Departure (13 page)

LYING IN THE BED THAT WAS ONCE MINE,
in the flat that was once mine, I bring the two notebooks out from under the mattress. A second ticks by while I struggle to choose which to open first. In my left hand, I hold the notes for the novel I've been working on since university. Yellowed, tattered pages hang out of three sides. In my right hand lies my journal, a black-leather-bound volume, one of many I've filled in my life.

Answers first.

I flip the journal open, and stare at the first entry. Third of August 2015. Incredible. This is the same journal I was writing in before I boarded Flight 305. How? I usually fill one every year. My journaling rate must have slowed considerably. Or . . . the entries stop soon after 2015. I hadn't thought of that. This could reveal what happened here.

For a moment I consider taking the journal back out to everyone in the living room, but I need to read it first. I almost dread discovering what it will reveal about me.

I page to the place where my next entry would have been—the day after the plane should have landed.

_______________________________________________________15 Nov. 2015

                
Certainty. Certainty is certainly the word of the day. See what I did there? Yes, of course you do, because I would, and I do. That was certain. And so is my fate, because I've selected certainty.

                
Okay. I'm giddy. It's the relief, the lifting of the burden, the crushing, paralyzing decision made: I will write Oliver Norton Shaw's biography, the sure-to-be-self-aggrandizing, overhyped tome that will change nothing, except for perhaps my fate. I will be well paid. That is certain. I can then use that money to pursue my true passion:
Alice Carter and the Secrets of Eternity
(note: I have renamed it since yesterday, when it was
Alice Carter and the Knights of Eternity
; let's face it, everybody likes a good secret, and with knights we rather know what we're getting, don't we?).

                
The biography will take a year to write, nine months if I can swing it, and it will be out in another year. The printers will kill half a forest to get the door stopper into stores. Critics will pick it apart. Some readers will love it. Some will hate it. And most will forget about it (the worst possible outcome). But the bottom line is that within two years, I will have cash in hand (my advance is to be paid a quarter upon signing, a quarter upon approval of the finished manuscript, a quarter when the hardcover is published, and the final portion upon paperback publication). Every six months, royalties will be paid, via check, minus my agent's 15 percent (well worth it, I still think). Two years to financial freedom. That is certain.

                
Certainty. I've decided to write Oliver Norton Shaw's biography. I am certain that in two years I will be a full-time fiction writer, my life dedicated to a young British girl, Alice Carter, who discovers that she's capable of far more than she ever imagined, that her choices and her unique abilities could change the course of history and save her world. I like that very much. That's something to look forward to. Twenty-four months to go.

So I took the job. And how did it turn out? Luckily I hold my own autobiography in my hand. I flip through the pages, reading the dates
scrawled in my handwriting, searching for a day around two years on . . .

_______________________________________________________21 Oct. 2017

                
Success. I am A Success. Foregoing capitals grammatically uncalled for but necessitated by the following facts:

               
 • The
Sunday Times
#1 Nonfiction Author? Harper Lane

               
 • The
New York Times
#1 Hardcover Nonfiction Author? Harper Lane

               
 • 
USA Today
? You guessed it.

               
 • Reviews. Not all bad. Few punches to the face here and there, but my editor has assured me, “The owner of the
Post
hates Shaw, has for years. Ignore it.” On another hatchet job: “Gibbs thought he'd be selected to write the book. No mystery why he's got a bee in his bonnet. Don't let him chop you up with the ax he's grinding, Harp.” And on and on. But the consensus is clear: it's a hit.

                
It's not just the critics and the charts. The readers—and there
are
readers—people are actually reading this thing and loving it and writing to me, saying so, saying that it gave them some perspective, some courage to go out and change their lives. That's powerful. Every day, when I open my e-mail, there's another dose of it.

                
That's one difference. With ghostwriting, I wrote to please my editors. They approved the checks, and the praise and pay came sporadically. Now the encouragement is delivered fresh every day, digitally, one click away. I'm writing for
them
now. I'm writing for happiness. For pride—in my work, and in the decision I made.

Interesting. I flip through the pages, searching for the thing I really want to know. Several months later, I spot the key phrase.

_______________________________________________________7 Feb. 2018

                
I've met someone. He's smart (very, very smart), charming, well traveled, and knowledgeable beyond belief. In a word, captivating.

                
But it's not like that. He's old enough to be my dad. He's one of Shaw's closest friends, another Titan founder, and his story demands to be told. The world would be a better place if it were. He says I'm the only person who can write it, that he will approve and support no one else. It's me or no one. If I say no, the world will never hear his story, never know the trials, triumphs, and reversals of David Jackson. I've agreed to do it.

I turn the page, surprised at the date. She's pouring every ounce of energy into Jackson's biography and not much into keeping the journal. Another page turn, and I'm at the book release.

_______________________________________________________16 Sep. 2020

                
In this business, they tell you anyone can get lucky once (I don't believe it). You do it twice, and they start to believe you're the genuine article.

                
I'm gathering believers.

                
They say the biography of Jackson is better than Shaw's, his life painted in richer tones, transporting readers to the place where he grew up, where he became the man who conquered the financial world and traded the fate of nations like pieces on a Monopoly board. Most of all, they come to understand his conversion at sixty, why he decided to join Oliver Norton Shaw, dedicating his life and his fortune to the Titan Foundation and the betterment of humanity. They see, in vivid brushstrokes, what being a Titan means to him, how it has made Jackson's life, all his sacrifices, worth it. In short, people understand him. Not just people on the street, but even his most intimate acquaintances. Men like David Jackson aren't overly personable, don't form close mates, aren't apt to emote by the fire with a drink in their hand. He's told me that even his closest friends have rung him up, saying that they finally get him. People he's known for forty years have come up to him at parties and confessed that they finally understand something he did decades before, and what he's trying to do now. Best of all, he's had calls from enemies, people he's feuded with in public and private, people who now want to bury the hatchet and join him and Oliver, to become Titans.

                
He rang me yesterday, related it all, insisting that I did this, that my biography did this.

                
I swore it wasn't true, and I believe that. It's his life, his story, his fortune, that will make whatever happens possible. I'm just a storyteller, and his is a story people want to hear. I was just in the right place at the right time.

                
I had lunch in Manhattan with Jackson and Shaw last Tuesday. They billed it as a celebration, but they're connivers to the end. There was a woman there, another Titan candidate, remarkable in her own right. Not as captivating as Shaw or Jackson, but her story speaks to me. And I know it will to others, to every woman, especially those who grew up in rural corners of the world, where opportunities come rarely and only the lucky escape. I like her, and I like her story. I agreed to write it then and there.

                
In my mind, I held them up, weighed them: my new subject and Alice Carter.

                
One is real. The other is a figment of my imagination, a bedtime tale at best.

                
One may inspire girls for generations. The other might be a hit for a few weeks or even a top-ten-grossing film in any given year, quickly buried by the sands of time and the hype of the next potential blockbuster. People won't remember Alice Carter. But they'll remember Sabrina Schröder because she's real. Every second of her struggle is true. Her triumph is an inspiration. Her story needs to be told.

                
It's an easy choice.

Whoa. Didn't see that coming. The bio must be on the bookshelf outside, one of the ones I skimmed past, looking for Alice Carter. I'll check after I finish with the journal.

After 2020, the journal entries change. The inner dialogue stops. There are no more thoughts or feelings. It's a bloody almanac now, a history of stats—mostly sales numbers—years, and the biographies I penned. No wonder the journal was never filled.

Then, suddenly, fifty years later, the terse, just-the-facts entries give way to something else.

_______________________________________________________23 Dec. 2070

                
Alone. Another year. And so is he. Nothing to do but write, my only friend. We've confessed our feelings to each other. He has a plan. He's so brave. It would change everything. For the first time since my mum lay on her deathbed, I've been praying. I want it so much. It's the only way. Without it, he's unreachable. No,
I am
. Forbidden.

                
The Titans—our last enemy. It's ironic. The controversial cabal I sold to the world is now the only barrier to my immortal happiness.

And that's it. No more entries. You've got to be kidding me. Maybe there's another journal. I'm about to ransack the flat when the bedroom door swings open and Nick leans in. “Hey—” He narrows his eyes, taking in the sight of me lying in bed with the journals, the sadness on my face. “Everything all right?”

Oh, sure, nothing amiss, just found out I abandoned my dream and passed away a spinster who wasted her final years pining for an unavailable man.

“Just resting,” I lie, trying too hard to sound casual.

Nick sees right through it. He already seems to know me so well. Or is reading people part of his job, whatever that is?

He comes in and sits down beside me, letting the door close behind him. My heart rate climbs. Butterflies multiply and rise like flames from a newly kindled fire. God, I've turned into a twelve-year-old. I should be in a mental institution.

“What's the matter?” he asks.

I hold the notebook up. “Been reviewing some of my life choices.”

“And?”

“Looked good initially, but things . . . didn't exactly work out.”

“For her.”

“Her past is my future.”

“It doesn't have to be.” He seems so sure. God, how does he do that? It's effortless for him.

I set the notebook aside, and he motions to the living room.

“I think we've made a breakthrough. There's a museum that may tell us what happened here. And Yul and Sabrina have agreed to talk there.”

“Museum?”

“It's called Titan Hall.”

THE MARCH TO TITAN HALL
feels endless. In reality, it's only four blocks from my flat.

Sabrina and Yul lead the way, with Grayson alone in the middle, and Nick and me bringing up the rear.

We're silent for our own safety, but I have the sense that everyone is deep in thought, contemplating this strange, deserted London of the future—waiting for answers, for the final shoe to drop.

With each passing block, with each empty street, hope that we'll find help slips away. This is my city and my neighborhood, and I feel their emptiness keenly, but I don't think I'm the only one affected. The vacant alleys, looted stores, crumbling office buildings, and abandoned residential towers all confirm the truth that every one of us is fearing but no one has yet stated:

London is empty—there's no help for us to find here.

Finally, we turn a corner and Titan Hall comes into view. It occupies an entire city block, most of it green space. What must have once been a splendid park is now overgrown; it feels like a nexus for nature's reclamation of London, the point of origin for weeds, vines, and trees that are slowly burying the last evidence of man's existence.

In the middle of the park sits a simple stone and timber building, barely visible through the lush overgrowth in the dim moonlight. The hall's modest size and simplicity, in sharp contrast to the crowded, overbuilt London around it, actually makes it far more striking. The effect likely didn't come cheap. I know this block; it used to be occupied by office buildings and large homes, any one of which would have cost a fortune.