Becoming P.T. Lyfantod - 29
A serial fantasy novel
What follows is Part 29 of Becoming P.T. Lyfantod
If you missed Part 1, start there:
The houses were dark on my street. I pedaled past postboxes and parked cars hardly seeing them. The cold wind tightened the skin on my cheeks, and the clouds brimmed with rain as my mind brimmed with Cyril Lightfoot. It didn’t feel real. I wished that I’d taken something. Anything. One of the matches. A pinch of white sand. Godwyn’s skull… Though who knew what might happen if I did? I wanted something to prove I hadn’t dreamt it all. So that when I woke in the morning I’d know I hadn’t gone mad. The wheels on my bike thump-thumped as I rolled into the driveway, and I let my momentum carry me up to the house, swinging one leg over to dismount while still moving. I left my bike beside the garage and headed for the front door. I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I nearly tripped over my grandmother, sitting on the porch.
“Mam-gu! What are you doing out here?”
She had that look in her eye, like she was half asleep, though she appeared to be coming out of it. She blinked, taking in her surroundings. “P.T.?” That’s when I noticed she had something in her hands.
“What’s that?” I frowned, kneeling to prise it from her fingers. It was a handkerchief, which was strange, because I didn’t know she owned any. Mam-gu always kept tissues stuffed inside her blouse. I held it up for a better look, and in the dim light of a distant streetlamp, I realized it was green.
I whirled, eyes darting about the silent street. “Where did you get this?” I hissed. “Mam-gu?” When she didn’t answer, I glanced back, loath to turn my back on hidden danger.
“Hmm?” Mam-gu gazed up at me dreamily.
“Mam-gu, who gave this to you? Where did you get it?” I held it in front of her face.
She frowned at it, then at me. “Court… ball…”
“Never mind.” It was no use. She wasn’t making any sense. I stuffed it in my pocket and bent to help her up. “Come on. Time for bed.”
With a hand under her arm and another at her back, I pulled. She rose unsteadily, but kept her balance once she reached her feet. She was still dressed, but wasn’t wearing any shoes. She must have been getting ready for bed when she had one of her episodes. Inside, the house was dark but the television was on, running some late-night advert. I guided mam-gu to the banister, then went to turn it off. I was reaching for the switch when I happened to glance up at the clock, illuminated by the flickering glow of the screen.
I had to look twice.
“What the—?”
I frowned at the hands, convinced I was reading them wrong, but no matter how long I stared, they remained adamant. It was almost four in the morning.
But we’d been gone only a couple of hours…
I looked up to see mam-gu mount the last step and vanish toward her bedroom. Trusting she could manage on her own, I turned off the telly and scampered upstairs in the dark, moving by touch and instinct, and silently shut my door behind me. The glowing red face of my bedside clock told the same impossible story as the one downstairs.
I fumbled over to my desk and flicked on the lamp, and in the semidarkness, I took the handkerchief from my pocket and laid it out flat. I retrieved the Book from my bag and lay it open beside it. Green ribbon. Green handkerchief. There was only one place—one person—it could have come from. I ran a hand through my hair. “What the hell is going on…?”
What did it all mean? What did he want? With me? With mam-gu? I cursed myself for not asking Lightfoot when I had the chance.
And what about the clocks?
I wished for someone to talk to. I wished Iain and Stuart were there. Or Merry. But if it really was four in the morning, they’d have plenty of trouble of their own.
I couldn’t fathom sleeping, so I tried reading instead, but the words might have been hieroglyphics. Eventually I turned off my lamp and dragged my chair to the window to wait for sunrise. If the clocks were right, it wasn’t far off. And if they weren’t… well that would mean something else altogether, though I’d no idea what.
I don’t know how long I stared out at the empty street, fretting over mysteries, but I must have dozed off, for sometime later, head hanging heavy and drool streaming down my chin, I lifted an eyelid to find the sky lightening in the east. The clock read half past six. Not wrong, then. I acknowledged the revelation, and lurched into bed. When I woke again it was after ten, and golden sunshine was streaming in my window.
A faint, rhythmic scraping and clinking was coming from outside. I swung my feet onto the floor and shuffled over to look. Mam-gu was out on her hands and knees, digging in the flower bed, head and shoulders hidden beneath a sun hat. I wondered if she remembered anything about last night.
The ribbon and the handkerchief lay where I’d left them. In the daylight I saw they were slightly different shades; the handkerchief a bright shamrock, as opposed to the ribbon’s dark, pine needle green. Hm, I thought, and marched off to the loo.
I emerged from the house a short time later with the Book in my bag, and the handkerchief folded safely in my back pocket. Mam-gu’s head swiveled as I pulled the door shut behind me. “Do I need to do laundry?” she asked, peering at me from beneath her hat. The sunglasses wrapped around her head made her look like a beetle.
I glanced down. One of my socks was wine red, the other golden yellow. “Err—no. I just need to pay more attention apparently.”
“Apparently. Where’re you off to?”
“Meeting Iain and Stuart.”
“Back to normal then? That’s good.”
“Yeah, pretty much…”
“Well, have a good time.” She turned back to the flowerbed.
“Uh… mam-gu?”
She looked up at me. “Hmm?”
“Do you… remember anything about last night?”
“Last night?” She pushed up her hat and doffed her sunglasses. “No. I must’ve dozed off in my chair. I don’t even recall going upstairs. I woke this morning still dressed, though at least I managed to take my shoes off. And my hip is acting up again.” She rubbed it, grimacing. “Why? Did something happen?”
“Oh… no.” I lied. “I just err—found the telly on when I got home, and wondered.”
“Thank you for turning it off.”
“Yeah…” I nodded slowly. “No problem. I guess I’ll see you later then.”
Mam-gu reached for her trowel, then paused. “I’m going to the supermarket this afternoon, if you need anything.”
“No, that’s all right.”
I went to Stuart’s first. I still on the sidewalk when the front door burst open and he ran outside, a bag slung over his shoulder as well. “What took you so long? I was starting to wonder if you’d died.”
I squinted at him. “It’s not that late. I was sleeping.”
“How can you sleep at a time like this? Speaking of time, did you—?”
“Lose six hours? Yeah. And—”
“Hold on.” Stuart held up his hand and ran off. When he reappeared with his bike, he said, “We should wait for Iain.”
It gets better with each chapter :)