Page 56 of Never Tear Us Apart
‘Because I have this constant ringing in my ears. It sounds a bit like when a heart monitor flatlines – and because everything that has happened to me in the last few days would tie in with your brain flooding you with hallucinogenic chemicals when you are on your way out the door and making your last seconds of life seem to last a lifetime.’
‘Did you see that in a movie?’ she asks. Now she’s attaching sticky pads to my chest and back.
‘Probably,’ I say.
‘Well,’ she says cheerfully, ‘I feel like I am alive and real; therefore, you are alive and real, too. Mind you, I would say that.’
‘Comforting,’ I reply.
‘It’s meant to be.’ Dr Gresch laughs. ‘If it seems real, if itfeelsreal, then what does it matter either way? Human experience is mostly emotion. It is real to you. That’s really all “reality” is.’ Those air quotes again. ‘Now, you’re all hooked up. So, take advantage of the free streaming services – and there’s a load of books. Just relax. I’ll see you in the morning.’
Turning to the window, I wave at Kathryn, who blows me a kiss goodnight.
‘If I’m in another reality when I dream, and I get stuck there, say, what would happen to my body?’
‘I don’t know,’ Dr Gresch says. ‘I guess we’d find out.’
‘Will you do something for me?’ I ask.
‘Yes,’ she says.
‘Will you look up a Professor Salvatore Borg for me? He was a physicist in Milan in the nineties. And maybe also in Malta in the early twentieth century.’
Dr Gresch raises her eyebrows but says nothing.
‘Of course.’ She smiles. ‘See you on the other side.’
‘But the other side of what?’
Chapter Forty
Sunday 9thAugust 1942, 9 a.m.
‘Maia? Maia?’ I hear Sal’s voice through the emptiness, a nothing that seems to go on forever in all directions, even inwards. It’s not dark exactly, just a sense of being nowhere and not existing, of nothing being present but his voice crackling in the distance like a faint star. His voice speaking my name becomes a fixed point, a spark to focus on, and I direct all that is left of me towards it, concentrating hard.
As the light of that single word grows, others come into being, competing for my attention. My mum shouts out my name, the way she used to when I was little and had been playing for too long in the woods at the bottom of the garden. I hear the whimpers of a little girl crying for her mother. Voices and words I don’t know call to me, too, but I fix on that one coppery spark, turning the whole of my being towards it the only way I can: with intention.
‘Sal?’ Opening my eyes is difficult, almost like I am a newborn.
‘You are here.’ Sal’s blurred face looms before me. ‘You are back.’
‘I’m back. I’ve got so much to tell you,’ I say, coming to life almost immediately. Reaching for the water jug on the table, I pour a little into my palm and pat it over my face, blinking. I feel myself arriving at the very tips of my fingers.
‘There are these things called microtubules . . .’
‘Wait.’ Sal stops me with a calming motion. ‘Tell me on the way. If you are able. We are already late.’
‘I’m fine,’ I say, standing up, looking down at my body. I’m wearing the same yellow sundress, but stuck just below the neckline is one of the plastic disc things that the doctor used to attach me to the machines. How on earth could that happen? Just when I think I am making sense of any of this, there’s another curveball or direction change that makes it all the more mysterious.
‘What are we late for?’ I ask.
‘You are to present your papers at HQ,’ Sal tells her. ‘Rumours are rife on the island, and you are at the centre of a few of them, I’m afraid. People simply don’t know you, and that is a little strange.’
‘Oh, I see,’ I say, patting myself down. I wonder what happened to the envelope I got from Nicco. ‘Oh, no. I think I . . .’
‘Here.’ Sal hands me my ID card without the envelope. He’s folded and creased it a little, and stained it, perhaps with some coffee, to make it look as if it’s been in a purse or a pocket. ‘Vittoria got a group of army men to carry you to me when you fainted on the bus yesterday afternoon. The doctor wanted you to be taken to the medical room, but Vittoria was adamant you came here. The doctor was astounded that Vittoria wouldn’t obey her orders! The poor girl was quite worried she wouldn’t have a job the next day when she left here. I hope it’ll be all right – I believe the hope of going into nursing is the one thing she has left.’
‘I’ll go and talk to the doctor,’ I resolve. ‘It was me who insisted. I knew I’d be safe here.’
