano, two new laptops on charge, a mahogany chest on which perched an ornate chess set, nicely stacked bookshelves. A lovely guitar resting in the corner. Nora recognised the model instantly as an electro-acoustic โMidnight Satinโ Fender Malibu. She had sold one during her last week working at Stringย ๎ขeory.
๎ขere were photos in frames dotted around the living room. Kids she didnโt know with a woman who looked like Ash โ presumably his sister. An old photo of her deceased parents on their wedding day, and one of her and Ash getting married. She could see her brother in the background. A photo of Plato. And one of a baby, presumably Molly.
She glanced at the books. Some yoga manuals, but not the second-hand ones she owned in her root life. Some medical books. She recognised her copy of Bertrand Russellโsย History of Western Philosophy, along with Henry Davidย ๎ขoreauโsย Walden, both of which sheโd owned since university. A familiarย Principles of Geologyย was also there.ย ๎ขere were quite a few books onย ๎ขoreau. And copies of Platoโsย Republicย and Hannah Arendtโsย ๎ปe Origins of Totalitarianism, which she did own in her root life, but not in these editions. Intellectual-looking books by people like Julia Kristeva and Judith Butler and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.ย ๎ขere were a lot of works on Eastern philosophy that she had never read before and she wondered if she stayed in this life, and she couldnโt see why not, whether there was a way to read them all before she had to do any more teaching at Cambridge.
Novels, some Dickens,ย ๎ปe Bell Jar,ย some geeky pop-science books, a few music books, a few parenting manuals,ย Natureย by Ralph Waldo Emerson andย Silent Springย by Rachel Carson, some stu๏ฌย on climate change, and a large hardback calledย Arctic Dreams: Imagination and Desire in a Northern Landscape.
She had rarely, if ever, been this consistently highbrow.ย ๎ขis was clearly what happened when you did a Masterโs degree at Cambridge and then went on sabbatical to write a book on your favourite philosopher.
โYouโre impressed by me,โ she told the dog. โYou can admit it.โ
๎ขere was also a pile of music songbooks, and Nora smiled when she saw that the one on top was the Simon & Garfunkel one she had sold to Ash the day he had asked her out for a co๏ฌee. On the co๏ฌee table there was a nice glossy hardback book of photographs of Spanish scenery and on the sofa there was something calledย ๎ปe Encyclopedia of Plants and Flowers.
And in the magazine rack there was the brand-newย National Geographicย with the picture of the black hole on the cover.
๎ขere was a picture on the wall. A Mirรณ print from a museum in Barcelona.
โHave me and Ash been to Barcelona together, Plato?โ She imagined them both, hand-in-hand, wandering the streets of the Gothic Quarter together, popping into a bar for tapas and Rioja.
On the wall opposite the bookshelves there was a mirror. A broad mirror with an ornate white frame. She no longer got surprised by the variations in appearance between lives. She had been every shape and size and had every haircut. In this life, she looked perfectlyย pleasant. She would have liked to be friends with this person. It wasnโt an Olympian or a rock star or a Cirque du Soleil acrobat she was looking at, but it was someone who seemed to be having a good life, as far as you could tell these things. A grown-up who had a vague idea of who she was and what she was doing in life. Short hair, but not dramatically so, skin looking healthier than in her root life, either through diet, a lack of red wine, exercise, or the cleansers and moisturisers sheโd seen in the bathroom, which were all more expensive than anything she owned in her root life.
โWell,โ she said to Plato. โ๎ขis is a nice life, yeah?โ Plato seemed to agree.