Page 31 of I Know How This Ends

“And my God, your Aussie grandmother is driving me up the wall .” Mum grins sheepishly. “I’d forgotten what a total pain in the arse she is.”

“Mum! Language!”

“Sorry.” She puts a hand over her mouth. “I guess I inherited it from you.”

We smile at each other fondly, and I miss her with a sharp, tugging pang in my chest.

“I may have met someone,” I say, throwing her a bone. “A man.”

“Oooooh!” She looks offensively surprised. “Who is he? What does he do for a living? Is he kind? Is he handsome?”

I laugh—she must be faking it, because I’m certain Eve has already told her everything—then pause: I can hear my grandfather

in the living room having the world’s most ridiculously polite conversation with a non-sentient being. He’s thanking Alexa

so much that she’s starting to get audibly confused.

“I’ll ring you in a few days,” I say, standing up. “And tell you all about it, I promise. I’ve just got to go make sure Grandad doesn’t start becoming Alexa’s butler instead of the other way

round.”

“Good idea.” Mum frowns. “Listen, Maggie—”

Everything suddenly goes woozy and here we go again —

Blinking, I stare at a television.

Somehow, I appear to have landed in front of another telly: slightly smaller, set against a dark gray wall.

Confused, I peer at it. Quickly, I put my hand to my head: short hair again.

Then I look at my finger. No ring. These seem to be the only clues I have to try and roughly pinpoint myself in time: I’m less than three years in the future, but further away than whenever I cut my hair.

“Henry?” Frowning, I turn slightly. “Is that you?”

“Mm-hmm.”

It’s really dark in here, and I abruptly realize I’m back in Henry’s flat, but what I thought was a painting of a ship is

actually a television. His face is flickering in front of what appears to be a cooking show: they’re making a raspberry pavlova.

“Sorry.” I quickly try to make amends, make Other Margot sound less stupid. “I dozed off for a second there.”

“Aha.”

Henry doesn’t even glance in my direction and—confused—I look back at the television. They’re whipping the cream, but it doesn’t

seem quite mesmerizing enough to require quite so much focus.

“Where’s Winter?”

“Mum and Dad’s.”

Then Henry grabs the remote control and pointedly turns up the volume. I stare at him in shock. What the hell is going on?

“Um.” I lick my lips. “Henry, are you OK?”

“Yup.” He’s still not looking at me. “Just let me watch the show in peace for a minute.”

My eyes widen: have I just landed in the middle of a fight ?

In which case, what are we fighting about? I quickly search Other Margot’s emotions for a lingering clue of what the hell

is going on. Somewhere under my confusion and hurt, Other Margot is... Ooh, she’s angry. Seething, in fact. Other Margot wants to bite Henry.

“We’re fighting,” I state matter-of-factly: I need to know what’s going on. “So can we talk about it? About... you know.”

Yeah, that’s all I’ve got.

“Not right now.” Bristling, Henry gets up from the sofa. Ooooh, he’s super mad too. “I’ll go watch them finish the pavlova

in the bedroom.”

Shocked, I jump off the sofa and follow him. I think this is both of us now: me and Other Margot, wanting exactly the same thing, at exactly the same time. I can feel my anger rising to meet hers.

“Don’t you dare!” I call. “Don’t you bloody dare just walk away!”

He closes the bedroom door and I feel another powerful wave of fury as I bang on it as hard as I can.

“Oy! Henry Armstrong! Get your butt out here so we can fight properly!”

I don’t know what we’re fighting about, but I do know that both Other Margot and I want to have it out as loudly as possible.

“I don’t want to fight right now, Margot! I’m tired!”

“Well, too late,” I yell back. “Because we’re fighting, so you just get on board and fight me back. You will not keep avoiding confrontation, mister.”

Breathing hard, I stare at the door in surprise.

Where the hell did that come from? Does Henry avoid confrontation? How did I know that? But something in me, in this version of me, somehow knows

he does. Is it a Red Flag? Is this a sign I should be paying attention to?

Teeth gritted, I watch as the bedroom door swings slowly open.

“Mister?” Henry says with his eyebrows raised. “Did you just call me mister?”

“Yes,” I say belligerently. “You’re being a dickhead.”

“Enough of a dickhead to be called mister?” Henry’s nose twitches. “That’s a large gauntlet to throw down, missy. ”

The corner of his mouth is twitching and now I’m even more infuriated. Don’t you dare just throw me into a random fight in

the future and be mad at me when I don’t even know what’s happened. I bet this is all his fault anyway.

“This isn’t funny,” I hiss.

“It is. A bit.”

“No.”

“On a scale of one to ten, Megalodon, how funny would you say this fight is?”

Annoyed, I feel my nose twitch too.

“Tell you what,” Henry says, his face clearing. “Why don’t you come and watch the pavlova with me and then we can fight. I’ll have an energy drink so I can shout back at you properly. But first I need to see what kind of shape they

put the raspberries in, Margot, because it’s a goddamn cliffhanger of a show and I must see how it ends.”

Both Other Margot and I soften as Henry gestures with an ironic bow toward the king-size bed. I make a mental note: we get

new bedding, with little blue flowers. It’s nice. I like it. I bet I chose that. Good job, me.

“ Fine ,” I say with dignity, stalking toward the bed. “But you’re still a dickhead.”

Probably.

“Takes one to know one,” Henry grins, picking me up and lobbing me onto the bed with neither ceremony nor effort. “Now shut

up or we’ll miss the bit where they dust it with icing—”

“—week?”

I blink and stare at my mother’s face.

“Um.” I’m sitting on my grandfather’s tweed sofa. I must have stood up and abruptly sat down again. “Absolutely. Or...

not? Sorry, what was the question?”

“Are you alright?” Mum peers at me. “It might be a bit of a—”

“Oh!” I scratch my eyebrow, still dizzy. “I’m fine! Just a little head rush. Need to take some more vitamins. Don’t worry

about me.”

She nods, watching me with the careful, astute expression of a mother who is vaguely aware her only child is still existing

on carbohydrates.

“Anyway, love you.” I give a little wave while I try to recalibrate. “Speak soon. Bye.”

“Maggie—”

Too late: I’ve switched her off.

I leave Grandad contentedly asking Alexa what the capital of Slovenia is and return home to spend the night worrying. It’s

one thing watching for Red Flags in the present, but what about the future? Can smoke signals be read accurately from this

kind of distance? I don’t want to have to chase Henry down every time we have an argument. It seems like an exhausting way

to potentially spend the rest of my life.

Just after midnight, still unable to sleep, I give up and slam out a quick text:

You up??

A few minutes later:

Jules: That’s a fuckboy text if ever I’ve seen one

Eve: Hahaha

Jules: What’s up?

Fighting is normal, right?

Jules: Who are you fighting this time?

Henry

Eve: Already?? That doesn’t sound good.

I pause, unable to say: Nope, at some point in the future.

Kind of.

Eve: What about?

Not sure exactly.

There’s a small silence, then Jules starts to type. Here it comes: Get out while you still can, he’s clearly an asshole, I never liked the sound of him anyway.

Jules: Go to sleep, Margot. You’re an idiot.

Oh. Right, then.

Eve: Stop analyzing for half a second and give him a chance. ;) Night night xxx

I breathe out heavily, relieved.

Not only do I have no idea what we were fighting about, but the fight clearly didn’t last very long. In fact, Henry started

laughing right in the middle of it. That seems good, right? Healthy? Or... not healthy? Avoidant?

It’s hard to know because Aaron and I never really argued.

Breathing out, I sit straight up in bed: actually, we never argued at all . Aaron would get icy and mean and I would apologize until he was nice to me again. Maybe the shock of my argument with Henry

was less that we were having one and more that I was having one.

An actual fight, where I felt comfortable enough to yell at him.

Huh.

Thanks, guys. You’re the best. Night. Xx

Lying back, I stare at my ceiling.

Another vision with something to teach me.

Another future, with a lesson to learn.

And I suddenly can’t help wondering if that’s why I’m getting them: not just so I can see the future, but so I can see the past too.

Like light passing through a drop of water, changing all the angles and splitting into colors that weren’t visible before.

For the best part of a year, I’ve been convinced that I lost my great love—that Lily got the life I wanted—and it’s becom ing increasingly clear that it’s not true.

The life I want is ahead of me, not behind me.

Impulsively, I grab my phone and text Polly.

I’m in. Let’s do this TV thing. Xx

Then I wriggle happily into my pillow and close my eyes. Maybe I didn’t realize what my life could be until I saw it.

Until I started realizing who I was, and who I could possibly be.