The Time-Traveller's Choice

the strength of the memory

I stood on the other side of Mile End Road, watching the man hauling potatoes into that long brown-grey building. His shirt was plastered to his back with sweat, and he had a funny gait: long and sure, but with a hitch in his stride.

"How's yerself, Charlie?" someone called, and he turned and waved with the hand not holding the potatoes.

Then I saw behind him there was a woman with a bundle clutched to her chest. My attention sharpened. She was a slender woman with black hair, wearing a grey smock. She looked down at the bundle and I heard her say in an Irish lilt, "Shh baby girl. Don't cry. Cryin' will get ye nowhere in this world."

I woke up.

My hand was curled on the pillow next to my head and there was something pressing into my palm.

I lifted two fingers, saw the crocodile skin finish, groaned and rolled over on the pillow. But I couldn't get back to sleep.

It was dark outside, which in midsummer in the North meant it was around 3am. I got up, got my toiletries, and went down the hall to the shower block. There was another girl in the block, but she left as I was arriving.

I stood under the lukewarm flow. Charlie. He was in the memory again, and this time I had a name. And the woman and baby. 

Back in my room, I thought I might be able to sleep now, so I got back into my pyjamas and lay down.

Mile End Road. Charlie. A grey-smocked woman with a baby. A long, dreary building with a gate. Not enough information to go on.

A tramway down the middle of the road. Horses and wagons competing with old-style cars. Crowds of people.

Well, the tramway (a quick search informed me) meant that what I was looking at must be before the 1930s. The horses suggested earlier.

I suppose I didn't really believe that the ring would be able to pull me back that far. But I underestimated the strength of the memory. And perhaps, the strength of my desire to go.

* * *

The smallest things can change your life. Was it Granny Alice's bequest, or was it the dreams? Was it the sight of Charlie, or the woman speaking so sadly to that baby? Or was it that I got ready for class a little more quickly than usual the next morning, and on my way out the door happened to glance at my watch? 

I stopped and set down my bag. I was wearing a black scoop-neck t-shirt, a knee-length floral skirt and black ballet flats, and had my my curly brown hair tied back in a ponytail because I hadn't felt like dealing with it. But there was no point leaving just yet. I could take five minutes to straighten my hair.

Or, I could try to learn more about Mile End Road.

I opened the drawer and took out the box. Flipped it open in my hand, and flicked the ring out of its bed and into the palm of my hand.