The Bone Clocks

It’s Jacko. He just stands there, watching me. The real Jacko’s twenty-odd miles away, I know, drawing a maze or reading a chess book or doing something Jacko-ish, but the kid I’m looking at’s got the same floppy brown hair, shape, way of standing, even a red Liverpool FC top. I know Jacko and this is him or an identical twin nobody knows about. I keep walking, not daring to blink in case he vanishes. When I’m fifty meters away I wave, and the kid who can’t be my little brother waves. So I shout his name. He doesn’t shout back, but turns and walks down into the underpass. I don’t know what to make of it, but I jog along now, nervous that Jacko’s done a runner to come and find me, even though the sensible part of me is sure it can’t be him ’cause how’d Jacko know where to look?

I run as fast I can, now, knowing something strange is going on, but not knowing what. The underpass is for walkers and cyclists only so it’s quite narrow, and as long as the width of the four traffic lanes and the grass in the middle it goes under. Ahead, down and then up a bit, the far exit’s a square of fields, sky, and roofs. I’ve taken a few steps in before I notice it: Instead of getting darker towards the middle of the underpass, it’s actually getting lighter; instead of getting echoier, it’s getting more muffled. I tell myself, It’s just an illusion, don’t worry, but after a few more steps, I’m sure of it: The underpass is changing its shape. It’s wider and higher, with four corners, a big diamond-shaped room … It’s becoming somewhere else. It’s incredible and it’s terrifying. I know I’m awake but I know this can’t be real. I stop walking altogether; I’m scared of hitting the wall. Where is this? I’ve been nowhere like it. Is it a daymare? Is all that stuff waking up again? There are narrow windows to my left and right, about ten paces away. I’m not going to look through them—they’d be well past the underpass walls—but through the left window I see dunes, gray dunes, climbing up towards a high ridge, but through the right-hand window it’s darker: The dunes roll down towards a sea, but it’s a black sea, utterly black-black, like darkness in a box in a cave a mile underground. A long table’s appeared in the middle of the chamber, wherever we are, and I’m walking down on the left side of it, and look, there’s a woman, keeping pace with me, on the right. She’s young and beautiful in a cold way, like an actress who can’t be touched; she’s got white-blond hair and bone-pale skin, rich rose-red lips and a midnight-blue ball gown like a woman from a story …

Miss Constantin, from my armchair when I was seven years old. Why’s my mind doing this to me now? We head towards a picture hanging in a sharp corner, of a man like a saint from Bible times, but his face has no eyes. I’m inches away now. There’s a black spot on the saint’s forehead, a bit above where the eyebrows meet. It’s growing. The spot’s a dot. The dot’s an eye. Then I feel one on my own forehead, in the same place, but I’m not quite sure I’m still Holly Sykes, not exactly, though if I’m not me, who else could I be? From the spot between my eyes something comes out and hovers there. If I look straight at it, it goes, but if I look away a bit, it’s like a small, shimmery planet thing. Then another comes out, and another, and another. Four shimmerings. I taste green tea. Then it’s like bombs going off and Miss Constantin’s howling and her hands are talons, but she’s flung away, bowled down the table by whip-cracking blue light. The old saint’s mouth’s opened, full of animal teeth, and metal screams and stone groans. Figures and shadows appear like a shadow-puppet show in the mind of someone going mad. One older man springs onto the table. He has piranha-fish eyes, curly black locks, a busted nose, a black suit, and there’s a strange indigo light coming off him, like he’s radioactive. He helps Miss Constantin up, and she points a silver-tipped finger straight towards me. Black flames and a roaring loud as jet engines fill the place, and I can’t run and I can’t fight, and I can’t even see anymore so all I can do is stand there and listen to voices, like voices shouting as a building collapses on their owners, but I catch one clear voice saying, I’ll be here. Then there’s a new shaking, and a light brighter than suns is powering up and up and up until my eyeballs melt in their sockets …