The Watch – Part 101:

‘I have about a million questions and have no idea what one to ask first,’ Amy said, sitting up in bed. Her leg was propped up on a couple of cushions. I was sitting on the chair beside her bed, not knowing where to begin my explanation. We were lucky enough to book the same room we had last night once more. I was expecting the woman behind the counter to ask what happened that Amy had a bandage around her leg and limping quite badly, but I gave her a stern look as if to say, ‘just don’t’ to which she nodded her head and went off to grab the key for the room. She was really sorry that she couldn’t arrange for us to stay in a room on the lower floor due to it being all booked up, but we didn’t mind since we were just really pleased that we were able to get a room for the night. The stairs were a bit of a struggle for Amy’s leg, but I and the woman behind the bar helped her up each one and when she reached the final step and onto the floor where our room was, she was so pleased and relieved that she more or less simply walked to the door as if it was just any other night.

We settled in our room instantly. I made sure Amy was comfortable and happy before making myself as much of the same as I could. I’ve always had this feeling at the back of my head that Amy would know someday, but I never knew that it would be this day. It has only been a few days since I acquired my watch that my secret was revealed. I don’t know how to feel or what to think. I want to try and explain away my feelings to myself to help me understand what is going through my head, but there are no straight thoughts.

‘I guess, I should start with the question that I asked before,’ Amy said after a good few seconds of silence, ‘how did you do what you did back there? How were you able to lift those heavy beams with one hand?’ I wasn’t going to beat around the bush. There was only one way that I was going to explain things properly and that’s directly.

‘I have this watch,’ I said, lifting up my sleeve to reveal the ordinary looking watch to Amy. She had already seen the watch before and so she looked at me a mixture of confusion and intrigue. I carried on explaining, ‘it may look like an ordinary watch, but it’s far more than anything you can imagine. It can grant me the ability to have any superpower I want, travel in time to the past or the future, and even allow me to travel between parallel universes.’ Amy looked at me with a blank expression – disabling my ability to read her mind via facial expressions alone. I had to just wait and see what her verdict will be. 

‘How long have you had this watch?’

‘Since the first day of the summer holidays. I found a strange package sitting on my table beside my sofa with a cryptic letter that didn’t explain much about where it came from or who sent it. At first, I thought it was a gift from my mum and dad or something like that, but then things got a lot weirder than I had expected.

‘And what, you decided that you would put this watch on,’ Amy asked as if she was giving me a lecture, telling me off for doing the wrong thing.

‘I didn’t know what the watch actually was. I thought it was just an ordinary watch that was sent to me as a gift from someone who wanted it to be a surprise. No one would know until it was too late.’

‘And you didn’t think about taking it off?’

‘I can’t,’ I said simply.

‘You can’t? Or you won’t?’ Good question, but I am leaning towards the one answer that is far stronger than the other.

‘I can’t. I tried to, but it has attached itself to my arm, embedded itself into my DNA. It’s that connection between me and it that is allowing me to have any super power that I wish, and so on.’ Amy went silent. I could tell that she was trying to out a question amongst the pile she has in her mind, but her expression was still blank: I couldn’t predict what that would be. I just had to be prepared for whatever she asked.

‘So that was you in the shopping centre. You stopped that runaway train. And you stopped that gang from destroying the train we were on yesterday.’ I nodded. ‘I’m guessing time travel had to have played a part in the shopping centre incident?’ she deducted slowly as she was piecing it together as she went along.

I explained all that had actually happened in the shopping centre. ‘I was as surprised as you were when I turned up, but I quickly figured it out that it was my future-self. When you left to go home that night, I went back in time and completed the paradox. Once I had run out of the shopping centre, I didn’t have a clue what to do next, so I simply through it in the river where it sunk to the bottom never to be found again.’ Another short pause.

‘All those stories that we read on those forums. All those entries about you being seen by people. All that time we were researching this person going around saving people, essentially becoming an icon among the people; all that time you knew it was you. All that time I was sitting beside the person. All that time we were figuring it all out, you knew the answers already.’

‘No.’ She looked at me quizzically. ‘I was just as much in the dark as you were.’ I sighed as I knew this was going to sound bad from Amy’s perspective. ‘Most of those stories haven’t happened yet. Whilst you were conducting research just to see if he actually exists, I was conducting research into what would happen. It’s all one big paradox.’

‘I see,’ Amy said directly. ‘You are aware what that looks like from where I’m sitting, don’t you?’ I nodded. ‘And you are aware that I should be shouting at you right now for lying to me, but I’m just simply too tired and broken to do so,’ I nodded again.

‘Why did you keep the secret from me?’

‘It had nothing to do with trust. I knew I could trust you. I was just afraid that you would be caught up in so much worry over protecting the secret, or that you be targeted by someone who would do anything to know who I am. I couldn’t risk that.’

‘So it’s the basic story, then,’ Amy said, accepting the cliché and moving on. I nodded for the third time.

‘Listen, I understand perfectly why you wanted not to tell me. It’s just, it would have been nice to have been told considering I was sitting next door to you all this time. I’m not directly saying it, but there is an element in all of this that point to you using me, and that doesn’t feel nice. Do you understand that?’ Her voice had grown strong to make her point have more weight.

‘I am sorry,’ I said, bowing my head in shame.

‘I know you are, and that’s why I will accept your apology, but now that I am in the loop, I want to know everything.’

‘OK, what do you want to know?’

‘Start from the beginning.’

I spent the next few hours telling her my story from the moment I found the watch right up to now. I explained about the two parallel universes that I want to, that I met a parallel version of her and what we did together. Most of my explanation was taken up with what happened with the robots, this evil person with the same name as me, and his backup plan with the rockets. Hour after hour went by as I packed in as much detail as I could. I was expecting my throat to go saw with thirst, but instead it carried on without protest, as if it knew that this was an important moment in my and Amy’s relationship. When I had finished, there was a long pause as Amy had to finish processing it all before finally speaking up.

‘You stayed to save that world. What made you decide that?’ she asked. ‘Or should I say, what made you decide to be a hero?’ That was a powerful question, but one I knew I had answered myself ages ago.

‘When I stopped that robot in that arena, I knew I had caught the attention of whoever was in control, and I couldn’t leave knowing that that person would at least try and find me, and in doing so, would cause so much distress. I simply couldn’t walk away knowing that. If I were to walk away, I would always know that I had essentially left that world to be destroyed by this crazed person. I didn’t mean to interfere in the arena, but I couldn’t just sit there with the watch at the ready and watch these people be interrogated by this robot. I stayed because I knew it was the right thing to do. When I came back home, and I saw the runaway train on the news, I felt the same feelings – I just couldn’t sit back and watch that happen knowing I am perfectly capable of doing something about it, so I did something about it.’

Amy smiled. Is she going to say anything? I think that if she did, it would ruin the moment. I might have ruined the moment for myself for wondering what is going to happen next. I think I should have just let things play out naturally. As well as so many questions flying around her head, there were an enormous amount of thoughts as well. What was she thinking? It isn't my place to know. If I did, I could ruin everything. I know nothing about what she's thinking just the same as she doesn't know what I'm thinking.

‘Would you have told me?’ she asked suddenly.

‘I would have tried to keep it a secret for as long as I possibly could for the reasons I explained earlier,’ I said as best I could. ‘But it’s impossible to claim that I would never have, I mean…’

‘I’m going to stop you there before you dig yourself into a hole,’ Amy said truthfully. ‘I know what you were trying to say. It’s safe to say that you also kept the secret from me because you were afraid of my reaction. You didn’t want to lose me.’ I nodded at the truth.

‘And yet, if you had kept the secret from me for as long as you possibly could, there was a chance you could have done more damage than good, you do know that, don’t you?’ she explained. Again, I nodded silently to show her that I understood. ‘And I do understand that. You don’t have to worry, OK, I do understand it all.’ I looked up with surprise. She continued, ‘from the moment I saw you on the first day of class four years ago, I liked you. Over those four years, that like started to grow into something more. When you saved me back at the station – OK, I was surprised and I needed so many questions answered – but my feelings towards you haven’t and won’t go away, and it’s because of those feelings that I have, I’ve been able to understand everything you’ve told me tonight. I’m not going to walk away, OK. You don’t have to worry about that.’

I couldn’t say anything as I was stunned and happy at the same time. ‘I love you, Sebastian Spencer, and that’s never going to change.’ I had to gather myself up before I responded.

‘I love you, too, Amy Haywood.’ That would have been the perfect ending to this conversation, but Amy treated this as an ending of a section before moving onto the second part.

‘Does Tom know?’ I shook my head. ‘Are you planning on telling him?’

‘Truthfully, I don’t know.’

‘Do you want my honest opinion?’

‘Please.’

‘I think you should. He is your best friend and has been your entire life. He deserves to know your secret probably more than I do.’ I nodded again. ‘But, it’s not my secret to give, and I have no right to force you to do anything. I’m not sitting where you are and as much as I understand what’s going on, I’m not experiencing this from your perspective. I understand the reasoning behind wanting to keep this a secret, and so you can count on me that I will never let your secret pass my lips until you are ready to tell whoever. I know that you don’t want to put me in an awkward position, and so I will return the favour by not putting you on the spot and revealing even the tiniest amount to anyone. You have my word.’ We both paused as we both let that sink in before continuing.

‘That means a lot to me, you know that.’

‘I do.’

Yet another moment of silence.

‘Do you know anything about this secret organisation we’ve been researching about?’

‘Actually, I am in the dark just as much as you are on that subject. I know nothing about the organisation.’

‘Oh.’ Amy flicked her eyes towards the clock on the wall. ‘It’s four in the morning,’ she wasn’t at all surprised. Neither was I. ‘We had better get some rest,’ and she positioned herself so that she was laying down. I knew that she had so many more questions, but she wouldn’t have been any good to anyone if she was too tired to concentrate on the answers or anything for that matter.

‘Do you need any help?’ I asked.

‘No, I’ve got this,’ she said, lifting up the duvet and sliding herself in. I removed the cushions from the bed, allowing her to stretch her leg out without any obstructions, and placed them onto the chair that I was just sitting on. I then climbed into the sofa bed.

‘What are you doing over there?’ Amy asked.

‘Getting into bed,’ I said.

‘You don’t have to sleep on that thing,’ she said. ‘Come over here and lay on an actual bed. You’ll feel much better in the morning.’

‘You sure?’

‘Yes,’ she insisted. ‘After what we’ve just been through, a good night’s sleep is what we need and you’re not going to get one sleeping on that thing. I slid out of my sofa bed, walked over to the double bed that Amy was laying in and climbed into the opposite side. It really did feel much softer, enabling me to get into a good position immediately.

‘Turn out the light for us,’ Amy said. I turned off the lamp beside our bed and closed my eyes.

‘Sebastian?’ Amy asked.

‘Yeah,’ I answered.

‘The room’s light is still on…’

TO BE CONTINUED…

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)