Cecelia Ahern - Girl in the Mirror

Jack followed the old man into a small room. A machine. The machine. Two old armchairs. A fireplace. Unlit. It smelled of damp. It felt cold.

‘Take a seat.’

The old man was already sitting down.

Again, Jack hesitated, weighing up his options. Then he sat.

Jack placed his briefcase on the thin cold carpet and looked around for a place to lay his hat. The old man offered no help. He settled on hanging it from the handles of his briefcase. He opened the button of his suit jacket, leaned forward, his elbows on his knees as though about to negotiate a deal and he didn’t want the fireplace to hear him. A salesman, the man guessed.

‘So,’ Jack said.

‘So, I attach these here.’ He ignored the impending small talk and attached three wires with suction pads to the man’s temples, and forehead. The mind’s eye.

‘Begin,’ he said, not looking Jack in the eye. Waiting.

‘What do I do?’

‘You just describe the memory as best you can, colours, smells, sounds, expressions of those around you. Speak clearly please.’

‘How does this work?’ Suddenly he looked unsure. Not of himself but of the machine. Of the hype surrounding it.

Did it ever matter how it worked? The old man had debated this endlessly in the beginning years. It was like before turning on the wireless wanting to be told how exactly it works. Or before getting into an automobile wanting to know the exact workings of its engine. It never mattered. ‘Do you want me to tell you how it works or do you just want it to work?’

Once again Jack hesitated. He studied the old man, not liking his attitude, not having imagined it would be like this at all. An old machine in a damp, run-down room with an old man with a chip on his shoulder. It was short of magical. But he seemed to question his predicament again and then surrendered.

Jack cleared his throat.

‘I was away at the weekend. Or at least I told my wife I was.’

He paused for a reaction. He didn’t get one. The old man didn’t flinch, didn’t react, didn’t appear to judge.

‘In fact I didn’t leave the city.’

Again no reaction. He sighed.

‘I met someone and I’ve never done it before but I …’ his voice cracked slightly. ‘I can’t sleep, I can’t eat. I know I made a huge mistake. But I know I can’t lie, I just can’t. Every time she looks at me I just know she knows. She asks me about the weekend away, the one I was supposed to have and I just freeze, I get confused. I want to close my eyes and make it all go away, I want to see the weekend I should have had.’

They mistook him for a counsellor all the time. That’s not what he was there for.

‘Do you need to know all this?’ Jack asked, his eyes wet.

‘No.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘I thought you were getting to it. You just need to tell me the memories.’

‘The ones I want to put in my mind?’

The man nodded. ‘And you know this does not erase memories, it merely adds new ones. I’m not in the business of deleting memory files.’

‘I know that.’

Jack moved his hat to the armchair rest, reached into his briefcase and retrieved a brochure.

‘This is where I should have been. A sales conference. In a hotel in Kerry. That is the hotel there. That is the bedroom. They have extensive grounds, with views over Kenmare Bay. I would have spent time walking there. I enjoy walking. The climate enables a subtropical woodland to grow. They have eucalyptus trees. The air smells sweet. Fresh.’ He swallowed. ‘My colleague told me about it.’

The old man motioned for him to continue.

‘The sales conference was in the hotel. That I don’t need help with, it’s just another conference room in another hotel. But there was a tour around the Ring of Kerry. My wife always wanted to take that trip. I should take her but I can’t now. She’ll realise I’ve never been there but maybe after this …’ He looked at the old man again needing encouragement to continue. The man helped him go through the finer details, how the clouds cast shadows on the mountains, how the air smelled fresh from eucalyptus, sweet with rhubarb, and salty from the sea, how he felt the sun on his face, how his room looked, how he had no cash to tip the man who brought his luggage to his room, how his shirt was crumpled when he took it out of his case, how he should have put it in a suitbag just as his wife had said. They talked about how he’d bought her and the children presents not from Dublin’s Grafton Street on the way home from his city-centre hotel, but from the railway station as he awaited his delayed train. How he’d phoned his wife the bathing pools during a break in their conference instead of when the woman he was with had momentarily left his side in bed in that city hotel.

When Jack was finished the man removed the pads from his forehead and temples. Jack blinked a few times then looked back at him.

‘Goodness.’

The old man turned the machine off. Jack seemed relieved, jovial, cocky even.

‘Saved me money on travel, that did. Should have said I was in Fiji.’

The old man stood up and began his goodbyes. ‘Yes, well, it sounds like it would have been a beautiful trip. Shame you didn’t go on it.’

Jack’s smile faded.

They are nearing the gateway of the park. Out of the green oasis and back to the concrete city, though he doesn’t mind. It’s a beautiful day. The best day of the year, they wonder. They walk under the trees, a light chill now as they are sheltered from the sun. She shivers slightly and he holds her hand tighter as though by doing so he can keep her warmer. He wants to make everything perfect for her all of the time, even when he knows it’s impossible. The smell of moss fills his nose, tickles again. The damp floor to which the sun’s rays can’t creep is thick in the air. It is refreshing and they say so. He steps aside to allow her to walk through the gate before him. She thanks him and waits for him to join her. They look at one another, prepare to part and already his stomach churns at having to leave this dream and go about his work day.

Thanks for last night, she says. There is a shyness about her now, though not an ounce of it last night. He loves this about her but he does not say. He doesn’t want to make her uncomfortable. They make arrangements to meet again tonight. Dinner in the Shelbourne perhaps. Yes. That would be nice. Perhaps an early night. She laughs again, the shyness gone. Of course, my dear. Of course.

‘A cheating husband?’ he said to Judith as soon as Jack Collins had left.

She didn’t look up.

‘He loves his wife.’ She sounded bored by it. But the boredom was too forced. He knew she cared.

‘So he said.’ He sighed.

‘You didn’t believe him?’

‘I did.’

‘But you don’t approve of him?’

He didn’t want to answer. He wasn’t supposed to judge his clients. He never usually did.

‘Everyone deserves a second chance,’ she said.

‘I’m not in the business of helping people lie.’

She looked up then. He saw doubt.

‘Making new memories is not lying,’ he said a little too forcefully. ‘That appointment was a mistake,’ he said, more gently.

‘Okay,’ she shrugged.

He sat with Judith. They ate cheese sandwiches as she continued to read through the letters. He watched her but tried not to make it obvious. Her facial expression didn’t change. He couldn’t tell whether she was impressed or not by any letter her eyes moved over. She put them into two separate piles. He tried to figure out which was which pile. She finished another letter, took a bite of her sandwich then put the letter in the pile on the left. He still couldn’t tell.