Page 47 of I Know How This Ends

I did check with Polly and Charlie whether ancient Greek etymology and Aristotle were a little too much for children, but they both agreed that this sort of detail is exactly what adults find irritating and kids desperately want.

In which case, I fall into the latter category, not for the first time.

Pausing, I smile up at the space where Lenny will be inserted.

“Good question, Lenny. So what is weather ? Well, it’s all around you, all the time, even if you don’t notice it. Weather is what makes sure that you exist. Without it, none of us would be here. It’s the oxygen we need to breathe, and the water we need to drink. It’s the

sun we need for heat, and it grows the plants we need to eat. And this all happens in something we call the atmosphere .”

I point at another digitally added photo.

“The atmosphere is a bit like a big cuddly blanket wrapped around the world. It keeps us from getting too hot or too cold,

and it keeps the things we need where we can use them, so they don’t disappear into space. Which means we have to protect

it, just like it protects us. Don’t we, Cheddar?”

I lift Cheddar up to my face and he squeaks in his cutest possible voice and puts a tiny soft paw on my cheek, quite the environmental

crusader. I hear one of the cameramen go awwwww not quite under his breath and I flush with pride: my boy nailed it.

Although I suspect Cheds is going to become a total diva.

“Weather is powerful .” I feel my eyes light up. “It’s hurricanes and tornadoes and storms and lightning and thunder and it can be scary, and dangerous.

But it’s also incredibly beautiful . Rainbows and auroras and sunsets and sunrises and specters and iridescent clouds. It is everything in the world around us,

it changes all the time, and every week I’m going to tell you all the things I love about it so that you can love it too.

I’m going to teach you how to study the sky for yourselves. We’ll look at how fast the wind can move and how big raindrops

can get, and why. We’ll study snowflakes, jet streams and fires. I’ll even teach you how to measure the wind with a sock.”

I pause and look to my right.

“Why, yes, Lenny. A sock . What do you mean, you don’t have any socks? Ah. Clouds don’t have feet. I see. I’m sorry.”

Polly chortles softly behind the camera and I grin at her.

“So what we’re going to do is explore this magical world in all its different moods, so that we can make sense of this incredible planet we live on. And maybe make a little more sense of ourselves, too, while we’re at it.”

A flush of happiness: this is my job .

It’s everything I loved about Instagram and it’s everything I loved at the Met Office and it’s everything I would never, ever

have believed I could do if I hadn’t been shown it was possible.

“So sit with me, mini meteorologists, and together we will—”

Oh fuck .

“We will—”

No.

“We—”

Everything fades and just as Polly lifts her eyebrows—

The pain is indescribable.

It’s a deep, physical agony, spreading from my chest and radiating outward into every cell in my body: through my shoulders,

into my arms and hands, my throat, my face, my knees. I ache all over, and my first thought is: flu. I must have the flu again.

Except way worse than last time. I appear to be shaking violently, as if my body simply cannot contain the strength of it.

I try to open my eyes, but can’t: everything stays black.

Panic builds.

A loud, weird noise pops out of me and I suddenly realize I’m crying: crying with such rawness that it sounds like a seagull

screeching. I press my face further into the darkness and realize I can’t open my eyes because I’m up against fabric, which

is moving slightly. It’s warm and wet—I’ve clearly been crying awhile—and I suddenly realize: Henry. I’m sobbing against Henry’s

chest; I can hear his breath through his jacket.

Relief pulses through me—he’s here—but I still can’t stop crying because now my fear is blending with Other Margot’s. She’s

scared too: I can feel it. Scared, and lost, and empty.

“Sssshhh,” he whispers, stroking my hair. “It’s OK. It’s OK, Meg.”

Hiccuping, I realize my hand is in my pocket and it’s clutching something: a piece of paper or card, slightly glossy. Experimentally,

I feel little serrated edges and a weird half-circle cut out. What is it? Why am I holding on to it so hard? It’s warm, damp,

crumpled; I must have been holding it for quite a while.

And I’m not sick, I realize. This pain, it’s not illness. I recognize this feeling, but not at this intensity. Never as strong

as this, but a lesser version? That, I know.

It’s heartbreak.

“Henry.” I try to lift my head a bit, but he’s holding me too tightly and I’m slightly trapped. “What’s happening?”

Instinctively, I lift my free hand to my hair: now my touchstone in time. It’s pretty much the same length, and when I run

my fingers across each other I realize I’m not wearing any rings. So this is soon. Wherever I am, whatever is happening, this

incredible pain is not far away at all.

Fear rockets through me again: newer, fresher.

“Henry.” I struggle to get away now. “ What is happening? ”

I don’t care if I sound mad, don’t care if I scare him: this pain is absolutely terrifying and I need to know where it comes

from before I lose it completely. Except all I see is Henry’s face—so sad, so compassionate—and when I look down, I realize

he’s wearing a black suit.

With a searing bolt of terror, I look down at myself: I’m in black too.

Black coat, black dress, black tights, black shoes.

We’re sitting on the bench, the nose-picking bench of our Second Date, and the lights of Bristol are shimmering around us.

With growing horror, I realize that there are too many colors. The lights are red, green, blue, pink, white, yellow. When

I turn my head slightly, I see the huge Christmas tree that goes up in the park every year. The park is freezing cold, and

all the branches are bare, like skeleton fingers.

It’s Christmas. But is it this Christmas?

“Who—” I’m starting to sob again. “Who is it, Henry? Who? ”

Because this pain, this feeling of being totally lost, of being stranded, of being alone, this is the kind of heartbreak you

only feel a handful of times in your life. For one of the few people who are part of you. I don’t know what to do with this

feeling, where to put it, and for the first time, Other Margot doesn’t either.

We’re both lost, together.

Henry frowns and I suddenly realize: whatever is in my pocket, that will tell me, that will give me a clue—maybe it’s a program,

maybe it’s from the funeral, maybe it’ll have a photo and an epigraph and a—

Panicking, I rummage for it and realize I’m fading.

No.

Ten more seconds.

Just ten more seconds.

With effort, I pull the piece of paper out of my pocket and—

“Margot the Meteorologist?”

My cheek is wet, and when I lift a hand I realize there’s a tear streaking down my face. The pain is still there, like the

moments after you wake up from a nightmare. Somehow, this hurt was so great it managed to filter through to this version of

me too.

I quickly wipe my eye.

“Sorry,” I lie as calmly as I can. “Just got a lash stuck on my contact lens. Let me just run to the loo and get it out—”

“Actually,” Charlie interrupts, “we’re pretty much at the end now, Margot. You’ve done amazingly. Maybe you could just wrap

it up, and then we’re done?”

My entire body still aching, I nod blankly.

“So sit with me, mini meteorologists,” I bleat with as much chirp as I can muster, trying to smile, but my chin is wobbling

and my eyes are filling again. “And together we will take the world by storm.”

Then I stand up, shaking.

“I’m so sorry, but I’ve realized there’s somewhere I urgently need to be. Can you take the cat?” I thrust Cheddar at Polly.

“I’ll pick him up later.”

“Sure.” She takes the squawking kitten. “Is everything alright?”

“No. It’s not.”

Because I’ve done the math, and if this funeral happens this Christmas—which all the signs point to—then I am about to lose

someone I love deeply in the next few months. And I’ve already seen Henry, Eve, Winter, Mum, Dad, Grandad and Polly in future

visions. Which means there’s only one person left: one person I love who has been absent from all of them.

I assumed it was a choice, but now I’m not so sure.

And every single shred of anger, resentment and hurt has abruptly disappeared, as if ripped from the ground by a tornado:

none of it exists anymore.

All that’s left is love.