I’m afraid I have to decline your invitation to feature in your documentary. I don’t want to speak on behalf of Danny or Charlotte but I suspect they won’t be keen either. While I don’t doubt your abilities as a filmmaker, I’m afraid I’ve learned the hard way that no good comes from speaking about that time in my life.

In the quiet seaside village of Silvercross, nobody went to the shore after dark. Locals said the waves turned eerie at night, that they whispered secrets no human should hear. But Rowan had always been a restless soul, and the curiosity gnawed at her until she could no longer resist.

When we were engaged, she had badly wanted a diamond ring, but I could never have afforded it at the time, being only a vintage book seller. I knew she was disappointed, but she agreed to marry me anyway.

“Are you coming or not?” An exasperated Dorinda Thompson called from the bottom stair as her 20-year-old son Oliver fussed with his hair. He had skipped the last three Thanksgiving family reunions at Aunt LaDonna and Uncle Mooney’s house two hours away.

“It’s going to be alright, Jack. Breathe.”

Victoria helped her husband onto the Lady Zephyr, a two thousand-passenger cruise ship
looming over the port. As she climbed the ramp in her black and gold Versace headscarf and matching shirt, Prada shades, Victoria felt like she was on a runway.

“We should’ve stayed in Spain” he continued. “What idiot wanted to return to Sherwood?”

“You” said Maid Marion. “The Spanish sun was too hot for you; the soccer too boring; the lemons too yellow.”

Robin bridled. “I never wanted to leave Sherwood.”

That familiar clackity- clack of a train woke me. It is a soothing sound, but I have pain everywhere, in my back, in my head. Where am I?

It’s only afterwards maybe, when you’ve had time to run it through again and again from all angles, that a sudden accident starts to make any sense. At the time you’re being propelled in such an unstoppable blur that the loss of all awareness soon leads to the loss of consciousness.

Sitting in his armchair, Basil stared at her photo. Something so big - so life-changing and catastrophic - there should’ve been a warning. Some tremor in the earth, or darkening of the sky, to herald her departure from the world. But it was just an ordinary day.

There are certain things in life so fundamental, so implicit in the structure of the world, that you can go for years without ever becoming consciously aware of them. And when awareness comes, it is simply the bringing into light of something you have always known on a deeper level. So it was for me with the Other Ones.

Turning to the left side of the booth to see who spoke, Raleigh blinked and felt his face break into a full smile. Framed by thick swirls of long brown hair was a fabulous face featuring hazel-green eyes and a slightly flirty grin. The young lady wore a bronze tan and appeared to be glowing in a bright yellow dress accentuating a voluptuous figure.

All my customers had the same old chat. It was uncanny. All these people, these hundreds of people who didn’t even know each other, and they all said the same little things to me every day.