First Among Sequels (Thursday Next 5)

I stared at him. “You knew I was lying to you all those years?”

“Pumpkin,” he said as he gently ushered me into the house and closed the door behind us, “you do love me, don’t you?”

“Yes, but—”

He put his finger to my lips. “Hang on a minute. I know you do, and I love it that you do. But if you care too much about upsetting me, then you won’t do the things you have to do, and those things are important—not just to me but to everyone.”

“Then…you’re not cross I’ve been lying to you for fourteen years?”

“Thursday, you mean everything to me. Not just because you’re cute, smart, funny and have a devastatingly good figure and boobs to die for, but that you do right for right’s sake—it’s what you are and what you do. Even if I never get my magnum opus published, I will still die secure in the knowledge that my time on this planet was well spent—giving support, love and security to someone who actually makes a difference.”

“Oh, Land,” I said, burying my head in his shoulder, “you’re making me go all misty!”

And I hugged him again, while he rubbed my back and said that everything was all right. We stood like this for some time until I suddenly had a thought.

“Land,” I said slowly, “how much do you know?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Bradshaw tell me quite a lot, and Spike and Bowden often call to keep me updated.”

“The rotten swines!” I said with a smile. “They’re always telling me to spill the beans to you!”

“We all care about you, Thursday.”

This was abundantly true, but I couldn’t get Thursday1–4 and her brief sojourn to the real world out of my mind. “What about…other stuff?”

Landen knew exactly what I was talking about. “I only figured out she was the written Thursday when you came back upstairs.”

“How?”

“Because it was only then I realized she hadn’t been wearing the necklace I gave you for your birthday.”

“Oh,” I said, fingering the locket around my neck. There was silence for a moment as we both considered what had happened. Eventually I said, “But she was a terrible lay, right?”

“Hopeless.”

And we both laughed. We would never mention it again.

“Listen,” said Landen, “there’s someone to see you in the front room.”

“Who?”

“Just go in. I’ll make some tea.”

I walked into the living room, where a tall man was standing at the mantel with his back to me, looking at the framed pictures of the family.

“That’s us holidaying on the Isle of Skye,” I said in a soft voice, “at the Old Man of Storr. Jenny’s not there because she was in a huff and sat in the car, and you can just see Pickwick’s head at the edge of the frame.”

“I remember it well,” he said, and turned to face me. It was Friday, of course. Not my Friday but his older self. He was about sixty, and handsome to boot. His hair was graying at the temples, and the smile wrinkles around his eyes made me think of Landen. He was wearing the pale blue uniform of the ChronoGuard, the shoulder emblazoned with the five gold pips of director-general. But it wasn’t the day-to-day uniform, it was ceremonial dress. This was a special occasion.

“Hi, Mum.”

“Hi, Sweetpea. So you did make it to director-general after all!”

He shrugged and smiled. “I did and I didn’t. I’m here, but I can’t be. It’s like everything else that we’ve done in the past to change the present—we were definitely there, but we couldn’t have been. The one thing you learn about the time business is that mutually opposing states can comfortably coexist.”

“Like Saturday Night Fever being excellent and crap at the same time?”

“Kind of. When it comes to traveling about in the timestream, paradox is always a cozy bedfellow—you get used to living with it.” He looked at his watch. “You destroyed the recipe, didn’t you?”