Present Day

  The footage looped back to the beginning.

  Linda didn’t notice at first.

  She was still half in the church — the smell of cold stone, the sound of wood clicking shut — her body standing at the bar while her mind replayed a coffin lowering into earth.

  Jolie nudged her arm. Not gently.

  “Linda.”

  Linda blinked. The bar snapped back into place — sticky floor, neon reflection in the mirror, Mick wiping his hands on a cloth that would never be clean.

  “That woman,” Linda said, voice thin. “Her name was Margaret. Margaret Marlowe.”

  Jolie tilted her head. “Okay.”

  “She was convinced she was dying,” Linda went on, words tumbling now that they’d started. “Even when the scans said remission. She laughed when I told her. Like I’d missed the point.”

  Jolie exhaled through her nose. “So either she was very unlucky... or very good at seeing patterns.”

  Linda nodded slowly. “She told me it wouldn’t last.”

  “And it didn’t,” Jolie said quietly.

  The woman on the screen reached for Alice’s hand again.

  Linda’s jaw tightened.

  “And the grandson,” Linda said. “Elias. Elias Marlowe.”

  Jolie frowned — not theatrically, but enough that it registered. “That name...”

  She searched her memory, visibly annoyed when it didn’t cooperate. “I’ve heard it. Somewhere. I just don’t know where.”

  Linda looked back at the screen. “He was... calm. Not comforting. Just steady. Like he expected endings.”

  “That’s unsettling,” Jolie said flatly. Then she glanced at Mick. “Sorry.”

  Mick shrugged. “I’ve met worse.”

  Linda finally tore her eyes away. “Thank you,” she said to him, meaning it. “For this.”

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  “Yeah, well,” Mick said, already defensive. “Don’t make me regret it. And tell your girlfriend she’s on thin ice. One more no-show and I’m done.”

  Jolie nodded once. “Fair.”

  They stepped outside into the cold.

  The door shut behind them with a dull thud, sealing the bar’s noise inside. The street was wet, sodium lights reflected in broken orange puddles. A bus hissed past. Somewhere, someone laughed — distant, careless.

  Linda stopped walking without realising she’d done it.

  Jolie noticed immediately.

  “Hey.” She turned back. “What are you doing?”

  Linda stared at the pavement. “I keep seeing it,” she said. “The funeral. Like it’s happening again. Every time I think I’ve moved on, it’s—”

  “Linda,” Jolie cut in.

  Not sharp. Not cruel.

  Just firm.

  “This is why I’m stopping you.”

  Linda looked up, confused. “Stopping me from what?”

  “From disappearing,” Jolie said. “You’re doing that thing where you go somewhere else and leave the rest of us standing here.”

  Linda’s mouth opened. Closed.

  Jolie continued, voice low but tight. “I didn’t drag you here for closure. I dragged you here because Jamie’s clock is ticking.”

  Linda flinched.

  “You think he’s going to wait?” Jolie went on. “You think he sees Skye alive and thinks, oh, that’s fine, mystery solved?”

  Linda swallowed. Her fingers twitched uselessly at her sides.

  “He’ll come back,” Jolie said. “He always does when he thinks he’s been wronged. You know that.”

  “I know,” Linda whispered.

  “And here’s the part you’re not listening to,” Jolie said, stepping closer. “If you freeze now — if you sit in the past because it feels safer than acting — you’re going to lose her again. Not to a car. To fear.”

  Linda shook her head. “You don’t understand. I chose to save a child. I chose—”

  “Stop,” Jolie snapped.

  Linda froze.

  “Do not do that to yourself right now,” Jolie said. “You did your job. And your daughter is alive anyway, which means whatever guilt story you’ve been telling yourself? It doesn’t get to drive anymore.”

  Linda’s chest heaved. “If I’d picked her up—”

  “—your daughter would still be alive,” Jolie interrupted, voice rising. “Because she is. Alive. Standing. Breathing. Probably asking Alice what she missed.”

  Linda’s ears rang.

  Jolie lifted a hand and snapped her fingers once, sharp.

  “Linda. Look at me.”

  Linda forced her eyes up. It felt like dragging herself out of deep water.

  “You were a nurse,” Jolie said. “A good one. When things went wrong, you didn’t spiral — you assessed. You stabilised. You acted.”

  Linda’s hands curled into fists. “This is different.”

  “Yeah,” Jolie said. “Because this time it’s your kid. That doesn’t mean you stop thinking. It means you think harder.”

  Linda closed her eyes.

  For a second, she saw Skye in the coffin again — pale, finished, unreachable.

  Then another image pushed in.

  Skye at the kitchen table. Alive. Irritated. Asking for cereal.

  Her breath stuttered.

  Jolie softened — just a fraction. “Margaret Marlowe didn’t come out of nowhere,” she said. “People like that leave trails. Hospitals. Paperwork. Visitors’ logs. If she’s alive, she might still be there. And if she’s not... someone remembers her.”

  Linda opened her eyes slowly.

  The nurse-brain stirred. Reluctant. Rusty. But present.

  “The hospital,” Linda said.

  “Yes,” Jolie replied. “Now.”

  Linda hesitated — one last tug from the past — then nodded.

  “Okay,” she said. The word sounded steadier than she felt. “Okay.”

  They started walking again.

  Behind them, the bar’s light flickered.

  Ahead, the hospital loomed — glass and concrete and fluorescent certainty — the one place where Linda had always known what to do when life broke open.

  And this time, she wasn’t going back to save a stranger.

  She was going back to protect her daughter.