The Professor Returns
Slade turned off the tap and glanced up at the clock on the kitchen wall; it was four-forty five in the morning. He gulped down a mouthful of water. He wasn't even thirsty, just restless, and a trip to the kitchen distracted him from his inability to sleep. He often had this problem when staying over at Holly's and it had nothing to do with sleeping on the sofa, or the fact that he shared the living room with the hum and whir of the machine. It always put him in a thoughtful state, one where his mind just couldn't rest. Of course, he spent a lot of time thinking about Holly in the next room, trying to picture her there and wondering whether she went to sleep thinking of him, too. She had long ago offered him the alternative of staying in her spare room, but he always insisted he was fine on the sofa – for some reason, it kept his hopes alive that this was just temporary, that one day Holly's bedroom door would open to him.
Slade liked sleeping on Holly's sofa more than he liked sleeping in his own bed, in his own flat. Her flat felt more like a home, his home. He liked the feeling that he was there, on hand, to protect both Holly and the machine. There was always a little awkwardness in the morning - passing each other in the hallway, the bathroom rituals, sharing coffee and toast in the kitchen - but he looked forward to it all the same. For some reason, the odd glimpse of Holly in her striped bathrobe, towel-drying her hair drove him crazy. On one occasion, believing Holly to still be in bed, he had emerged from the bathroom clad only in his boxer trunks; their meeting in the hallway had provoked the most incredible blush from Holly, confirming once again the feelings he knew were there. Nevertheless, he made sure it never happened again; it wasn't right to make Holly feel uncomfortable in her own domain, however flattering he might find it. His good behaviour was rewarded one day recently, when he discovered a brand new toothbrush in the bathroom, alongside hers.
"What's this?" he had asked, grinning. "Trying to say something about my breath, Holly?"
She had fixed him with one of her long-suffering looks before trying to dismiss its significance.
"Forgive me for worrying about your dental hygiene."
He settled himself back on the sofa, pulled the quilted blanket up to his chest, and closed his eyes. His brain relived the events of the day, the stalker he and Holly had apprehended, the look on Grisham's face when he presented her with the charge sheet only hours after assigning him the case.
It was only when he heard the noise that he realised he had just dropped off to sleep. His eyes immediately snapped open. He froze. It sounded like the door creaking open. He thought he saw the swoop of a shadow in the pulsing light from the machine. Instinctively, he knew it wasn't Holly in the room with him.
His heart started to beat faster when he thought about Holly next door. A figure was standing with his back to Slade, wearing a long dark coat. Slade held his breath. The man seemed to be looking for something. Slade silently swung his feet off the sofa and kept low. Where was his gun? He felt around in the puddle of discarded clothes on the floor, reacting with relief when his hand connected with the cold metal. The man was at the machine now, and Slade watched as he ran his hand over the controls. How had someone got into the flat? Knowing he had to move before the intruder did, Slade stepped forward, looping one arm around the man's neck and pinning the other behind his back. The man gasped, stumbling backwards into Slade; it took all of Slade's composure to ensure they both stayed upright.
"What do you want?" the man spluttered.
Slade could see now that the intruder was a lot older than him, a man in his late fifties at least, and that he wasn't going to put up much of a fight.
"What do I want?" Slade replied. "I'm not the one breaking into other people's homes in the dead of night."
"Let me explain," the man said, quaking in Slade's grip.
Slade pushed the man towards the sofa, still bearing the indentation from his own recent repose. He could see him a little more clearly now, the owlish spectacles, the greying hair. The two men faced each other, both wondering what the other was planning to do next.
Holly was roused from her sleep by the sound of a struggle. As she kicked off the covers and rushed to the bedroom door, her first thought was of Slade. Frantically, she looked around her for something that could double as a weapon, but the only thing she could lay her hands on was a particularly heavy edition of Fundamentals of Applied Dynamics. Wielding the book, she carefully opened the door. It was then that she realised that the sounds of physical struggle had been replaced by muffled voices. As she approached the living room, her heart leapt into her throat when the door was suddenly opened.
"Everything's under control," Slade said.
She noticed the gun in his hand.
"What's going on?" she replied, hearing her voice waver. "Who's in there?"
"I caught a man creeping around the flat," he said. "What have you got there?"
Slade nodded towards the book.
"What were you planning to do? Bore him into submission?"
"Are you okay?" she asked, ignoring him and looking for signs of injury. Slade, she knew, could handle himself in a fight, but he wasn't as invincible as he sometimes thought he was.
"I'm fine," he nodded. "Think I took him by surprise. He probably didn't expect to find anyone asleep on the sofa."
"Should I call the station?" Holly asked, immediately thinking about the potential problems of allowing access to her flat, and the problem of explaining why Slade was there in the middle of the night. Her biggest fear, though, was that someone, a stranger, had now presumably seen the machine.
Before Slade could answer, they both heard a voice from the living room calling Holly's name. They exchanged confused glances. The man called again, louder this time, and something sparked within Holly. She pushed past Slade towards the door, wriggling free as he tried to grab her arm to stop her. It was impossible, she must be mistaken – but she had to know.
Holly burst into the living room, but it was empty. She looked around her, left to right and back again, but there was nobody there.
"Where is he?" Holly asked.
By this time, Slade was in the room, too, and was equally baffled.
"He's gone!" Slade exclaimed.
The shutters on the windows were still closed, and when Slade went to check, they saw that the windows were, too. Logically, Slade knew, too, that anyone who thought about trying to escape from her first floor window would sharp change their mind when they saw the drop.
He shook his head.
"How did he do that? He was right there on the sofa."
Thoughts spooled through Holly's mind, things she instantly dismissed as impossible and illogical. But she knew what she heard. Or what she thought she heard.
"Are you okay?" Slade asked.
Holly started checking over the machine, looking for signs it had been tampered with. When she looked up, Slade was watching her with a look of concern on his face. She nodded, suddenly becoming aware of the short nightshirt she was wearing, and the feeling of Slade's eyes on her. Ordinarily, the fact that he was only wearing boxers' shorts and a close-fitting t-shirt would have distracted her, too.
"What did he look like?" she asked, trying to refocus.
Slade shrugged.
"Medium height, glasses, greyish-brown hair, probably late fifties."
"What else? What was he wearing?"
Slade frowned. It was like being back at the police training college, doing the suspect description test. Accuracy in this area was never his strong point.
"He had a dark coat; it was hard to see much else."
"Are you sure?"
"Holly, what is this about? What's with all the questions?"
Holly turned away, sighing. She was kidding herself.
"It's nothing, Slade," she told him. "We should get some sleep."
"Do you want to report it?" he asked. "I can look into it tomorrow, tell Grisham I'm tying up loose ends on the Ridley case."
She was about to answer when her attention was drawn to something on the arm of the sofa, glinting in the light from the machine. She picked up a gold locket on a long chain.
"This locket, where did you find it?"
Slade frowned. "I've never seen it before. Maybe your intruder dropped it; could be a useful clue."
"No, Slade, I know this locket." Holly felt a swell of emotion. "It belonged to my mother."
"Your mum?"
"I haven't seen it since...since she died."
Slade could see the effect that these simple words were having on Holly, and he looked for signs that she wanted his comfort. As usual, she did her best to rein in her emotions. She had never talked about her mother, and had left it up to Slade to privately speculate on what had happened to her.
Holly released the tiny clasp on the locket and gasped as she opened it. In it was the same tiny photograph that had always been there, a photograph of a baby. She felt Slade looking over her shoulder.
"Is that you?" he asked.
She nodded.
"You haven't changed a bit."
Holly smiled. "When I was little, I was always asking her to show me the photo. I made her promise she would give me the locket one day. I looked for it after she died, but never found it. Then I forgot all about it."
"So what's it doing here now? Do you think someone was returning it to you?"
"I don't know. Maybe."
Slade touched her shoulder, and Holly resisted the urge to fold herself into his arms. It used to be enough to just have Slade around, but more and more recently she found herself craving his physical touch. But things were too complicated.
"Go back to bed, Holly," he said. "I'll stay up, just in case he comes back."
Holly shook her head. "I don't think I could sleep now."
"Do you want to travel back, see if we can find out who he was?"
It was tempting, but Holly wasn't sure she could cope with the emotions wrapped up with the inevitable disappointment.
"I'm going to make some coffee," she said finally, her fingers enveloping the locket clasped tightly in her hand.
It was easy to focus on work when there was so much going on. Holly took delivery of several boxes of clothing, bagged as evidence and waiting to be tested for gunshot residue. When she had finished with them, Grisham sent her out to a crime scene with Nicky, who was shortly to sit his exams and wanted some revision on collecting hair and fibre evidence. Slade was doing what he hated most: paperwork. He had observed that one of the downsides of the machine helping him to solve cases was that his paperwork requirements had gone through the roof. He often asked Holly to read through his reports, and she never failed to be amazed by his creative spelling and unique turn of phrase. It had crossed her mind that perhaps he did it deliberately, to enable him to hang around her office.
"What are you up to tonight?" Slade asked, perching on the table while she read through his work. He noticed something different about Holly; the locket was around her neck, tucked into her blouse.
"Building a new particle inhibitor," she replied. "Slade, 'appointed' is spelled with two Ps, and 'privilege' does not have a D in it."
He rolled his eyes.
"Do you want some help?"
"Oh, so you've taken that course in micro-mechanics, then?"
"Okay, do you want some company?" he revised.
"Will you keep out of my way?" Holly said, raising an eyebrow at him.
"I can't promise that, but I will cook dinner."
It was an offer that Holly could never refuse. In the last year, her kitchen had seen more use than in the previous ten years combined. Until Slade came into her life, the kitchen table was simply a repository for projects-in-progress, which occasionally got pushed to one side so she could eat a toasted sandwich. She hated to admit it, but she loved to watch him work; cooking revealed a passionate and creative side that no-one else got to see. Neither of them had openly acknowledged the fact that Slade now spent as many evenings at her flat as away from it, but it was an arrangement that seemed to suit them both. There was only the odd uncomfortable moment, such as the time she met him in the hallway wearing only his boxers' shorts; she hadn't known where to look or what to say. This was all surprisingly new to Holly; she had always believed that attraction to the opposite sex should be first and foremost an intellectual one, but whatever she felt for Slade was also undeniably physical. She was almost ashamed to admit that the physical attraction had been there from the start, and it was only since she had come to spend more time with him that she had developed such a powerful emotional and intellectual attachment.
"It's a deal," she told him. "Providing you do the washing up, too."
"Remind me what I get out of this?"
It was one of those moments, happening all the more frequently, when the blurred lines of their friendship really started to show. Holly used to hate it when men tried to flirt with her, but not Slade – he knew how to walk that fine line perfectly.
"Two words for you, Slade," she said. "Time machine."
Slade nodded, accepting defeat. He took his corrected report from Holly's outstretched hand and slunk back to his desk, although not without checking over his shoulder to give her a wink.
Holly returned to her own report-writing. She was actually relieved that she wouldn't be going back to her flat alone that evening; the emotions stirred by last night's strange events were still very raw. She knew why Slade had offered to keep her company – because he thought she must be shaken by the break-in – but that wasn't it. Instead, she was consumed by 'what ifs?', and it had sent her brain into overdrive.
When they arrived back at Sundown Court that evening, both Slade and Holly were weighed down with shopping bags. It was weeks since Holly had properly replenished her cupboards and fridge. Slade wasn't strong on detail when it came to his work, but he seemed to have perfect recall when it came to recipes, and he assured Holly she was now stocked up for a good couple of weeks.
"That's strange," Holly said, as she turned the key in the latch. "I mustn't have locked the door this morning."
Slade frowned. "No, I saw you do it."
They looked at each other. Slade put down the grocery bags and put his finger to his lips. He reached into his waistband for his gun and stepped over the bags and into the flat. As he made his way through the hallway, a figure appeared in front of him, and in that split second three things happened; Slade raised his gun, the man raised his hands, and Holly cried out.
"Dad!"
Slade couldn't have been more confused, as he watched Holly run towards the man and saw the man take her in his arms. There was no doubt about it: it was the same man, the man from the night before. The fact that Holly was calling the man 'dad' wasn't helping to make things clearer; her father, as far as he knew, was as good as dead, a prisoner in the dreaded Loop of Infinity.
"So," he heard the man say. "Are you going to tell me why this fellow keeps pointing a gun at me?"
In the stark light of the kitchen, Slade could see that Professor Turner was not a well man. His skin was pale, almost grey, and his clothes hung off him, almost as though he had shrunk in the rain. Overcome with emotion, Holly had succumbed to tears and was now trying to regain her composure. Slade's instinct was to try to comfort her, but her father had taken on this role. The three of them sat around the kitchen table, Professor Turner clasping his daughter's hand. They kept looking at each other, both seemingly unable to comprehend the other's presence, and both unable to find the words to say. Slade couldn't help but feel like an intruder himself.
"I can't believe it's really you!" Holly said, tears pricking her eyes again. "What happened to you? When you didn't come home, I was sure you were trapped in the Loop of Infinity."
"I was," her father replied. "It exists, Holly, just as I always thought."
"So how did you...?"
"It's a long story, and I may not have time to tell it."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that this isn't the first time I've tried to get back here."
"Last night," Slade cut in. "You left the locket."
Professor Turner nodded.
It was then that Holly realised she hadn't introduced the two men to each other, and how incomprehensible this all must be to Slade.
"Dad, this is Jeff Slade. We work together. And Slade...this is my father."
Holly never expected to hear those words come out of her mouth, but it sounded like music to her.
"Work together?" Professor Turner asked. "Work where?"
"I work for the police now, Dad," Holly told him. "As a Science Officer. Slade is a detective. He knows about the machine."
"Pleased to meet you, Professor Turner," Slade said, offering his hand across the table. The older man shook it, warily.
"I've seen you before," he said.
"Slade was here last night," Holly said.
"I know, but before that."
"You were here before?"
"Six days ago. When I travelled here, you were in the kitchen. I think you were cooking," Professor Turner said, nodding to Slade.
"Why didn't I see you?" he replied.
"It was only a few seconds, and then the glitch happened."
"The glitch?" Holly said.
Professor Turner took a deep gulp from his glass of water.
"To you, Holly, I've been gone for nearly six years. But to me, it's been two thousand, one hundred and sixty-three days, each one of those the same. Never have I been so sorry that a theory of mine turned out to be correct. I always taught you that you can't change the past, but in those first days I was desperate, and I tried over and over again to undo what I did, to get back to the machine."
"Why didn't you?" Holly asked. "I thought something terrible must have happened to you."
"It was such an idiotic thing," he sighed. "When I went out that day, I got myself in a position where I feared I would meet myself. By the time I managed to escape the situation, I simply hadn't sufficient time to return to the machine. When the watch ran down, I was at the corner of the street; I could even see you up at the window, Holly. When I accepted that it was impossible to change the past, I knew I had to come up with another way. I had to continue working on the machine, develop new theories, prove myself wrong. The problem was that each time I made an adaptation-"
"- the next day, the machine returned to the way it was," Holly said, nodding.
"Erased by the timeline," Professor Turner confirmed. "It was the same with all the plans and calculations I made. Every time I wrote something down, it would disappear, even when I tried writing on my own skin."
Slade recalled the various injuries, gunshot wounds included, that had simply disappeared when he returned to the present day.
"I realised that I needed to put myself in a position where I could complete all the work within a day," Professor Turner continued. "So I could trial the machine without my adaptations being undone. At the same time, I had to keep a count of how many actual days had passed since the accident, so that when – if – I ever succeeded, I would know I was in the right time."
Holly found it hard to comprehend what she was hearing. She always knew her father was an exceptional scientist, a visionary in his field, but she hadn't realised how much determination and resilience he had. She felt him squeeze her hand.
"It was you who kept me going, Holly," he said. "I have been with you every one of those days, watching you do the same things over and over, and never able to tell you what had happened to me."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because you would have wanted to help me, and I couldn't let you. I had to let you live your life the way it was intended to play out. It broke my heart, not able to see how your life was developing in the present. I started staying up later and later into the night, believing that I was close to cracking it; some days, you would urge me to look after my health – I must have looked terrible."
"You don't look well now," Holly said, putting a hand to her father's head. "Have you even been eating?"
Her father, she remembered, used to become so preoccupied with his work that he forgot to eat proper meals. A habit she had fallen into herself.
"Living the same day over and over means eating the same food. After a while I suppose I lost interest; food became just a basic fuel."
"So, how did you get back?" Slade asked, trying to keep up. It was one thing trying to keep pace with one genius, but two was pushing the limits of his ability.
"I managed to find a way to create a transverse temporal pathway," Professor Turner replied.
Slade automatically looked to Holly for a translation.
"It's like forcing a shortcut between two time zones. Like dismantling a wall or digging a tunnel," she explained, before turning back to her father. "I wasn't sure that was possible."
"I wasn't either," he replied. "I had never truly considered it until I needed to. The problem is that I can't find a way to stay in the present – that's why the glitching keeps happening. Sometimes I feel as though I'm in a giant game of snakes and ladders, or that I'm tumbling back down the rabbit hole."
"But you must have solved the glitching now?" Holly asked, echoing Slade's exact thoughts.
"I don't know," Professor Turner said. "This is the longest I have managed to remain in the present, but I don't know how it has happened. For all I know, I could glitch at any second and be back there again."
"Then we're wasting time," Holly said. "We have to work. You have to show me what you've been working on."
She got up from the table, her father automatically following. Slade had never felt more useless or out of his depth, and this was a time when Holly really needed help.
"You'll need something to keep you going," he heard himself say. "I'll bring you something to eat."
Holly turned back, offering an appreciative smile. That was all he needed.
Within minutes, the coffee table was adorned with Frederick Turner's frenzied diagrams and calculations, and Holly was poring over them, trying to get up to speed with her father's ideas. While she did this, he circled the machine, making notes and examining the components.
"This is commendable, Holly," he said. "I always hoped you would continue the work, but you've done so much. Can you control how far you travel?"
She shook her head, suddenly feeling her accomplishments left wanting.
"Not yet. It's still unpredictable; sometimes it's three minutes, sometimes it's a few days."
"A few days? That's longer than I ever managed. You replaced the photon rods? That must have been expensive."
"It's why I had to get a job," she told him. "I thought working for the police would at least allow me enough time to keep working on the machine."
"And then you met him," Professor Turner said.
Holly knew her father was referring to Slade, and the tone he used was not enthusiastic.
"I know we agreed that the machine had to be kept secret," she began, suddenly feeling like she was nine years old again. "But I had no choice. Slade caught me out."
"How?"
"I went back in time to help him solve a case and keep his job. He was going to be fired."
Saying it out loud made it sound so foolish, and conveyed more than she wanted to about her feelings for Slade. She had risked everything for a man who, at the time, was basically just a work acquaintance.
"How do you know he'll keep it secret?" Professor Turner asked. "What's to stop him from going public, from exposing everything?"
"He promised me he wouldn't," Holly said, feeling a barrage of emotion well up inside her again. Regaining her composure, she added, "He made a commitment, and I trust him."
Professor Turner touched his daughter's shoulder, and when Holly looked up she saw the solemnity in his eyes.
"But has he made a commitment to you?"
Holly lowered her gaze again, trying to fix her eyes on the pages in front of her.
"How can you be sure he isn't just using you for the machine?" her father continued. "And what happens if he meets another woman, wants a life elsewhere? I'm sorry, Holly, I'm just afraid; all I've ever wanted is for you to be happy."
Harnessing her self-control as best she could Holly faced her father, a look of tender concern on his face. He had always been able to read her like a book, and she knew he would see straight through any lie or half-truth she offered him.
"You always told me that loneliness was a terrible thing," she said.
"But maybe it's better than heartbreak," Professor Turner replied, not missing a beat.
Unbeknown to either of them, the latter half of their conversation had been overhead. Approaching the living room with an offering of food, Slade had immediately stopped on hearing the mention of his name. Even he had scruples when it come to listening in to private conversations, but the obvious intensity of the dialogue between Holly and her father could not be ignored. And when he heard what Professor Turner had to say – and what Holly clearly felt unable to say – he felt a powerful ache build in his chest. Slade knew Holly was a scientist first and foremost, and she relied on evidence – and Slade hadn't given her the evidence she needed, that she deserved to be given. In a daze, he retreated to the solitude of the kitchen, food still in hand.
Holly watched her father remove the transmuter from the underside of the machine and examine the circuitry.
"It isn't like that, Dad. Slade and I are just friends," she said.
"You had more than that with Stephen Marlowe," Professor Turner replied. "But then you never looked at Stephen the way you look at this man Slade."
Holly was silenced by this; her father had quickly evaluated the evidence in front of him and come to the correct conclusion. She shouldn't have expected anything else. It was at that moment that there was a knock on the door, and Slade came into the room. Holly instantly felt her cheeks flush, as though she had just made some terrible confession. Why was Slade looking at her like that?
"There's more in the pan if you can manage it," Slade said, addressing her father. "Looks like you could use it."
"Thank you," Holly said quietly. As usual, the food smelt delicious, homely.
"Um, Holly," Slade said, feeling the weight of Professor Turner's stare. "Can I talk to you in the kitchen for a moment?"
Holly was reluctant to leave her father, aware that there was so much work to do, afraid that he could vanish into thin air at any moment. When they were in the next room, she waited for Slade to speak, but he seemed to have been struck dumb, a scenario neither of them were used to.
"What is it?" she asked.
Slade took a deep breath. With all the consideration that he had given his relationship with Holly over the past months, this wasn't something he had planned for. He had assumed he would have time, would be prepared, that somehow it would all just, well, happen. But now it seemed he would have to help it along.
"Slade, I have to get back to work."
"This'll only take a minute."
He looked at her, searching in vain for some sign that she could read his mind, that she would save him the difficulty. He started to feel panic rise within him.
"Well?"
Cupping her face with his hand, Slade kissed Holly for the first time, deeply and passionately. He thought he felt her returning the kiss, but then found himself being pushed away.
"Slade, what are you doing?" Holly cried.
Slade felt himself floundering.
"I'm, um, I was, I mean, I thought it was what you wanted, what we both wanted?"
"God, Slade, your timing!" she exclaimed. She couldn't comprehend what had just happened. One minute her father was reminding her that Slade had never declared his feelings, and the next Slade was apparently trying to do exactly that, albeit in a remarkably clumsy and ill-judged way.
Holly needed to get away from both of them, to clear her head, otherwise she would never be able to focus on helping her father. The problem was that she knew she had given herself over to the kiss, for just that split second. Slade must have felt it. And she could still taste the kiss, felt her pulse still racing from its intensity and impact. For his part, Slade looked as though she had actually slapped him.
"I'm going out", Holly told him, grabbing her jacket from the hook in the hallway. "Please tell my father I'm going to the library and then to central labs for spare components. I'll be as quick as I can."
As the front door closed with an abrupt slam, Slade felt as though he'd received a punch to the gut. He had seen Holly angry, seen her angry with him plenty of times, but he honestly didn't think that she would react this way to his romantic advances. Calling what he did romantic was, he knew, pushing the meaning of the word to its very limits, but he genuinely thought the end would justify the means. His timing, he acknowledged, could have been better. But despite his self-rebuke, Slade still felt a little dazed from the kiss, which far surpassed even his expectations. In that fraction of a second in which Holly returned the kiss, nothing had ever felt so right.
Slade knew he couldn't hide in the kitchen all night, so it was with hesitation that he re-entered the living room, unsure how much Holly's father had heard of their encounter. He found Professor Turner lying face up under the machine, tinkering with some of the mechanisms; his empty plate lay on the floor beside him.
"I've got to hand it to you, Mr Slade," he said, his voice muffled by the machine. "You know your way around the kitchen, which is more than I can say for myself."
"Glad you liked it," Slade replied, flatly.
"Where's Holly?"
"She went out. Said she needed to go to the library and find some spare parts."
"At this time of night?"
Slade shrugged.
"Aren't you going to eat?" Professor Turner asked.
"I might have something later."
"Well, in that case, you can give me a hand here."
Slade gave a short laugh. "They don't teach quantum physics at the police training college."
"Do you know how to use a spanner and screwdriver? Then you can help. I'm getting too old to be putting myself through these physical contortions, and I'm getting arthritis in my fingers."
Professor Turner got to his feet, and Slade rolled up the sleeves of his shirt before taking up the position the older man had vacated, beneath the machine. He had no idea what he was looking at, but he felt a challenge coming on.
"Can you see a series of cross-haired screws?" Professor Turner asked. "They should be holding some red wires in place."
Slade confirmed that he could.
"The wires all need to be stripped back, and then the screws re-tightened."
"You're not trying to electrocute me, are you, Professor?" Slade said.
"Do I have a good reason to?"
This reminded Slade of something: the back-and-forth battles of words in which he and Holly often found themselves. She had clearly learned from the best.
Slade did what he was told, his mind recalling the days he and his brothers had spent working on the old Ford Capri they all shared in their teens.
"You know, you're not at all what I imagined, Mr Slade," Professor Turner said.
"What you imagined?"
"Every day I have been away, I wondered about what my daughter was doing. How she was coping, whether she was alone. I desperately wanted some companionship for her, someone who would take care of her."
"I'm not sure Holly thinks she needs taking care of."
"I know. But she's had had rather a lonely life. After her mother died, there was just the two of us, and I wasn't very good company for her. I didn't cope very well with Isobel's death, and I threw myself into my work, to the detriment of Holly's childhood. I moved her away from her friends in Cambridge, brought her here. She never complained, but that's because she's so fiercely loyal."
Slade knew that more than anyone; she had shown him more loyalty than he deserved.
"You know she wanted to be a doctor, like her mother?" Professor Turner said. "She grew up helping me with my work, but when her mother died, I think Holly felt a responsibility to her. She did two years of a medical degree at Cambridge before switching to physics."
"So what changed her mind?"
Slade briefly tried to picture Holly as a doctor, working in a busy A&E or sitting behind a GP's desk. If she'd taken this route, they never would have met.
"I broke my arm in a stupid cycling accident. Instead of taking an internship at the Royal Free Hospital, she stayed here to look after me, and help me with my work, and I suppose she became hooked. Time travel can do that to you."
Slade tightened the last of the screws, as he had been instructed. Professor Turner directed him to a complex-looking box of tricks that needed to be removed, and an identical one put in its place. If Holly could see him now, she would think she'd entered a parallel universe.
"Time travel also consumes your life," Holly's father continued. "I've sacrificed too much. I couldn't comfort my wife when she needed me, I lost my daughter, and I've compromised my health. I don't want that for Holly. I want her to really live."
Slade felt a responsibility being conferred on him, although the words hadn't actually been spoken.
"Do me a favour, detective," Professor Turner said. "Go into the desk drawer, the one on the right. I need you to fetch something."
Slade frowned.
"I don't want to get it myself, in case the glitch suddenly happens," the older man explained. "There's a false back to the drawer. You should be able to lever it away."
Slade felt inside the drawer until his finger met with a small groove in the wood. The back of the drawer came away with a light tug. The next thing he felt was something velvet-covered; as he withdrew his hand, he saw it was a jewellery box. Professor Turner gestured for him to open it. Inside was a woman's ring, a diamond by all accounts.
"It was Holly's mother's engagement ring," Professor Turner explained. "She always wanted Holly to have it. I want you to give it to her."
"Don't you want to give it to her yourself?" Slade asked.
Professor Turner laughed. "No, I want you to give it to her. When the time is right."
Slade suddenly realised what was being implied.
"Professor Turner, I don't think you understand. Holly and me, we're just friends."
"Funny, that's what she said, too, and I didn't believe her either," he replied, not looking up from his calculations. "As I said: when the time is right."
Getting out of the flat was exactly what Holly needed, but now she was anxious to know if her father was still there. Central Labs had had most of the parts she thought she would need, and her mind was now energised by the work ahead of her. Of course, Slade wasn't far from her mind either. She was embarrassed to think of how many times she had imagined kissing him, but those were not the circumstances she'd pictured. She was furious with him for picking such a delicate time, but also afraid that there wouldn't be another one, that she might have pushed him away for good.
When she arrived back at the flat, she was surprised to find Slade apparently hard at work on the machine, her father coaching him from his position on the sofa. She immediately worried what her father was playing at, but when he looked up, those thoughts were instantly replaced by concern: he looked dreadful. His skin was even more pallid than before, his eyes blank with what was clearly exhaustion.
"Dad, you should go to bed and rest," she told him, shrugging off her jacket and dropping her bag to the floor.
"I'm fine," he replied. "We're making good progress."
Holly glanced at Slade, who was watching her. At least he had the good grace to look slightly sheepish.
"Then at least lie down on the sofa," she reasoned. "I can take over now."
Holly set to work, with occasional input from her father. He seemed to submit to his fatigue, and drifted in and out of consciousness as the night wore on. But he was still there, and that was what mattered.
As his help became less viable, Slade busied himself with tidying up the kitchen, making coffee and generally keeping out of Holly's way. She hadn't spoken to him yet, not directly, and now wasn't the time – he wasn't going to be that stupid twice in one evening. At some point he must have fallen asleep in the armchair, because when he woke up with a start, it was after three. Holly was asleep more or less upright at one end of the sofa, having clearly fought fatigue until the final moment. But there was no sign of Professor Turner. He quietly got up, and started to look around the flat, checking the kitchen, the bathroom and the spare bedroom. No sign. He checked the front door, which was still locked from the inside. It seemed to have happened exactly the way Professor Turner said it would.
Slade returned to the living room, where Holly's soft breathing mingled with the low drone of the machine. As he looked at her, his heart swelled. He touched his trouser pocket, feeling the shape of the jewellery box within it.
"Holly," he whispered, gently touching her face.
"Mmm."
She didn't open her eyes, and when no further words followed, Slade crouched down and lifted her into his arms. He half expected to be shoved away again, but this time Holly did not protest. In fact, he felt her arms encircle his neck, and she seemed to settle against his chest. He could feel her breath on his skin.
As Slade carried Holly through the hallway, he heard her murmur something.
"What was that?" he whispered.
"Where's my father?"
He pushed open the bedroom door with his elbow.
"He's gone, Holly."
Slade thought she would immediately want to return to work, but instead she nodded sleepily, apparently accepting this for the time being.
"You'll get him back again," Slade added. "One day."
He lowered Holly onto the mattress, and as he started to extricate his arms from beneath her, he felt a tug on his shirt front. Holly was drawing him towards her.
"Stay?" she whispered.
"I'll be right next door," he replied.
She shook her head, barely rousing from her sleep.
"No," she said, tugging at his shirt more insistently this time. "Stay. Here."
"Are you sure?"
He saw her smile.
"Don't get any ideas, Slade. At least not tonight."
He eased himself onto the mattress beside her, and pulled the duvet over them both. As he did so, he felt Holly inch closer to him; he offered her his arms, and she willingly fitted her body to his, their legs entwining.
"You kissed me," Holly whispered.
"Yes, I noticed that, too."
"Do you think you might do it again sometime?"
"That depends. Maybe if you promise not to break my arm."
Holly laughed softly.
"Slade?"
"What?"
"Is that a box in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?"
THE END