Day 2

The tickertape at the foot of the news slides by. What did it say? How long before it comes around again?

New Year celebrations in Australia, Paris and Edinburgh. Football results and the window of opportunity to buy more expensive strikers. A Minister arrested for drink driving. And there it is ‘Serious accident on the A1 near A614’ – five people in critical condition.’ No other details. Back to the New Year celebrations at the London Eye.

She used to live there – where the A614 snaked to meet the A1. Memories flooded back of the neat, small bungalow that sprawled between the woods and road. She could see the burnt sienna bricks, the white blinds at the window and the gravel path leading to the green metal door of the garage. And the bluebell woods that surrounded the house; a carpet of hazy blue that shimmers and hovers above the land, a surreal blanket that you feel you can grasp but always eludes you, always just out of reach.

She sighed and picked up the half-bitten mince pie from the floor. It’ll be fine she told herself.

She watched the loop again. No other news. No update on those involved in the accident. She thought how sad it was for some family – there would be people now who would never feel the same way about New Year. They would never celebrate it again in the same way – yet every year it would come back to haunt them. She turned the TV off. 2am – time for bed. She thought about her bed back in that bungalow, so very different from the one she was sleeping in now.

Lights out. Gentle snoring. Who knows what will come back to haunt them? What do any of us know about the past and when it might swap places with the future?